6. Question No. 6—Prime MinisterCHLÖE SWARBRICK (Co-Leader—Green) to the Prime MinisterQuestion No. 6—Prime Minister6. CHLÖE SWARBRICK (Co-Leader—Green) to the Prime Minister: Does he stand by all his Government's statements and actions?Rt Hon CHRISTOPHER LUXON (Prime Minister): Yes and especially this Government's action to unleash renewable energy. Between 2018 and 2023 when the Greens were in Government New Zealand imported 5.6 million tonnes of coal and nearly a million tonnes a year. Now with a Government actually fighting climate change not just burning coal we've got a plan to unleash investment in gas and renewables to keep the lights on. You heard it from the Minister: we have 71 applications for renewable energy projects so far under fast track. It's a fantastic result for our economy and our climate change agenda but the Greens of course we hope are not voting against it. We want your support. We know that you care about renewable energy and you care about climate change so support our bill; end the oil and gas ban. [Interruption]SPEAKER: Just a general comment: just calm it a little bit more.Chlöe Swarbrick: Why does the Prime Minister keep saying as he did just then that consenting is the issue when 33 solar and wind projects have already been consented to be built and would he perhaps reflect on how the economic incentives under the status quo do not stack up when profit-driving fossil fuels continue to stay in our energy mix?Rt Hon CHRISTOPHER LUXON: I don't know how to explain it to the member because we have been in a place where we have had the driest—[Interruption]—year on record since the 1990s.SPEAKER: Sorry I'm not going to have those outbursts. You ask a question; you should expect an answer. And frankly questions being asked aren't enhanced by any sort of cheering from the bleachers as it were.Rt Hon Chris Hipkins: But he began with a very inflammatory comment; he was speaking with his mouth full.SPEAKER: It was self-deprecating. He said he didn't know how to explain. I would have thought you might have liked to know how much he didn't know how to explain.Chlöe Swarbrick: Mr Speaker should I repeat the question?SPEAKER: No you can't repeat the question. Just carry on.Rt Hon CHRISTOPHER LUXON: I don't know how to be clearer. We as a Government have talked about this in this House over the last few weeks. We have a dry year with low lake levels no wind blowing no sun shining and we have no gas supply thanks to ending the oil and gas ban by the previous administration. The just transition was clearly a plan to move from domestic gas to imported coal.Chlöe Swarbrick: Is the Prime Minister—[Interruption]SPEAKER: Hang on—just wait for the House to get itself in a bit of order. OK.Chlöe Swarbrick: Is the Prime Minister aware that because gen-tailers are currently incentivised to keep fossil fuels in the mix due to them being paid for the most expensive source of generation in any 30-minute period that by his Government choosing to keep fossil fuels on life support his Government is actually actively undermining investment in renewable energy?Rt Hon CHRISTOPHER LUXON: I'd just say to the member we have an energy security problem right now. It is a function of having ended an oil and gas ban—put the ban in place.Hon Dr Megan Woods: Stop making stuff up.Rt Hon CHRISTOPHER LUXON: It is. We have no gas supply and as a result we need that in our system and we're going to need it for a long period of time. The answer is that we've got really high electricity prices. It's putting businesses out of business. That's not acceptable. Hard-working Kiwis are losing their jobs—the people that the Opposition used to care about but don't. The reality is we have an energy crisis; we're sorting it out. We want cheap abundant supply of both renewables and also gas and that's what we're going to do.Chlöe Swarbrick: Is an energy system that is run on fossil fuels or on renewable energy more profitable for our gen-tailers?Rt Hon CHRISTOPHER LUXON: We want to see an energy system where we double the amount of renewables and we also turn on huge quantities of gas so that we actually have the security that we need in this country to keep the lights on to keep people in work and to make sure working New Zealanders don't pay high electricity prices.Chlöe Swarbrick: Point of order Mr Speaker. That didn't even go close to addressing the point of profitability of gen-tailers.SPEAKER: Well I think it did.Chlöe Swarbrick: Mr Speaker I would really appreciate your reflection on Hansard because this is a really basic thing that we are consistently as the Greens trying to get straight answers out of our Prime Minister and are completely unable to.SPEAKER: Well I'm very grateful to be appreciated by the member. I'll ask the Prime Minister to answer the question again.Rt Hon CHRISTOPHER LUXON: Could the member ask the question again?SPEAKER: Yeah sure.Chlöe Swarbrick: Is an energy system that is run on fossil fuels or on renewable energy more profitable for our energy gen-tailers?Hon Shane Jones: Reliability equals profitability.Rt Hon CHRISTOPHER LUXON: What I can say is yeah reliability of energy supply is very important to determine profitability of our gen-tailers. We'll keep an eye on how much money they're making; we have a bit of a review going on within the energy sector but they need confidence to invest. They need to have cash to be able to