Shaw James: Oral Questions — Questions to MinistersText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeShaw James: Oral Questions — Questions to Ministers[Sitting date: 17 November 2015. Volume:710;Page:8024. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]5.JAMES SHAW (Co-Leader—Green) to the Minister of Finance: What advice if any has he received from Treasury in the last 18 months on the importance for New Zealand businesses of certainty about long-term policy settings?Hon BILL ENGLISH (Minister of Finance): I regularly receive advice from Treasury on the importance of consistent longer-term policy and the Government focuses on delivering as such. It is important for example to have consistency on climate change policies. It would be very disruptive if for instance we ditched the established emissions trading scheme for a carbon tax heavily taxed agriculture without any proven technological solutions for reducing emissions and suddenly announced we were trying to achieve carbon neutrality—whatever that is—by 2050.James Shaw: What specific action has he taken since Treasury advised him that he should secure a greater degree of political party consensus on climate policies so that businesses can factor climate change into their long-term decision-making?Hon BILL ENGLISH: In the first place it is not actually Treasury’s role to give advice about the breadth of support in Parliament for particular policies so in that case I actually just did not listen to it. Secondly the Government has got a climate change position. It is outlining that at the Paris conference as it has already outlined it here in New Zealand. From what I can see there is a fair amount of political support behind that.David Seymour: What would be the effect on long-term policy stability had the Government adopted an aggressive peak oil mitigation strategy when the Greens first raised that?Hon BILL ENGLISH: It would be pretty disruptive but I do not think that the Greens really expect anyone to take their policy positions too seriously. Often they are about symbolism and—[Interruption]Mr SPEAKER: Order! [Interruption] Order! I apologise.Chris Hipkins: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. Previous Speakers have ruled and you indeed have re-emphasised this ruling last week about members using supplementary questions and Ministers using supplementary answers in order to attack another party. The question attacked another party and so did the answer. [Interruption]Mr SPEAKER: Order! No I do not need—I listened carefully to the question. I do not think it did attack. The answer may have got political but the question in my mind was not an attack on a political party.David Seymour: Point of order.Mr SPEAKER: I need to know: is it a fresh point of order?David Seymour: Speaking to the previous—Mr SPEAKER: No I do not need—I have ruled.James Shaw: Why is this Government acting unilaterally to set climate policy when Business New Zealand has advised that its major companies group says that it wants more Government leadership on climate policy clarity of direction and cross-party agreement?Hon BILL ENGLISH: By and large we are not acting unilaterally. For instance this Government when it came in in 2008 adopted the emissions trading scheme that was put in place by the previous Government—in fact invented by the Green Party—because we thought in the end it was most logical to have a price. I understand that the Green Party position has now changed because the price is not high enough and there is not enough pain associated with improving carbon emissions. So we have not shifted ground but the Green Party has and it is a bit unfortunate because there was general consensus on the emissions trading scheme.James Shaw: Why does he believe that New Zealand needs a 30-year plan for infrastructure but not for climate change which will impact on infrastructure?Hon BILL ENGLISH: We do have—in fact it is more than a 30-year target; it is a 35-year target I think of minus 50 percent by 2050 because as we know you know it is going to take a long time for the world to heat up significantly and it is going to take a long time to take the measures that might mitigate that.James Shaw: Given that the Government has a target of a 50 percent reduction in emissions by 2050 what is contained in the plan to achieve that target?Hon BILL ENGLISH: The main tool is the one we adopted that was Green Party policy and that is the emissions trading system and that is the beauty of it—as demand for carbon credits rises the price will rise. That has been happening. The price was very low. It has now risen quite a lot in the last couple of years and it may well continue to rise. That is a sound long-term policy which I think most parties agree with.James Shaw: Does he agree with the Prime Minister in explicitly ruling out cross-party negotiations on achieving long-term policy stability on climate change and does he think that business owners can take any comfort about what they can expect from the Government?Hon BILL ENGLISH: We are always interested in discussing these issues but on some of them there are just some deep differences and on others the Green Party has changed its position and it would be a bit hard to know. I mean if the Green Party wants to can the emissions trading scheme and move to a carbon tax that is a pretty big shift. It would certainly take a lot of talking to persuade the Government it was the right thing to do and I actually cannot understand why the Green Party has changed its view.James Shaw: So has he received any advice that changing climate policies every time there is a change of Government is a good idea for business for farmers or for the country?Hon BILL ENGLISH: I think that a feature of the New Zealand approach at least is the stability of core climate change policy—that is the emissions trading system and the electricity market which promotes renewable energy. Those have now been in place for about 10 years. The major parties have tended to back that. The Greens did up until pretty recently I think so I would argue to Business New Zealand that there is pretty steady policy actually. Maybe it does not like the implications of it but we are not changing it.