Genter Julie AnneHon JULIE ANNE GENTER (Green—Rongotai): Thank you very much Madam Chair. I do just want to note that earlier in the debate we were told that most of the substantive debate was actually relevant to clause 7. So this is I thought the time when we would most get into the substance of the bill during clause 7.CHAIRPERSON (Barbara Kuriger): Except the questions are becoming—the Minister's answering the questions and we can't guarantee that the members will like the Minister's answers to the questions but the Minister's answering the questions.Hon JULIE ANNE GENTER: Well Madam Chair I'm going to just take the opportunity to point out to the Minister because he doesn't seem to understand the difference between having 2025 set by regulation versus 2027 or 2028—and the difference is 2025 is in six months and 2027 2028 is several years away. So the difference is that if he were to undertake a review—Tom Rutherford: What's the question?Hon JULIE ANNE GENTER: I don't have to ask a question. I'm going to use my time to speak thank you.Hon Members: Ooh! CHAIRPERSON (Barbara Kuriger): That's enough. Hon JULIE ANNE GENTER: I don't—[Interruption]CHAIRPERSON (Barbara Kuriger): Carry on.Hon JULIE ANNE GENTER: So the difference is that when the targets for 2025 to 2027 were set that was years ago and the industry had several years ramp up to know what the targets were going to be. The fact that they can now be changed in regulation means they can be changed in the next six months and they could be changed to be more ambitious or less ambitious therefore increasing uncertainty for the industry. Although given that the Minister keeps saying it's increasing certainty and we know that he's only really talked to certain people in the industry we can I think assume that the only direction of travel will be to weaken the standards and therefore allow more highly polluting vehicles into the country than otherwise would come in thereby increasing carbon emissions relative to no change.Now earlier I read from a letter a statement from Drive Electric—they're not the only ones. There are a number of people in the industry who are very concerned about the change to the standards from 2025 to 2027 and saying that this clause and this legislation increases uncertainty around direction of travel and any changes to the standard have broad economic implications. It's unclear but very likely it will reduce electric vehicle uptake it will increase emissions from transport it will increase imports of petrol and diesel relative to not changing the standard which of course costs the economy and affects the current account deficit.So I guess my main question now for the Minister is: in whose interest is this legislation and the changing of the targets? Is it for the vehicle importers who want to sell more highly polluting vehicles and earn more profit at the expense of New Zealand and at the expense of the climate? Is that the interest that the Minister is legislating in and if not why has he not opened up consultation and spoken to other people in the vehicle industry people who represent electric and low emissions vehicles? Does he admit that bringing in the legislation now and making the possibility of changing the target for next year is increasing uncertainty and direction of travel? Is it in fact as a result of cancelling the clean car discount? Because as I know very well the vehicle industry wanted the clean car discount. They did not want standards without the clean car discount. And when we brought in the clean car discount what happened is it made a huge difference to—CHAIRPERSON (Barbara Kuriger): We are talking about another bill now though. It would be good to come back to this one. Hon JULIE ANNE GENTER: Well OK. Those two bits of legislation work together and the combination of the clean car discount and the clean car standards together resulted in a substantial drop in the average emissions of vehicles being imported into the country. Since the clean car discount was cancelled it has massively increased the average emissions of the cars coming into the country. That's why now the Government has to water down the standard and create a lot of uncertainty in direction of travel because they got rid of the incentive that was working to change the demand consumer demand but also the options that are available for people.Of course the Minister won't do this but because we're not having a select committee process I think that it needs to be said that the voices of the people who care about the progress of our country who care about actually switching our fleet to lower emissions vehicles because it's better for everyone—it is literally better for everyone except some overseas car manufacturers who can make a bit more money selling us higher emissions vehicles. Oh and also the people who produce oil you know and fund the Atlas Network which is very influential to some of the people in here.