Young Jonathan: Electricity Transparency Bill — First ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeYoung Jonathan: Electricity Transparency Bill — First Reading[Sitting date: 02 December 2015. Volume:710;Page:8526. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]JONATHAN YOUNG (National—New Plymouth): I would call this bill a solution looking for a problem. That is the way I would describe it. With due respect to Mr Shearer—Hon Clayton Cosgrove: You said that about Solid Energy.JONATHAN YOUNG: Hello Mr Cosgrove. Good to see you back in the House. With due respect to Mr Shearer I was at that hearing when Doug Heffernan spoke. He did speak about some of the possibilities of what this would create and what we see is that the Electricity Authority is already putting into place mechanisms around this.So to address the concerns about transparency of consumers’ electricity charges the Electricity Authority has consulted on a proposal to “require retailers and distributors to consult each other about any media releases”—that is communication to consumers—“… about changes to consumer charges in a distributor’s area.” This will “require retailers to provide information in a standard form to consumers about any price changes” that makes clear the nature and reasons for price changes.So what this bill is wanting to do is to unpack all the different elements of what makes up an invoice so that people can see well this is the price for this and this is the price for that—there are usually around about seven different components. We know—and if you do not mind I will go back into a little bit of history because we know that just recently the Labour Party has scotched its one power purchaser proposal.What I want to read out is a response to that—and I am not doing this for political reasons; I am just doing it for information for the consumers out there. They need to hear it because Mr Heffernan has been quoted as being a great supporter of this idea Mr Shearer and this is what he said back in August a year ago. This is the quote from the Mighty River Power press release: “Mighty River Power Chief Executive Doug Heffernan says the official data from the industry regulator (Electricity Authority) and audited results reported by major power companies this week tell a very different story of a highly competitive market with flat to declining energy prices.”That is why I say this is a solution looking for a problem because what we are already seeing is that in this highly competitive market where we have nearly got over-generation we have seen for a number of years now the flattening of prices—and even the dropping of prices—and of energy charges. If we look at the componentry of what makes up a charge and they have gone up—Mr Shearer will know that we have gone through an incredible rebuild of Transpower’s national grid.If I could just read out a comment and a quote from the Auditor-General’s report on Transpower it says this—and this is going back to June 2008 which is when the previous Government was in power—“In June 2008 Transpower commissioned an independent review of its maintenance practices and spending. … Discussions with staff of both Transpower and the contractors revealed a workforce that [was] innovative [in its] approach to solving problems.” Fantastic. All right? Congratulations. “This has been driven mainly by a need to keep operational an aged asset base as little asset replacement has been undertaken on a broad basis in the last decade.” The last decade—2008. So that is during the tail-end of a National Government and all of a Labour Government that there was very little asset replacement.So since then to now about $5 billion has been invested in Transpower and as a State-owned enterprise obviously there is a need for a return on that level of investment. So we know that when prices have increased—and it has been half the increase under National compared with what Labour gave us—we know that most of it let us say has been generated by the required upgrade of assets by Transpower. All right?Stuart Nash: But make it transparent so the consumers know. Give the consumers an opportunity to know that.JONATHAN YOUNG: Look there is going to be a Transpower fee in every retail bill—every retail bill. Why do you not just come out and say—David Shearer: Where is it? It’s not there.JONATHAN YOUNG: Do a press release and say Mr Shearer “OK this year this is what the Transpower cost is going to be.”—end of story. Instead you want to create a very complicated mechanism. You want to find a solution for a problem that does not exist because what we are seeing is a very competitive cost-effective market that is working with 26 retailers out there competing for the consumer. All right?We are in a great place and we just need to see this continue to grow and develop. Thank you. And we do not support this bill obviously.