Smith Nick: Climate Change Response (Emissions Trading and Other Matters) Amendment Bill — In Committee Speaker Recalled In Committee 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Smith Nick: Climate Change Response (Emissions Trading and Other Matters) Amendment Bill — In Committee Speaker Recalled In Committee 
[Sitting date: 06 November 2012. Volume:685;Page:6290. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH (National—Nelson) 
: 
 I want to make just a brief contribution on the Climate Change Response (Emissions Trading and Other Matters) Amendment Bill and I want to begin with the substance. The core issue that Parliament wants to address with its climate change legislation is the issue of greenhouse gas emissions. I was fascinated to read the just tabled report from the Ministry for the Environment on the level of emissions. I really would ask members opposite to pick up that report and have a look at page 17 because what it shows is this: in the years 2000 to 2008 in every single year the level of greenhouse gas emissions increased quite dramatically. In fact over that period it shows it went from 64 million tonnes up to a level of 78 million tonnes in the 8 years that Labour was in Government supported by the Greens. 
In the period in which we have been the Government it is interesting to note that in each year emissions have gone down. I was expecting to hear speeches from members opposite commending the Government for its record in that regard. I thought that was the core of what this debate was all about. So I would firstly challenge members to look at that annual report and acknowledge that under this Government the emissions trend for New Zealand has changed and that New Zealand is set to comfortably meet its Kyoto commitments. Before members opposite bag New Zealand’s international reputation in this area I want them to line up and tell me which countries are doing a whole lot better than New Zealand. I say to the Minister in the chair the Minister for Climate Change Issues that New Zealand can stand tall. We are doing our fair share as we promised. 
The second issue I want to address is the question of agriculture. I have listened to speaker after speaker concerned about New Zealand’s balance of payments wanting us to grow this country’s exports. Is there a member in this Chamber who does not understand that the backbone of New Zealand’s exporting industries is our primary industries? Yet here we have members opposite wanting to kneecap our most important exporting industry. I want to ask members opposite how that will help New Zealand’s balance of payments. 
I particularly want to challenge members opposite on an article in the  
Guardian 
 newspaper last week. Do you know what it said? It said British consumers help climate change by eating New Zealand lamb. That is what the British newspaper said. Do you know why it said that? Because scientific studies have shown that when they consume New Zealand lamb the impact in terms of emissions is about half that of consuming British lamb. The question I have for members opposite who have consistently run the argument that for environmental reasons agricultural emissions should be put into the emissions trading scheme on 1 January next year is this: for the British consumer if that takes place you are actually providing a financial incentive for them to consume lamb that is produced somewhere else other than New Zealand. That will actually drive emissions up. 
I am all for environmental responsibility but I want to see measures being adopted in New Zealand that will help not hinder the reduction in the growth of emissions. I say that the position the Minister has taken that New Zealand should not put agricultural emissions into the emissions trading scheme until we see greater progress internationally—and secondly when we see the product of the huge investment that this Government has made in research programmes that will develop the practical technology by which farmers can address those emissions—is absolutely the right policy both economically and environmentally for New Zealand. 
The third point I want to make is the complete contradiction of members opposite in terms of their campaign around manufacturing jobs. You see members opposite cannot cry foul about the potential job issues for key industries like New Zealand Steel Holcim cement and the aluminium smelter down in Invercargill—they cannot sing that tune in one breath and then in the next say that they want to impose greater costs on those same manufacturers. I challenge the next member from Labour a member who has been championing the cause of jobs in the manufacturing sector to explain how putting more costs on the manufacturing sector is going to help jobs at this economically very difficult time. Labour cannot have it both ways. 
The final point I want to make is in respect of electricity prices. You see I constantly hear members opposite saying that they are concerned about households and their power bills. I simply challenge them to be honest and upfront because the amendments they have tabled in their names will all lift the price of power bills for average Kiwi households. I am one of those who want to see incentives for renewable power but there has to be a balance. There has to be a balance towards the shift we need to make in New Zealand before there is more renewable energy—and no Government in the last 20 years has had as good a track record as what we have seen take place in the numbers that are published by the Ministry for Business Innovation and Employment. It is proper that we do that. The important reforms that my colleague Amy Adams is working on in the Resource Management Act will help us build more renewable energy. But we need to balance that with the real costs that electricity imposes on both households and businesses. The part that I get frustrated with is this: members opposite keep talking about the emissions trading scheme costs as though they fall only on corporates but they do not. Every cost that we impose in this bill is not being imposed on some corporate but on ordinary New Zealand households farmers and businesses. I challenge members opposite to bring that reality to this debate. 
The very last point I want to make is that I have heard all sorts of rhetoric from members who say that this bill takes the emissions trading scheme backwards. That is untrue. 
Dr David Clark 
: $328 million. 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH 
: That is untrue and I just want to say to the member who has interjected that actually under this bill the New Zealand emissions trading scheme will take up a new sector of gases on 1 January. Not only is it going to include industry electricity and transport fuels which are not subject to the Australian scheme but on 1 January next year it is going to include those very powerful greenhouse gases which expands the scheme next year to more than what it was this year. Sure members opposite can claim that the scheme may not be going as fast forward as they would like. That is a fair argument. But it is not— 
Dr David Clark 
: It’s in reverse. 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH 
: The member says it is in reverse but the one-for-two obligation operates now. In terms of the sectors that includes they are all there now. The truth is the emissions trading scheme under this bill will next year include more gases and will be more extensive than it is now. It is important that we debate what is in the bill not what is in the fantasies of the members opposite.