As someone from Aotearoa New Zealand, I also want to honour the growing practice of sharing our own cultural knowledge. There is a Māori proverb that feels especially relevant to the themes of trust and transition: 

He waka eke noa — we are all in the same canoe. 

It’s a reminder that the journey ahead is shared — shared risks, shared responsibilities, and shared opportunities. 

Good afternoon,  and thank you for having me here today. 

I’ve been asked to speak about what’s happening in the energy sector — and the key challenges ahead. 

There’s plenty we could talk about. 

We could talk about the engineering challenges — how we build and operate an increasingly complex system. 

We could talk about economics — how we design markets, price signals, and investment frameworks. 

But I want to start somewhere slightly different. 

Because in my view, the pace of the energy transition is not primarily constrained by engineering. 

And it’s not primarily constrained by economics. 

It’s constrained by something else. 

It’s constrained by trust and confidence. 

And that raises a slightly uncomfortable question. 

Because if this is really a human problem — where are the psychologists in the engineering and economics labs? 

What we’re trying to do is not just redesign a system. 

We are asking people — communities, consumers, investors, institutions — to come with us on a significant transition. 

To change how they use energy. To accept new infrastructure. To trust new technologies. And in many cases — to accept new risks. 

And the reality is this: The transition will only ever move as far as the level of trust people have in it. 

And to understand where trust is breaking down, we need to start with how people are experiencing the system today. 

Trust Today 

Energy Consumers Australia regularly surveys trust across sectors — and the results are sobering. 

• Water companies tend to rank the highest. Insurance companies the lowest, at around 33%.

• Electricity and gas companies sit only just above that, at around 43%. 

• Supermarkets and banks rate higher than the energy sector. 

And this isn’t new. 

Back in 2018, during the smart meter rollout in Victoria, one comment captured the sentiment perfectly: “There’s this suspicion that smart meters are a plot by energy companies… when consumers asked, ‘what am I getting for this?’ the answer was — nothing.” 

So here we are. 

Right now, every part of the system is asking for confidence — in their projects, their prices, and their decisions. 

And yet, when you step back, there is a clear disconnect. 

Because customers are not experiencing the system in a way that builds trust. 

We see this every day in our work at the Australian Energy Market Commission. Stakeholders tell us: 

“I don’t feel like I’m getting a fair deal.”  
“The system is too complex to navigate.”  
“It feels like the system works for everyone — but not for us.” 

Across all of this, one message comes through consistently: Consumers feel they’re carrying the risk without control. 

And this is not a communication problem. It’s not that people simply don’t understand the system. 

I don’t understand how my car works — but I trust my car, and the institutions responsible for its safety, to get me where I need to go. 

This comes down to lived experience — whether the system feels fair, navigable, and supportive. 

And the evidence backs this up. 

Monash’s national household survey — more than 5,000 Australians — shows that emerging lifestyles and routines are already reshaping energy demand. These aren’t fringe behaviours; the dataset is nationally representative. And it reinforces something we see in our own work: people’s everyday practices are changing faster than the system designed to serve them. 

At the same time, research is showing a clear decline in public trust in the energy transition. 

And when people’s real‑world experience doesn’t align with the promise, trust doesn’t just weaken — it unravels. 

And you can see this tension clearly when you look at how our rules and protections play out in practice. 

Trust in Practice 

Last year, I chaired a subcommittee at the AEMC looking at improvements in retail  

One proposal was automatic switching to a better offer. On the surface, a great outcome. 

But the law requires explicit informed consent. Even if the switch is beneficial, retailers can’t do it without consent. 

From a consumer protection perspective, this makes sense. The potential harm from switching someone to a worse offer is far greater than the benefit of switching them to a better one. 

So the law is doing exactly what it’s designed to do. 

But it raises a deeper question: 

If we were operating in a high‑trust environment, would we have needed that law in the first place? 

We see similar dynamics in our pricing review. 

Through our analysis and engagement, it’s clear the transition is not landing evenly. Some households and communities are benefiting. Others are facing higher costs. And for many, the impacts feel personal and immediate. 

At its core, this is a question of fairness — who gains, who pays, and whether people feel they have any control over the outcome. 

And this isn’t just something we’re hearing anecdotally. 

An IPSOS poll last year captured a growing sentiment across Australia: that change is happening to people rather than with them. Two‑thirds of respondents agreed that “the economy is rigged to advantage the rich and powerful.” 

