Foster-Bell PaulPAUL FOSTER-BELL (National): E Te Tiamana o Te Komiti tēnā koe tēnā koutou katoa e ngā mema. Can I begin my contribution to this Appropriation (2015/16 Confirmation and Validation) Bill debate by thanking and congratulating the two previous members from the Opposition who spoke. Often during these appropriations debates we have a lot of political invective but I thought both made very thoughtful well-considered contributions and whilst not agreeing with every single thing I noted that they actually did pay tribute to some of the work that this Government is doing and I think doing very successfully in this space.Before going on to climate change issues I do want to touch on some of these big battles that have been fought in the conservation estate. My colleague now the Associate Minister for the Environment the Hon Scott Simpson whom I had the pleasure of serving under for 2 years in the Local Government and Environment Committee did touch on this. If we look at page 307 of the compiled reports of committees we will see the conservation report and that covers such things as the Battle for our Birds which we have heard about. We have heard about the War on Weeds and that includes everything from old man's beard which David Bellamy highlighted back in the 1980s through to the wandering willie which is a threat not only in the world of weeds but it seems wandering willie does beset the Labour Party from time to time as well.Sitting suspended from 6 p.m. to 7.30 p.m.PAUL FOSTER-BELL: Te Tiamana. Thank you very much Mr Chair. As I was saying before I was interrupted by the dinner break the issue of weeds in New Zealand is something that this Government is addressing with the $16 million to control wilding pines but also the funding that we have provided for the War on Weeds weeds such as old man's beard—Hon Simon Bridges: Must go.PAUL FOSTER-BELL: —and the dreaded wandering willie which also must go.I want to move from the Department of Conservation appropriations to our progress that we are making in climate change issues. I refer specifically to page 318 of the tabulated reports of select committees the report on the Energy Efficiency and Conservation Authority review. There are significant programmes in the areas of fuel efficiency. I want to congratulate all the Ministers involved particularly the Hon Simon Bridges who has been a real driver of electric cars I have to say. We are seeing a programme being rolled out that will lead to some of New Zealand's leading companies committing to having 30 percent of their fleet turned to electric over the next couple of years. We are talking companies along the lines of The Warehouse and Fonterra some of the very big employers that have very large vehicle fleets. This will make significant inroads into our objective to double the number of electric vehicles on our roads to 64000 in the near future. This will contribute to the Government being able to achieve our goal by the year 2030 of a 30 percent reduction in carbon emissions below 2005 levels. 2030 may sound like a distant time in the future however it is only 13 short years away and with some of the technological innovations and the sensible and wise policies of this Government as are laid out in the committee reports we will make I think a lot of headway towards achieving those targets and reducing our carbon dioxide emissions in New Zealand.I also just briefly want to touch on agricultural emissions. The $20 million investment in our sustainable agriculture programme and having seen the research they are doing at Massey University—