Harawira Hone: Electricity Industry Reform Amendment Bill — Second Reading In Committee Third Reading 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Harawira Hone: Electricity Industry Reform Amendment Bill — Second Reading In Committee Third Reading 
[Sitting date: 02 September 2008. Volume:649;Page:18565. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
HONE HARAWIRA (Maori Party—Te Tai Tokerau) 
: 
 Kia ora Madam Assistant Speaker. Kia ora tatou katoa e te Whare. The Auckland Energy Consumer Trust recently announced it would be paying dividends from Vector to 300000 beneficiaries in Auckland City Manukau and Papakura of about $320 each. This is a welcome windfall for people who have been suffering high electricity costs for far too long. It is a windfall that makes the Government’s offer of about $112 in compensation to soften the effect of the emissions trading scheme—and wait for it in 2 years’ time—look kind of measly miserly and mean-spirited in comparison. That one-off compensation payment will disappear at great speed when power bills go up about 5 to 19 percent once the electricity sector becomes part of the emissions trading scheme in 2010. 
This bill is supposed to be about developing renewable energy resources. One approach is to define “new renewables” to include hydro and geothermal power so that lines businesses can invest in them as well. This will be good news for Maori resource trusts like Nga Awa Purua which 5 months ago announced a new $450 million geothermal power station in partnership with Tauhara North Mighty River Power and the Sumitomo Corporation and which is planning a second operation at Rotokawa that will generate enough energy to power a city the size of Tauranga. We hope that any future innovation in renewables—hydro wave wind and geothermal—will include fair negotiations with mana whenua as well. 
We know that Aotearoa benefits hugely from electricity generated in Ngai Tahu - Ngati Whaoa territory even though these iwi derive very little benefit from the resource. We also know on the other hand that geothermal stations like Ohaaki can cause great damage to iwi and that in fact of the five marae in the area four of them can no longer fulfil their functions because of subsidence caused by geothermal development. Indeed the latest predictions are that within the next 5 years the area will suffer widespread flooding and that after only 10 years the whole area will be regularly underwater at high-water level on the Waikato River. With all these impacts we naturally support benefits coming back to iwi from the rich resources that drive the nation’s power stations. 
This bill also proposes to allow owners of lines businesses to get involved in generation and retail to encourage a bigger market for generation of renewable energy resources. The New Zealand Wind Energy Association welcomed this move believing that it might help to reduce potential barriers to investment by lines companies. Others however thought that the bill went too far and that relaxing the corporate separation could possibly push prices up for consumers. 
Finally the bill sets in place incentives to provide better conditions for the owners of lines businesses to invest in generation from renewable energy sources. 
The Maori Party has consistently spoken out about the need to prepare for the reality that coal gas and oil production are going to peak and we have challenged members of Parliament to work together to learn how best to adapt to the end of cheap oil and energy to become proactive and energy-literate and to properly evaluate energy options. Ohaaki for example reminds us that the environmental impacts of geothermal energy may in fact be too great to bear. We know too of marine alternatives like marine energy which is close to commercial development but we also know of the massive impact on local iwi in and around Kaipara for example of Crest Energy’s proposed harbour turbine project which will stop fishing diving and even boating across 17000 hectares of traditional fishing grounds. 
We are happy to support any idea that will help create a larger renewable energy pipeline now and we know that time is of the essence not just for the ending of urgency but for real solutions to reduce oil dependence and consumption and to our ultimately becoming energy independent here in Aotearoa. Tena koe Madam Assistant Speaker. 
Bill read a third time.