That tells us something deeper is going on. It speaks to a broader rise in populist sentiment — a sense that institutions are distant, unresponsive, or acting in ways that don’t reflect people’s lived experience. 

And when that belief takes hold, trust becomes much harder to build, and much easier to lose. 

We’ve also been doing work on behavioural insights. 

We spend a lot of time asking how to change consumer behaviour — through price signals, comparison tools, nudges. 

But not nearly enough time asking: How do institutions behave? 

Because trust is shaped just as much by what we do inside the system as by how consumers respond to it. 

And we plan on hosting an academic mini‑conference on these points later this year. 

And this challenge doesn’t stop at the household level — it becomes even more visible when we look at infrastructure and communities. 

Communities and Infrastructure 

So far, I’ve focused on individual consumers. 

But trust is also a constraint on the transition itself — particularly when it comes to infrastructure and those who live alongside it. 

Every day, we see coverage of transmission builds, renewable projects, and their impacts on regional areas. 
We see cost blowouts, delays, uncertainty about what’s being built, and debates about planning frameworks. 

Strip all of that back, and what we’re really talking about is fairness and social licence. 

Monash’s State of Grid Transition 2026 report captures this clearly. It highlights what many of us feel but rarely say out loud: there is a “broadly perceived gap” in how we are steering the transformation of the NEM. 

Senior leaders across the sector are calling for more collaborative, multi‑stakeholder processes — not just technical modelling, but shared visions and shared accountability for the future grid. 

These are large, visible changes. But instead of shared progress, what communities often see is distrust, concern, frustration — and a sense of not being heard. 

People also know which side of the transition they’re on. 

If you’re in a community where existing industries are in decline, or where new infrastructure is being built around you, the transition can feel like something happening to you. 

If you’ve been able to invest in solar or batteries, you’re more likely to feel like you’re on the winning side. 

These impacts are visible. And they shape trust in very real ways. 

We see this with electric vehicles. 

The concern is no longer the cars themselves. It’s the infrastructure. 

Will charging be available? Accessible? Reliable? 

People don’t care who provides it. They just want it to work. 

And this brings me back to the central point: Trust is a constraint on how far — and how fast — the system can move. 

If communities don’t trust the infrastructure, if they feel the process isn’t fair, and if they don’t see themselves in the outcome — the transition slows down. 

And when you zoom out across the whole system, a deeper pattern emerges. 

The System’s Tension 

Everyone is asking for trust. But should we be asking a different question? What am I doing to earn that trust? 

Because when you look at how consumers are experiencing the system, it’s a different story. 

They’re not asking, “Who should I trust?” They’re asking: “Why does it feel like I’m carrying the risk?” 

And when every part of the system is asking for trust — but the experience doesn’t feel fair — trust isn’t built. 

It erodes. 

So the question becomes: where do we go from here? 

Looking Forward 

Let me now shift to looking forward. 

There’s a useful concept — often attributed to Donald Rumsfeld — of the known unknowns and the unknown unknowns. 

Recognising that isn’t about being moral or political. It’s simply acknowledging that the human response is part of the system design. 

Because if trust is the constraint, independent voices become even more important. 

And I’ll be honest — I wish this were an easy problem to solve. 

But we are not operating in a simple environment. We are operating in a world where rage‑baiting algorithms, hyper‑partisanship, and AI‑generated misinformation have made people more sceptical — and in many cases more emotional — about politically charged issues like the energy transition. 

So my challenge to you is this: Will we ever truly operate in a high‑trust environment again? 
And if not, what does that mean for the work ahead? 

How do we earn trust in an environment where our shared reality is fragmenting, and where many groups are harder to reach than ever? 

Do we simply accept that there will always be large numbers of people who don’t trust us — or the institutions we represent? 

And if that’s the case, what does responsible, fair, evidence‑based decision‑making look like in that context? 

And this brings me back to where I began: 

He waka eke noa. 

If the transition is a canoe, then every one of us — policymakers, engineers, researchers, communities — are  in it together. 

The speed and direction of that waka will depend on the trust we build, the fairness we deliver, and the choices we make. 

The energy transition is not just a technical challenge. Yes — engineering matters. Yes — economics matters. 

But this is fundamentally a human transition. 

And it will only move as fast as the trust we have in the system. 

If we want a faster transition, we need to get better at building trust. 

And that starts with all of us.