Gilmore Aaron: Climate Change Response (Moderated Emissions Trading) Amendment Bill — Procedure Second Reading In Committee 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Gilmore Aaron: Climate Change Response (Moderated Emissions Trading) Amendment Bill — Procedure Second Reading In Committee 
[Sitting date: 24 November 2009. Volume:659;Page:7924. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
AARON GILMORE (National) 
: 
 It is my pleasure to speak last in the second reading of the Climate Change Response (Moderated Emissions Trading) Amendment Bill. The previous speaker Moana Mackey was talking—apparently—about this bill but members would not know that from the rhetoric that came from her. They would know that nothing that came out of her mouth made any sense whatsoever—either she cannot count or cannot read or both. But we will find out about that. 
This bill provides a step along the path towards meeting our climate change needs a future for my children and my future grandchildren and the ability whether members believe in climate change or not—like some of our friends over there in the ACT Party—for New Zealand producers to get their goods into overseas markets while we are doing our fair share. Some will say the bill does not do enough; some will say it does far too much. But this bill will provide some comfort to mums and dads out there who may be listening to this debate today in that the cost of this scheme will be half what the Labour scheme would have cost. 
Moana Mackey 
: What a load of rubbish! 
AARON GILMORE 
: I ask the member to read the bill. That member is proving that she has not even read the bill. 
This bill went to the Finance and Expenditure Committee and I must say that sitting through that committee while it considered this bill was an experience. We have heard about all the sorts of behaviour that occurred on that committee. I do not want to go into that but I must say that I will recall that behaviour for years to come. 
I want to talk a little about the so-called cost to New Zealand of this emissions trading scheme—Mr Cunliffe’s $110 billion; the so-called huge cost for taxpayers. There is no $110 billion cost to New Zealand. We have heard that New Zealand will have to pay a large amount of money and that there will be $110 billion of debt for this emissions trading scheme. Climate change is complex but if those members who are making that claim about $110 billion had read the bill or knew how to count or both we would not have this misunderstanding. What is that mythical figure—the supposed $110 billion debt that will occur? What it is is that instead of taxing the good people of New Zealand by $2 billion per annum the Government is giving back $2 billion to people to allow them to have a transition to a sustainable climate change position. 
We campaigned on providing a fiscally neutral emissions trading scheme and this bill helps to deliver that. We believe in jobs and in our communities. So we believe that the best thing to do is not to have the Government gain $2 billion from taxing people but to use that money to mitigate the transition path to a better position for our communities out there. This scheme has been designed so that over the next decade there is only a small net gain for the Government rather than it raising billions of dollars from communities out there. Jobs that would have gone from thousands of factories and businesses up and down the country under the Labour scheme will be kept. We care about jobs and we care about communities. 
Finally contemporaneously with this bill we have announced a suite of measures which other people have not spoken about to add to the transitional part of the legislation. There is $323 million for home insulation and a further $24 million for low-income households. In my maiden speech I spoke about living in a State house that was uninsulated and that my family could not afford to heat. I am proud to be part of a Government that has introduced a housing scheme that gives people in State housing the ability to have their homes heated and insulated properly so that other little kids out there listening to this debate today can grow up in a warm and healthy home. What else have we done? We have introduced $36 million for bio-diesel we have introduced funding for a centre of research excellence for agriculture we have introduced some changes to the Resource Management Act to streamline renewable energy projects and there are many more measures. We have also resolved the legal dilemma that existed with regard to iwi who had been so easily brushed aside by the previous Labour Government. That is something that we inherited. 
We will hear plenty more over the next day or two on this bill and I look forward to contributing to the debate. I support this bill.