Greens senator Sarah Hanson-Young says Australia can't allow tech firms to'drain our power and water'. Greens senator Sarah Hanson-Young says Australia can't allow tech firms to'drain our power and water'. Australia'sleepwalking' into AI crisis and'tech bro free-for-all', says Greens senator Sarah Hanson Young's warning comes as David Pocock urges government to prevent firms using Australian content to train AI models Tue 23 Jun 2026 06.21 EDTFirst published on Tue 23 Jun 2026 05.16 EDT His call came as the Greens senator Sarah Hanson-Young called for a moratorium on the building and approval of new datacentres in Australia until "we get the regulations right". She said the nation was "sleepwalking" into an AI crisis and could hand tech companies a greenlight "to drain our power and water". Pocock used Senate question time on Tuesday to ask the government about intense lobbying from AI proprietors over possible new rules and regulations for Australian-made content - including suggestions Labor would create a new "carve out" or extend existing licensing arrangements.

Arts, creative and media groups have demanded the government rule out allowing big tech companies to take Australian content to train their artificial intelligence models, with concerns such a shift would "sell out" Australian workers and lead to "rampant theft" of intellectual property. "It is not appropriate for big tech to steal the work of Australian artists, musicians, creators, news media, journalism, and use it for their own ends without paying for it," Ley said on Wednesday. In an interim report on "harnessing data and digital technology", the Productivity Commission set out proposals for how tech, including AI, could be regulated and treated in Australia, suggesting it could boost productivity by between 0.5% and 13% over the next decade, adding up to 116bn to Australia's GDP. The commission suggested several possible remedies, including expanding licensing schemes, or an exemption for "text and data mining" and expanding the existing fair dealing rules, which it said existed in other countries. The latter suggestion prompted fierce pushback from arts, creative and media companies, which raised alarm their work could be left open for massively wealthy tech companies to use – without compensation or payment – to train AI models.