Simpson Scott; Rurawhe AdrianHon SCOTT SIMPSON (National—Coromandel): Thank you Mr Speaker. Listening to that Government member Rachel Brooking and also to the Minister one would be led to the view that this was all part of a planned and coordinated strategy—that it was always in place and it was supposed to be part of a bigger agenda. Actually this has been a Government stuff-up from go to whoa.Barbara Kuriger: Another one?Hon SCOTT SIMPSON: Another one—another stuff-up of quite significant proportion actually. In a week last week when the wheels were starting to well and truly fall off this Government here we start this week in urgency and another Government stuff-up—sadly I have to say from a Minister who's usually not known for stuffing things up; a Minister who is usually better and across the detail of his portfolio; a Minister whose judgment some of us in this Parliament have come to respect. But tonight that respect has been dimmed more than a little because he's let his better judgment be overruled I think by poor advice—not for the first time on this piece of legislation.A year ago exactly 12 months ago the Minister knew that there was a problem with this legislation—took Cabinet papers to Cabinet committees offering a plan forward and advice and a structure and a way forward but with the caveat that actually the risk to the Crown accounts at that stage 12 months ago he saw as being minimal as being very small as being slight. So notwithstanding the fact that the Cabinet committee agreed to a process to make the changes that tonight we are making under urgency—only a few days before the first auction comes to take place—the Minister said Oh no we can wait until there is a substantive amendment to the principal Act before we fiddle and tweak with this last little piece of the reserve price auctioning system."And then something must have changed. I suspect probably that the Minister of Finance or indeed Treasury officials woke up to the risk to the Crown accounts and they were able to give the Minister some late but probably good advice that said "Actually you do need to do something about it and you'd better do it blimmin quickly because if you don't there is a risk to the Crown accounts."—to the tune of close to $100 million if it all went wrong. So a rushed piece of legislation sent to select committee having been introduced under urgency—poor process poor form poor strategy poor House management and poor oversight by a Minister who's usually much better than this. And then a truncated short select committee process where some privileged few were tipped off in advance about the progress of this bill through the House—Angie Warren-Clark: In a public document.Hon SCOTT SIMPSON: In a—tipped off. This is what is really bad about this process: a small group of people who happen to subscribe to a worthy and credible but niche publication called Carbon News which is not one of the most well-read publications in the country those subscribers had—well in legal terms you potentially could say malice of forethought but they certainly had advance notice that this legislation was coming to the Parliament notice well ahead of members of the general public notice well ahead of other players in the market place well ahead of commercial interests and businesses that might want to be participating in this process. Unless you were a subscriber to this worthy and credible but very niche publication you didn't have the inside running you didn't have the inside knowledge and you weren't able to prepare in advance for a very truncated short select committee process.Now the select committee did I think do its very best. They did a good job under difficult circumstances in a very very tight time frame but it was not what this Parliament has come to expect from a fulsome and complete analysis of legislation as important as this. Because it's fundamental as my colleague Stuart Smith has said to the cooperation to the confidence that both members of Parliament have in this overall climate change initiative legislation—the emissions trading scheme (ETS) is fundamental to us achieving our broad and agreed objectives. But if the Parliament doesn't have confidence in it and if the people who are participating in the programme don't have confidence in it—and what's worse if the people of New Zealand if the citizens the families the communities the businesses the councils don't have confidence in it—then this is just grist to the mill to those who say "Oh well the climate change stuff is all a fantasy." and "We shouldn't be doing anything; it's going to cost a whole lot of money." and "I don't understand it." That just gives them ammunition.So the Minister I think has missed a real opportunity tonight to extend a hand in a way that would have been meaningful that would have shown cooperation collegiality and true bipartisanship on a key piece of climate change legislation by adopting and accepting the three very reasonable very rational and very sound amendments presented too from my colleagues Stuart Smith and Erica Stanford one each and from Simon Court in the ACT Party. Each of those amendments would have added value confidence and a sense of true bipartisanship to this piece of legislation. I think our Parliament is the worse for the Minister not having taken up that opportunity and it has put my party in a position where we are now no longer able to support this legislation at third reading having supported it at first reading having worked collaboratively and collegially through the select committee process having supported it at second reading and then having put forward very sound constructive ideas in the committee of the whole House only for them to be rejected out of hand by the Minister who was receiving I think poor advice that could have been so much better for the progress of this piece of legislation.The Minister as I said is usually better than this and I would imagine that tonight he will be going away somewhere soon to probably talk and do a little bit of a debrief about how he could have done better on this legislation—how could he have presented to the Parliament a year ago a piece of legislation that didn't need to be put through the Parliament under urgency without full and proper scrutiny of select committee where submitters across the nation who had not been the privileged few who had been tipped off could also have participated in this process.So here we have frankly a comedy of errors and if it wasn't such a serious business it would be laughable it would be comical it would be the sort of thing that—if the political commentators weren't already so charged with so much ammunition against this Government and so busy filling the columns and the airwaves of the country with scorn and derision this would be just another thing. It would be just another thing to add to the list. Some of them may pick it up but as the Minister said tonight probably there will be very few New Zealanders listening to this because I'm told there is a documentary screening at the moment something to do with the Royals which may be drawing the attention of citizens who are more interested in matters of that sort than they are on fine detail somewhat pointy-headed nerdy stuff about how effectively our emissions trading scheme works.And it's a real pity I think because it's been a missed opportunity where the sort of good work that was envisaged by none other than the Green Party MP Dr Kennedy Graham who did so much good work to form a collaboration across the Parliament in terms of a bipartisan approach—I hope that tonight Dr Kennedy Graham is totally immersed in the Meghan and Harry saga because he would be mortified to be watching the actions of this Government as they squirm and slither around and try to tidy up what has been a complete botch-up from go to whoa—tried even at one stage to blame the officials when actually what was very clear was that the Parliamentary Counsel Office had not been briefed adequately on the Cabinet decisions made.This is fundamental stuff. This is fundamental stuff towards our democracy and this Government has let themselves down they've let this Parliament down and what's more they've let the people of New Zealand down. They speak so highly and in such grand terms about their ambitions and their goals but they deliver nothing and when they make mistakes they don't have the good grace to stand up and admit they've made a mistake and they do it time and time and time again. Well this will be just one small further nail in the coffin of hopeless and despair that this Government wreaks upon the populace of New Zealand but it's a small one and some of us who are not watching television tonight—DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order! The member's time has expired."