Fitzsimons Jeanette: Sustainable Biofuel Bill — First Reading 
Fitzsimons Jeanette: Sustainable Biofuel Bill — First Reading 
[Volume:656;Page:5271] 
JEANETTE FITZSIMONS (Green) 
: 
 I would like to thank all of the members of the House who have spoken in support of the Sustainable Biofuel Bill. It is very satisfying that it appears that the bill may go through unanimously. The ACT Party has not spoken but every other party has spoken in support of the bill and I thank them for that. 
A couple of things came up in debate that I would like to set right. The claim was made by Chris Auchinvole as has been made many times before that the tallow in New Zealand is currently exported and made into soap in China and that if we do not do that then soap will be made from less sustainable things. Well I have good news for members: it is the glycerol in the tallow that is made into soap. The glycerol is a by-product from turning tallow into bio-diesel so we can turn the tallow into bio-diesel here be left with the glycerol and export that to China to be made into soap. So it is a win-win solution like most of the things that the Greens propose. 
It was a concern that when the previous legislation was repealed the officials adjusted New Zealand’s expected carbon emissions in 2020 upwards to adjust for the fact that there would not be biofuels being used in New Zealand to reduce those emissions. I hope that the combination of this bill and the Government’s policy means that those emissions can be adjusted again. 
We have heard tonight a debate mainly about the philosophical arguments between National and Labour about whether mandatory standards are better or worse than subsidies. That is a philosophical political debate and the parties have an absolute right to debate that. But what has happened as has happened so often before is that sustainability has once again slipped through the cracks of that argument between those on the right and on the left. I do not want members to get me wrong. I tell them the Greens do have a view on that issue and it includes a concern that as David Parker has said even with a subsidy local producers may still find they do not have a stable market because if oil prices continue to fluctuate wildly it will sometimes be economic to buy biofuel and sometimes not economic. That means that local producers may not be able to sell it stably and therefore they may not invest in the industry. So we do have the problem that the measure might not be effective. 
But that is not the issue here today. The issue is about how to make sure that any biofuels that we do use are sustainable and on that we seem to have agreement right across the House. It is another issue where the Greens sold a policy to the Labour members last year helped to develop it cooperatively with them saw the legislation be repealed then sold it to National after the election. I thank both parties for accepting the importance of the issue. We have actually brokered an agreement across the House without National or Labour ever having to talk to each other about it and we now have general agreement that biofuels should be sustainable in much the same way that we have brokered agreement between Labour and National that home insulation is worth investing in. We are pleased to play that role. 
I thank everybody for their comments on the bill tonight. I look forward to getting it back as quickly as possible. I do not think the Local Government and Environment Committee will need to take very long to consider the bill because it has already considered the exact wording that is in the bill has helped to develop it and is thoroughly familiar with it—or at least the members who are still on the committee are—and I am sure that it will not take the committee very long to decide it is a good thing to put the legislation back in force. I look forward to the bill coming back to the House and passing into law. 
Bill read a first time.  
Bill referred to the Local Government and Environment Committee.