Norman Russel: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to MinistersText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeNorman Russel: Questions for Oral Answer — Questions to Ministers[Sitting date: 29 May 2014. Volume:699;Page:18476. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]3.Dr RUSSEL NORMAN (Co-Leader—Green) to theMinister for Climate Change Issues: Is he confident that ordinary New Zealanders are being treated fairly under the emissions trading scheme?Hon TIM GROSER (Minister for Climate Change Issues): Absolutely particularly when compared with what would happen to New Zealanders and their jobs to farmers and our export income and to businesses and households if that member ever got his hands on climate change policy in a future Labour-Greens coalition.Dr Russel Norman: What inquiries has he made into the practice of companies passing on carbon costs to consumers under the emissions trading scheme—costs that are much higher than the companies themselves are having to pay?Hon TIM GROSER: I do not make inquiries; I have discussions with my officials which are always fruitful informative and greatly appreciated.Dr Russel Norman: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. My question was specifically about the passing on of carbon charges. I appreciate that the Minister has conversations with officials—Mr SPEAKER: Order! The question as I heard it started with “What inquiries has he made … ?”. The Minister said that he did not make inquiries.Metiria Turei: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. Can I just get clarification from you on this ruling—that now the subject of the question is only going to be whether an inquiry was made as opposed to the actual content of the question which is about the details of that inquiry. Is that the limit to which Ministers will now have to answer questions—whether they have made inquiries or sought advice?Mr SPEAKER: In that particular case the member asked the question as to what inquiries the Minister had made then added something substantial to it and the Minister addressed the question. Maybe it was not to the member’s satisfaction; I can accept that it may not be to the member’s satisfaction. It may not be to the satisfaction of the members in the House. That is for the House to judge. My job is to rule that he has addressed that question and I have done so.Metiria Turei: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. Can I just—Mr SPEAKER: No—can I just clarify because I do not want any misunderstanding here. I have ruled on that matter—Metiria Turei: Yes.Mr SPEAKER: —and now the member is relitigating that—Metiria Turei: No I am seeking clarification.Mr SPEAKER: I have clarified it for the member.Metiria Turei: I am seeking additional clarification.Mr SPEAKER: Then if the member could quickly put that point I would be grateful.Metiria Turei: Does that mean then that if a member of the Opposition stands and asks a Minister whether they have sought any advice on a particular matter the Minister need answer only that part of the question that refers to whether or not they have sought any advice on any other matter but not on the subject of the question?Hon TIM GROSER: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker.Mr SPEAKER: No I do not need any assistance on this. On occasions that may well apply. I will judge individual questions and individual answers and my job is to determine whether I think they have been addressed. It is not my decision whether they have been addressed to the satisfaction of the member and I accept that in this case it will not have been addressed to the satisfaction of the member.Dr Russel Norman: Is the Minister confident that companies have ceased using the emissions trading scheme to overcharge consumers as the Emissions Trading Scheme Review Panel found that they were doing—that is the Government’s own Emissions Trading Scheme Review Panel—in 2011?Hon TIM GROSER: This Government is not about to launch some inquisition into companies on their pricing strategies. We believe in the market and we know exactly what the market signals are doing in this case.Dr Russel Norman: Has the Minister bothered to read his own Government’s Emissions Trading Scheme Review Panel report from 2011 which found that companies were using the emissions trading scheme to overcharge consumers by charging them a higher price on carbon than the companies themselves were paying and the panel came to the conclusion that it “would like to caution ETS participants that they face the risk of regulatory intervention in the future if such behaviour continues”?Hon TIM GROSER: Yes I have read the report.Dr Russel Norman: Does the Minister intend to follow the recommendations of the committee that there should be regulatory intervention if the behaviour continues of companies using the emissions trading scheme to overcharge consumers as it found in the Government’s own emissions trading scheme review from 2011?Hon TIM GROSER: No we have no intention of doing this and at the current regrettably—I would have to say—low international prices it is a non-issue.Dr Russel Norman: So just to be clear is the Minister saying that even though his own Emissions Trading Scheme Review Panel found that companies were overcharging consumers by charging them a higher price for carbon than the companies themselves were paying with the companies pocketing the difference and had called for regulatory intervention to prevent it from happening the Minister plans to do absolutely nothing?Hon TIM GROSER: Well I do not have the report in front of me but it is not my recollection that it said anything of that sort. At the end of the day a review is a review. We are the Government; we make the decisions on behalf of what we think are the balanced interests of all New Zealanders.Dr Russel Norman: Has the Minister sought any update on Treasury’s estimate of the fiscal implications of the changes his Government made to the emissions trading scheme where Treasury found that the increased cost to the Government would be in the order of $900 million per year by 2030 as a result of the weakening of the emissions trading scheme that his Government introduced?Hon TIM GROSER: This is really relitigating very old territory. What that figure referred to—and I cannot verify whether the figure is accurate or not—was the increased charges that the Government would have got if it had increased the pace of the emissions trading scheme. Nobody gave any money to anybody. I think that the member needs to live in the current situation.Moana Mackey: How can he continue to defend his inaction on New Zealand’s collapsed carbon price on the basis that he does not want to impose a higher cost ofcarbon on “struggling” businesses and households when the benefits are not being passed on or where the struggling businesses he was referring to are electricity generators and oil companies?Hon TIM GROSER: I am very comfortable with the Government’s overall approach to containing costs throughout the entire economy of which this is a very small part.