Peters Jim: Resource Management (Energy and Climate Change) Amendment Bill — Third Reading 
Peters Jim: Resource Management (Energy and Climate Change) Amendment Bill — Third Reading 
[Volume:615;Page:11405] 
JIM PETERS (NZ First) 
: 
 I am very pleased to follow the Minister who has just talked about a good hard-working Labour Government and a well-established energy policy. That takes my mind back to the debate that took place on 10 May 2000. Mr Hodgson said this: “I do not have time to go through it but I do want to say that the Energy Efficiency and Conservation Bill which I hope will soon pass into New Zealand law and the strategy that derives from it and the attention that we will be able to pay to mandatory environmental performance standards and the like will make a significant contribution to that climate change strategy.” 
I want to go back to the mandatory environmental performance standards which on 10 May 2000 Minister Hodgson said were about to follow in this “well-established” energy policy. I turned to the actual bill—which was well supported by the Government being a member’s bill—and saw that it states in clause 11 that “a strategy must be consistent with any national policy statement for the time being in force under the Resource Management Act 1991.” 
Are those the elements of a “well-established” energy policy? I think not. When I go back to the bill’s opening narrative I see it states that it will aim for energy efficiency the use of renewable energy and planning for the effects of climate change. That language is very similar to that used by Ministers and members of the Government in the year 2000. What do we have in the year 2004? We have more pious language more platitudes no clear definition no consistency and no clarity for those people who have to work under the Act. 
So when we come to the third reading debate the question has to be asked: does the bill achieve its purposes? Does the bill give councils and practitioners—not the least potential holders of resource consents—guidance in implementing these legislative provisions should they be passed? Does the bill add further information? Does it impose further compliance costs upon councils and potential applicants? In other words is this going to be an effective bill on behalf of this “hard-working” Government? The answer has to be a very clear no no no. 
This bill does none of those things. Instead it introduces an element of uncertainty at the very time we are—and we were last year—again at the very forefront of an energy crisis. It does that for two reasons. First of all it does so because of a rigid adherence to renewable sources only. There has been no ability in the last 4 years for non-renewable resources—and gas and coal are the main ones—to play any real part in Government planning and thinking. 
I was one of those who heard the chairperson of the Local Government and Environment Committee say that some of us in the House must have been talking to coal sources. I can assure our committee chairperson that I have talked to no coal sources. But what I have done along with other members of the House is to look at the total structure of where we are with regard to energy generation in this country—not the least because some of us are engaged in looking at the Waitaki River catchment. What we see at the present time is a very haphazard fragmented approach. There is no coherence in our energy policy despite the recent Act— 
Hon Harry Duynhoven 
: Yes there is. 
JIM PETERS 
: The Minister says otherwise. I say again that people out there in the field know that I am right—there is no coherence in our energy policy. There has been no determination to really explore the options and sources of our energy policy and this bill is a very inadequate apology for one small segment of our potential energy policy. I am very hopeful that between now and whenever the election falls next year this issue can be well debated because the failure of the Government— 
Hon Dover Samuels 
: Ha ha! We will be here. 
JIM PETERS 
: There may be laughter and joy over there but the failure of the Government to really pursue the alternatives—the options—will be a heavy one for New Zealanders to bear in the future with regard to higher energy prices higher generation costs and no long-term ability to plan. 
Companies such as Genesis Energy said in their submissions that natural gas and coal would be an important energy source for at least the long-term and foreseeable future. When we examine the options—and only one of them is inherent in this bill—and look at the high cost that could yet be paid in the case of Meridian Energy’s Project Aqua the high cost of transmission from the South Island with outdated lines the high cost therefore to the end-line consumer and do not seriously consider a policy that allows modern high-technology coal stations to be sited in for instance the Auckland region at a cost but not one comparable to the high cost of inter-island generation then we have to wonder whether the Government has really thought about generation both for the present and future. 
The other issue I want to bring back to members’ minds is this: this bill contains no decent proper definition of the effects of climate change at all—we have had a pass-off. If one looks at the Resource Management Act one sees some comment there about those effects but they should have been effectively spelt out in this particular bill and they were not. More than that there was certainly no attempt—nor could there be—to adequately convey what benefits were to be derived from the use and development of renewable energy. Nor were we supplied with the comparative value of the benefits to be derived from the use and development of renewable energy as compared with the development of energy from non-renewable sources. They were just not there. 
So throughout the bill we have had a Minister who should have worked towards a national policy statement to give mandatory guidance to those who operate and work under the Act. He should at least have talked to us about environmental performance standards if that was to be the desirable end of the bill—in the Government’s mind—with regard to the end use of energy. Instead none of those things eventuated. The Ministry for the Environment told us in recent years it would develop national policy standards but eventually it did nothing at all. Therefore I say again that this policy—the strategy of 2001 as developed from the Act of 2000—and this slight interference with energy generation in this country will not be good enough. 
I say again that the Government had the opportunity just over a year ago to seriously look at the Resource Management Act and produce a consistent Act. It did not take that chance and we are going through these two potential Acts—one here the other with regard to the Waitaki River valley—without any overarching purpose and policy. 
New Zealand First is very mindful of the fact that we have energy needs but we do not support this Resource Management (Energy and Climate Change) Amendment Bill. The bill reflects the Government’s unfounded optimism in the continued value of adherence to the Kyoto Protocol. It reflects an unfounded belief in the long-term benefits of a renewable energy source as opposed to those that are non-renewable. This bill is not sufficient to meet the continuing needs of power generation for us today or in the future and therefore should not proceed.