Brownlee Gerry: Electricity and Gas Industries Bill — In Committee 
Brownlee Gerry: Electricity and Gas Industries Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:620;Page:15708] 
GERRY BROWNLEE (Deputy Leader—National) 
: 
 That was a speech from a Minister who does not have a clue what he is doing. That was a speech on behalf of a Minister who does not have a clue what he is doing either. Apparently we cannot unscramble an egg. Well that might be true but let us be very clear that in the 4 years the current arrangements have been in place Labour has been in Government. Right through the whole change process Labour has been there. Right now whether or not those members want to admit it more of the electricity industry is in direct Government control than was ever the case throughout the years of the 1990s. 
Government Member 
: Not true. 
GERRY BROWNLEE 
: That is absolutely the truth because what has happened is the big generators have become the big retailers. The Government has stood by and let them swallow up all the small organisations around the country that were there to represent the best interests of their consumers and to participate very directly in the market. We have to ask ourselves—I would have asked myself this if I were the Minister—how we can have competition when generation capacity is balanced with retail demand. How can we get competition in that sort of environment? 
There is no incentive for any of the State generators to provide low-cost electricity because they have captive consumers. They just quietly sit there and jack up the price as much as they possibly can and the Minister says that he cannot do much about it. He will form a committee and call it a commission and he will see what happens. I tell the Minister that nothing will happen as a result of this bill passing. The situation with regard to the security of supply of electricity in New Zealand will continue to worsen as long as the Labour Government chooses to put its head in the sand. 
This country has not had the investment in electricity infrastructure that it should have had during these years of a growing economy. The reason is simple: nobody will stick up his or her hand on a very big project worth hundreds of millions of dollars while the Resource Management Act is acting as a block to that happening. We know that right now if one of the Ministers was prepared to do what is sensible and give the go-ahead for the Dobson project security of supply in the top half of the North Island could be assured. No the Government has no interest in that. So now we have the situation whereby South Island residents have been told by Transpower that it can no longer guarantee security of supply even if enough electricity is being generated because there is too much demand for the end product. 
This Electricity Commission will comprise a group of interested people who will sit around writing reports and making recommendations to the Government. It cannot possibly do anything to hasten the development of greater electricity infrastructure in this country. All the talk about the work it might do to try to reduce demand simply ignores the fact that this country wants to live well wants a growing economy and wants people to have the benefit of living in supposedly the First World. I cannot see how we will achieve any of that if a group of Ministers are simply going to abdicate their responsibility to some bureaucracy. 
The Minister is sitting there shaking his head and saying that they will not do that. I ask the Minister why we are passing the bill. Why are we setting up this thing? Worse how much will it cost consumers? The purpose apparently is to improve the security of supply of electricity. The only thing this Government has done is to preside over racing electricity prices and that will continue.