spend money on the capital projects to drive more renewables. But I want to be clear to the House and to the member: this is an issue around supply and the lack of supply has driven up electricity prices. When you see mills going to the wall and hard-working Kiwis losing their jobs because of that and paying more in electricity prices that is utterly unacceptable. We care about working New Zealanders we care about hard-working Kiwis; we're going to do something about it.Hon David Seymour: Is the price gained by a particular type of generation such as gas partly a feature of it being available to run on cold nights when people want energy and there's nothing else and if so is this an example of how keeping the lights on requires an understanding not of Instagram bumper stickers but the real practical world?Rt Hon CHRISTOPHER LUXON: Well I would agree with the member that the bumper sticker end-of-oil-and-gas ban didn't think through the second- and third-order consequences. It was classic old school Government wasn't it?—made a statement made a bumper sticker but didn't follow through with the plan.Hon Chris Bishop: Thank you Mr Speaker. Can the Prime Minister confirm that the Infrastructure Commission produced a report in 2022 that shows New Zealand is on track to miss between 11 and 15 percent of emission reduction targets from energy due to resource consenting delays and that's why the Greens should support fast-track?Rt Hon CHRISTOPHER LUXON: Absolutely. Resource consenting times have increased dramatically and the cost has too. That's why we've got fast-track legislation.Chlöe Swarbrick: Why would the gen-tailers currently invest in renewable energy when under the status quo since partial privatisation under the former National-led Government they have paid out nearly $11 billion in dividends by burning fossil fuels nearly 2½ times more than what they invested in new power generation?Rt Hon CHRISTOPHER LUXON: I'd just say to that member whose party was part of the previous Government if you felt so strongly about it over the last six years why didn't you overturn the mixed-ownership model as a consequence?Chlöe Swarbrick: Supplementary. [Interruption]SPEAKER: Just a minute. This is unbelievable. Can we just really have a bit of a break on things?Rt Hon Chris Hipkins: Point of order Mr Speaker. I think you've got a legitimate point but I'd also encourage you to think about the answers and the sort of reaction they're going to provoke. Almost every one of the Prime Minister's answers is talking about the previous Government rather than the Government that he's the Prime Minister of. That is going to provoke a certain sort of reaction.SPEAKER: Well I appreciate that but it's not prohibited. If a circumstance goes back through that time then obviously that's something you can mention. I'm also listening to some of the back and forth as well and all I would say is it's perhaps not overly helpful in getting any answers for the public.Chlöe Swarbrick: Why is the Prime Minister and his Government actively pursuing a climate-burning anti-evidence fossil fuel strategy which actively contradicts and—[Interruption] Mr Speaker point of order.SPEAKER: No we're just going to start your question again and people are going to listen and people who don't listen won't be staying.Hon David Seymour: Point of order Mr Speaker. Perhaps it'd be helpful to reflect on Standing Order 390 which states that questions should not include arguments or imputations beyond what is necessary to make the question comprehensible. Now we've just heard a whole lot of word salad that frankly is going to get a reaction from the Government benches. Upholding that rule 390 might actually lead to more harmony in the House.Rt Hon Chris Hipkins: Speaking to that point of order Mr Speaker.SPEAKER: That would require me also to uphold the mirror of that particular Standing Order with regards to answers in which case Government Ministers would be saying very little at any point during any question time on any day.Rt Hon Chris Hipkins: Well Mr Speaker with regard to the member's point of order you might like to consider whether that should apply to the supplementary question that the member himself just asked of the Prime Minister literally about three questions ago.Hon David Seymour: Speaking to the point of order.SPEAKER: Oh look I've already got an awful lot of homework to do after this session. Is it really necessary?Hon David Seymour: I can see that my supp is still a sore point for the leader of the Labour Party but so be it.SPEAKER: No no don't go down that track. Could everyone just take a take a breath for a minute.Chlöe Swarbrick: Thank you Mr Speaker. Why is the Prime Minister pursuing a climate-burning anti-evidence fossil fuel strategy which actively contradicts and undermines renewable energy development and building in this country?Rt Hon CHRISTOPHER LUXON: Well I just say I reject the characterisation of that question. What we are not doing is we're not shutting off domestic gas to import foreign coal so that we can make emissions even worse. That was the strategy of the last Government; it failed. It created the problem that we're in. You know we know that gas is much better than coal and as a result we're very happy to expand the amount of gas and expand the amount of renewables but we're not doing what the last Government did—and what a mess that you left us.