Cosgrove Clayton: Ministerial Statements — Solid Energy—Voluntary AdministrationText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeCosgrove Clayton: Ministerial Statements — Solid Energy—Voluntary Administration[Sitting date: 13 August 2015. Volume:707;Page:5784. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE (Labour): This is indeed a very very sad day and I start by saying this: I hope Tony Ryall the former Minister for State Owned Enterprises wherever he may be is listening very very—Hon Gerry Brownlee: Mr Nasty.Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE: —carefully to this. No no Mr Brownlee says “Mr Nasty”. The Mr Nasty in this piece is a Government that rammed this company into the ground—rammed this company into the ground.Between 1999 and 2008 Solid Energy was an award-winning export company delivering hundreds of millions of dollars to the taxpayer. In 2009 the Government’s first act by the then Minister for State Owned Enterprises was to write to that company and demand more dividends. As a result of that it took $164 million worth of dividends from that company. The Government expected the company in that letter which will be tabled later today to ratchet up its debt level which it did to around I think $313 million. And then when the coal price moved and its own scoping consultants who were in there to scope Solid Energy for sale reported back in 2009-10 that the ship was heading for the rocks the Government did nothing. It did absolutely nothing. The alibi to the New Zealand people for hundreds of millions of dollars of waste and for probably further hundreds of workers losing their jobs is: “Oh! The coal price devalued.”Well that is true. The coal price devalued the markets dried up. Any village idiot on that side of the House could have read that in the paper. The question before the New Zealand people that the Government has never answered is a simple one: why when it saw that happen did it not react? Why did it do absolutely nothing—absolutely nothing? There was the photo of course of Mr English allowing outlandish expenditure opening the lignite path; sexy coal from Mr Brownlee—that is an oxymoron—allowing outlandish expenditure where management spent until it dropped where management and executives particularly the then chief executive officer was allowed to get a massive golden handshake for sitting at home. Why did the company not react? Other coal companies around the world reacted.I have worked in the minerals industry. I have worked there. I know what happens. I know what happens when the commodity price moves and companies react within days. Coal companies around the world reacted at the same time within days and they are surviving and they are profitable today. These people were derelict in their duty.On 5 June 2012 Minister English and then Minister Ryall put the company under month-to-month close watch and still they did nothing. There is a pile of papers metres high that the Government itself released from Treasury and other agencies warning since 2010 that this company was heading for the rocks. It has never ever told the New Zealand people why unlike its international counterparts it did not react. It blocked every parliamentary inquiry. The only person who has been able to have a quick look at this was the Auditor-General. Yet Mr Brownlee interjecting and Mr English and then Mr Ryall and today Mr McClay have never given an explanation as to why they did nothing. No Minister has been accountable. No one resigned. No one was sacked. No one on the board was sacked. No one in management was disciplined.Hon Gerry Brownlee: That’s not true.Hon CLAYTON COSGROVE: That is absolutely true. They resigned and they ran as the ship sank. No one was required to go. But the people who paid the price and who are paying today are the hundreds of staff on the coalface literally who keep the show on the road—West Coast miners. The company could have reacted.What could the Government have done? It could have called in the management and the board and said “Where’s your B plan?” like every other coal company around the world did and survived. If the board had said no the Government could have sacked the board. No it did nothing. Or it could have changed the statement of corporate intent and then put some direction in. These were the tools that this Government could have used.As Mr Brownlee grins away and as people worry about their jobs and other people on the West Coast are looking for jobs as a result of his Government’s inaction they will note that down. I say to the Government: come clean. I say to the Government: for once since taking office in 2008 explain to the New Zealand people why you took no action—why you refused to intervene on the board why you allowed the outlandish expenditure and why no one from the Government the board or management has ever been held accountable for this. The Government members sit there as they wasted $389 million of taxpayers’ money and point the finger at everybody else. Well the buck stops with them. They should get up and the Minister of Finance should make a ministerial explanation today and explain why he sat there with Tony Ryall the Government and the Prime Minister and let Solid Energy be run into the ground.