Smith Nick: Estimates Debate — In Committee 
Smith Nick: Estimates Debate — In Committee 
[Volume:649;Page:17698] 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH (National—Nelson) 
: 
 The global challenge of climate change is one of the issues of our time and this afternoon I will take the time to challenge the Government’s pretty poor record over the last 9 years in respect of climate change. If we look at the issue of greenhouse gas emissions from New Zealand we see that Labour came into Government in 1999 promising to reduce those emissions by 20 percent by the year 2005. But we know from the official record that has been reported to the UN that far from emissions being reduced they have continued to increase and most worryingly to increase at an ever-faster rate. In the estimates that we are considering before the Committee we note that in fact the Government is seeking $12 million this year for the monitoring and measurement of those emissions. 
My first question to the Minister is about the fact that in 2007 the Government said sustainability was the issue of the year. The Prime Minister actually mentioned that word 38 times in her first speech to the House. Of course there was also the New Zealand Government’s claimed goal of moving towards carbon neutrality in 2007. So my question to the Minister is simply this: where is the data for New Zealand’s 2007 emissions? We know that emissions were pretty bad in 2006 and there is speculation that they were even worse in 2007. I want to know why the Government does not come clean and tell New Zealanders what the emissions from New Zealand were in 2007. We know that the Government spent $6 million—$6 million—last year on a carbon monitoring programme. I tell the Minister that if he has spent $6 million we expect to know what the data for those emissions were. We know the energy data from the Ministry of Economic Development and we know the agricultural and forestry data from the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry so why do the people of New Zealand not know the data for those emissions in 2007? 
I have lodged a whole series of questions to the Minister but he has ducked and he has dived—he is almost trying to avoid accountability. We have a fiscal responsibility Act I tell the Minister but I ask whether it will take a requirement prior to the election to get transparency into that data and for the Minister to come clean. 
Chris Auchinvole 
: Probably—probably. 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH 
: Well maybe it should but I want to know why a Government that says climate change is the greatest issue of our time will not tell us what the net emissions were for 2007. It is a very simple straightforward question— 
Chris Auchinvole 
: Does he know? 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH 
: —and if the Minister does not know that I ask how he can have the cheek to come to Parliament and ask for another $12 million to monitor those carbon emissions when he cannot answer with a very simple easily calculable decision on what the emissions were for 2007. 
I will tell members what I think. I think the Government is too embarrassed to tell us what the figures were for 2007. I can tell the Committee what Government members will say. They will say that after 8 years of a Labour Government emissions in 2007 grew by a greater rate than they did in any previous year since records began. We know the Government’s climate change policy drove record amounts of deforestation last year with the loss of 19000 hectares of forest and that will make the figures we have to finally report to the United Nations next April awful—just awful. I say to the Minister that the electorate has a right to know. Before people go to the polls this year they need to know this Government’s record so I simply challenge the Minister to tell us the emission figures for last year.