Hayes John: Climate Change (Emissions Trading and Renewable Preference) Bill — In Committee 
Hayes John: Climate Change (Emissions Trading and Renewable Preference) Bill — In Committee 
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JOHN HAYES (National—Wairarapa) 
: 
 I rise to oppose the Climate Change (Emissions Trading and Renewable Preference) Bill. Given that we are speaking on Part 1 and the purpose I would just like to point out to the Committee that the purpose of this Act is to enable New Zealand to meet its international obligations under the convention and the protocol for Kyoto. I draw the hypocrisy of this Government to the attention of this Committee— 
The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson) 
: Order! 
JOHN HAYES 
: —of this Parliament and of this country. I say that New Zealand First and Helen Clark are part of this hypocrisy and they are leading it. 
Sitting suspended from 6 p.m. to 7.30 p.m. 
JOHN HAYES 
: In seeking the call I wish to ask you Mr Chairperson if I might have 5 minutes—my original time—reinstated because to have 20 seconds sloped off is a bit rough. 
The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson) 
: I will look on that favourably Mr Hayes. 
JOHN HAYES 
: Thank you very much Mr Chairperson. This Climate Change (Emissions Trading and Renewable Preference) Bill being promoted by Minister Parker represents politics triumphing over sensible policy development. This evening I want to bring two perspectives to our debate on Part 1. First of all from a foreign affairs perspective—and here I refer to clause 5 in Part 1 where the bill sets out that we are enacting this legislation to meet our international obligations under the Kyoto Protocol—I point out to this Committee and to the people of New Zealand the inconsistencies between the Government’s behaviour and this legislation. 
Let me quickly cover three areas. First we are concerned about constraining carbon emissions here in New Zealand but we are very happy to export coal to India where it is burnt without any form of sequestration. Second our troops are keeping peace in the Solomon Islands while Malaysian loggers are stripping out tropical rainforests that are the very lungs of this planet. I think that this is another area where the Government is being rather remiss in terms of what it is saying as compared with what it is doing. 
The third perspective I have is that the first period of the Kyoto Protocol ends in 2012 and the reality is that there is absolutely no consensus on what to do next. There was the meeting in Montreal and the meeting in Bali where the G8 said “Let’s go for a 50 percent reduction in carbon emissions by 2050.”—it has picked up our National Party policy—and George Bush was operating in Sydney where he was promoting an Asia-Pacific group of countries pursuing aspirational goals of a 25 percent reduction by 2030. But it is not clear how any of this will mesh with a broad UN-based approach. There is no consensus about what the time period should be what commitments should be made and how we should share the burden of protecting our climate between developed and developing countries and there is absolutely no consensus about how we can enforce the provisions of the Kyoto Protocol. 
I will now move away from the foreign affairs area and speak as the local member of Parliament for the Wairarapa electorate. It is an area that has been really knocked around by droughts over the last couple of seasons and by low beef and sheep prices but now we have this absolutely messy loopy silly incomprehensible legislation complete with 785 amendments before this Committee. It is just absolutely outrageous. As I have said it is clear evidence of politics triumphing over common sense. I think it is quite clear that the Government does not want to contemplate at all the damage it will do to farmers fishermen and foresters in my electorate which stretches from Ngawi to north of Waipukurau. The Government clearly is not listening; it is making politically driven changes. 
I think about a number of areas where we have concerns. The first is that the bill really discriminates against small to medium sized enterprises and they are in a majority in my electorate. New Zealand is very dependent on small companies and particularly companies in my electorate for its foreign exchange. I think it is absolutely unreasonable not to have these companies included in a process that treats all people equally. 
Agriculture is our most important industry. It is a mainspring of the Wairarapa economy but this legislation is going to put that industry at risk because it fails to resolve the issue of how to deal with the estimates of the difference in emissions. If we cannot measure the emissions from individual animals—and there can be variations of plus or minus 50 percent as my colleague Lockwood Smith mentioned earlier today—a market cannot function effectively with that level of uncertainty. Part 1 fails to resolve the issue of whether the point of obligation should be with the individual farmer or with the processor at this level. That is a fundamental design issue in the legislation that needs resolution by this Parliament rather than deferral to regulation. It is almost as if the Government wants international accolades for introducing an emissions trading scheme when the scheme is really just an incomprehensible shell and none of the necessary machinery has been clearly thought through or is in place to function. I do not believe that the agriculture sector can be excluded from the bill but because it is such an important contributor to our foreign exchange I think it is really important that we do not introduce legislation that will cause a huge problem for our farmers. 
Over the last 3 years I have watched as indecision about this legislation has driven foresters in the Wairarapa to destroy a good bit of their plantings. There has been significant deforestation in my electorate over the last 3 years and the principal reason for this is the confusion imposed by this Government on the people who work and operate in my electorate. I say to Mr Parker that this deforestation underlines a confusion that should have acted as a caution for those who are promoting this legislation because we will end up with unintended consequences. I have had foresters emailing me today saying: “John what does this bill mean for us in the next 3 5 10 20 50 years?”. This scheme is the first internationally that attempts to include forestry in the legislation and I think that that is a more difficult area than for example agriculture. In my electorate we have people who are harvesting manuka honey. Manuka is a crop that is now bringing in $45 to $50 a kilogram for bioactive honey and we are expecting the price to go significantly higher. If we are going to promote manuka plantings from which to harvest that honey what are the consequences in this legislation for those farmers? If we are going to convert pasture and hill country back into manuka honey - producing areas that eventually transfer back into native bush because that is the inevitability of what will happen what sort of carbon credits will be available in that situation? 
The other area that gives me great concern is that of fishermen in my area. The Wairarapa has a very large section of New Zealand coastline and this legislation penalises New Zealand fishermen in comparison with those who come from offshore. 
R Doug Woolerton 
: What did you do for fishermen? Nothing! 
JOHN HAYES 
: I say to the member—I think his name is Mr Woolerton—that those people who come from offshore and import their fuel with them will not be penalised by this bill in any way in comparison with people working out of Ngawi or other areas of the coast. 
This is appallingly bad legislation. I do not think we have seen the like of it for many years.