Hughes Gareth: Ministerial Statements — Solid Energy—Voluntary AdministrationText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeHughes Gareth: Ministerial Statements — Solid Energy—Voluntary Administration[Sitting date: 13 August 2015. Volume:707;Page:5786. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]GARETH HUGHES (Green): I would like to start by saying that the Greens’ sentiments and our thoughts are with the workers their families and the communities on the West Coast and in Huntly. They are facing a time of unease and of great uncertainty and our thoughts are with them. I would also like to start by acknowledging the local communities—the councils the mayors the Amalgamated Engineering Printing and Manufacturing Union and hard-working local MPs like Kevin Hague and Damien O’Connor. What we have seen is—Hon Members: Ha ha!GARETH HUGHES: It is not really a time for laughing guys. What we have seen already is that 500 workers in the Buller region are to lose their jobs and what has the National Government done? It has not lifted a finger for the 500 workers who have already lost their jobs. Yet today what we see under this decision is a short-term band-aid with no long-term solutions for the region.What the people of the West Coast of the Waikato and of all of New Zealand want to see us do is work together for solutions. They want to know what the future is for those communities post coal. I remember growing up in Gisborne and seeing the hundreds of men laid off at the freezing works where my father worked. I know a little bit about the pain the suffering and the uncertainty it brings to small provincial communities and this is what the West Coast is going through today.Obviously the problem is the price of coal. Having sat on the Commerce Committee and having followed this issue for many years it has been like viewing a slow-moving train wreck. What we have seen is Ministers who have been overconfident about Solid Energy who have overvalued it overgeared the debt ratio and taken out too many dividends. What we saw unfortunately was a State-owned enterprise taken to the brink. It was part of coal. We have seen consumption decline in the US in China and across the world. Coal and the price was always the problem yet it always seems to have been the Government’s only answer to that same problem. To paraphrase the old saying: if you find yourself in a hole it is time to stop digging—yet the only answer has been more digging. Last year once again more was invested internationally in renewables and clean energy—$150 billion invested last year alone—yet the answer has always been more coal.Obviously the Government needs to take responsibility. We saw the debt-gearing issue which was outside the bounds of typical coalmining companies internationally. We saw the dividends taken out to generate cash. We still never got an answer as to why the Ministers did not require a halt to the culture of excess at Solid Energy. We saw a headquarters known as “the Palace”. We saw $23 million in bonuses paid out while the company was going belly up. We saw this company spend $64 million on a coalmine that it closed only a month after it purchased it. The Government waited until the absolute last moment to lay off and replace the board of directors and then we saw the grandiose house of sand plans of the former Dr Don Elder.The sum of $230 million dollars was borrowed and spent on fossil fuel non-coal alternatives. We saw the lignite mining for which we saw the finance Minister turn the first sod and which the Prime Minister supported in this House. This Government is complicit in the absolute waste of taxpayers’ money with some of the most polluting fossil fuel types of coal and the support for lignite and for underground coal gasification. After all of this the Government still refused an independent inquiry.So today we see the deal which hopefully will act as a short-term reprieve. I understand that redundancies have been guaranteed for at least 5 weeks for those 540 staff and 200 contractors. It is good to hear that those workers are protected and provided with some certainty. It is a short-term solution though with no long-term certainties.This is where the Government needs to look. We have reached out to the Government to work together. Together we can develop solutions for the West Coast economy and greater job security for the locals. It starts with making sure there is a proper economic development agency on the coast. The Government can speed up the roll-out of ultra-fast broadband on the coast. We can be investing more in skills and trades training on the West Coast and in Huntly. The Government can look to the future and to what the economic trends are. It is areas like clean energy. It is areas like home insulation. It is areas like greater science innovation and research and development spending.We want to see people in work on the West Coast and today even though the Government has not taken the opportunity with all the financial mess we have seen in that State-owned enterprise over the preceding years to start a just transition and to prepare those communities for the future jobs in the modern economy now is the time we can start. Let us work together and support the West Coast.