Hughes GarethGARETH HUGHES (Green): Imagine if this Chamber was on fire. Would we sit around and debate what to do? Would we argue and vote on whether it was important or whether it was happening at all? What would we do if petrol was being poured on it making it worse? I ask these questions because they relate to a little story I want to tell.On 28 August 1859 George Bissell and Edwin Drake took a gamble. It was a gamble that would pay off financially for them and for many others but who would have guessed it at the time that it could risk the survival of our species? These two men were looking for an alternative to whale oil. Facing financial problems experimental technology and even fire they eventually managed to build the world's first oil rig. On that day the oil age began and it changed the world. It quite literally changed the world. There was so much oil that it is even changing our atmosphere. One hundred and fifty years on scientists say we cannot afford to burn 70 to 90 percent of all the oil we have discovered if we want to avoid a runaway catastrophe.The science is clear but for polluters it is an inconvenient truth. These polluters have persuaded politicians to spend public money for private profit. You can see it in Trump's America and you can see it in National's New Zealand. It is like a fire in a crowded cinema and instead of yelling out Fire!" someone locks the door and disputes whether there is a fire at all or what should be done about it. That would be murder and what some politicians are doing is being accomplices to planetary homicide. In this House we have 121 seats. That is twice as many politicians as Māui's dolphins yet National is opening up the Māui's dolphin sanctuary for the last 63 for oil drilling. These 63 are battling extinction threatened by fishing nets. They do not need any more risks. It is just one example of how National is the pro-pollution party.You just have to look at the facts. They gift the oil industry $46 million a year in tax breaks and subsidies. They will give them another $800 million to help them decommission their oil rigs. They spent $240000 wining and dining 11—11—oil executives for a couple of days. This year they announced an oil block the size of the land of the country of Papua New Guinea. They have opened up a full third of the Māui's dolphin sanctuary and turned it into an oil block and allowed oil drilling to the shores of Lake Te Ānau. For what? We have seen a succession of oil companies leave New Zealand and those who choose to stay pay the fourth-lowest tax plus royalty rates in the world. National has given up on the last of the Māui's dolphins and they are supporting the last industry we should be supporting. It is like investing in tobacco farms or nuclear weapons factories.History will be the judge but the Greens know which side we stand on. We will stop deep-sea oil drilling and we will focus on clean energy. The Stone Age did not end for want of stones. It ended because we had something better and the oil age will end for the same reason. The good news in New Zealand is that we have a wealth of clean energy and the energy of hundreds of thousands of caring Kiwis to change it. There is a growing movement across this country to stop those who would fan the flames of climate change. Right this very second brave New Zealanders are out on the sea off the coast of the North Island aboard the Taitu and the waka Te Matau-ā-Māui to oppose the beast—a massive seismic survey vessel. Last month Kiwis risked arrest at the petroleum conference. Last year we saw our Churches our councils and our universities vote with their feet and their wallets to say no to oil.We do not need Bissell and Drake's oil rigs any more. We are seeing a movement. This is our generation's nuclear-free moment. We have got a wealth of clean energy. No other nation is so well endowed with so many resources. It is crazy—we have got such a head start into the 21st century but National is trying to drag us back. We could be the country with wind turbines in our hills and quiet cheap electric vehicles. We could be the place like nuclear-free New Zealand again the world looks to for inspiration. But some want to stay in the past for profit and some want to stay in the past for lack of vision. We cannot let them win.I have got a petition calling on the Government to stop its support for the exploration of oil drilling. If you want to support our fragile atmosphere if you care about our last Māui's dolphins and if you want to protect Lake Te Ānau and our environment sign your signature and add your name to the right side of history. Kia ora."