Tom Elliott says the decision to shut down yet another oil refinery could seriously backfire on Australia.

It’s been announced ExxonMobil’s refinery at Altona will close, impacting up to 350 jobs and leaving Australia with just two refineries.

Tom Elliott said he “understood the reasons” why but Australia had fast lost its fuel security.

“If things ever go a bit pear-shaped in this part of the world, if the giant tankers full of refined petrol stop arriving because of a war or something, then we will be absolutely stuffed,” he said.

“The ability to convert crude oil into petrol, into diesel, into LPG, into jet fuel, into kerosene, into all those products that, even though the Greenies hate it, is still essential to Australian life.”

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Federal Energy Minister Angus Taylor told Tom Elliott there was little that could be done to save the refinery and jobs.

“We are obviously very disappointed,” he said.

Tom Elliott asked if Mr Taylor was concerned about Australia’s oil reserves.

“We will be OK as long as we stay on this,” he said.

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