Sowry Roger: Third Readings 
Sowry Roger: Third Readings 
[Volume:620;Page:16116] 
Hon ROGER SOWRY (National) 
: 
 The Minister of Energy showed no enthusiasm for the legislation in that speech. One does not have to look very far to see why he is not enthusiastic about it. One has only to look at the submissions made to the Commerce Committee to see that every single energy company—the Government owns the majority of them and appoints the directors—actually opposes the legislation. Energy companies like Genesis—the Labour Party Government put Mike Williams the President of the Labour Party on the board of Genesis—made a submission opposing the legislation. It would have been interesting if the Minister could point to one energy company that supported it but he could not. 
If we look at the groups that made submissions we see that the Orion lines company totally opposed the legislation. It was highly unusual for Transpower to come before a select committee to argue that Government legislation should be changed. I could go through a range of other groups. I can understand why the Minister would not want to stay in the Chamber to hear about the TrustPower submission. TrustPower one of the private companies in the energy sector said that if the Minister passed this legislation it would not solve any of the issues and that TrustPower would have to re-examine its role in the New Zealand market. It said it would have to “put weight on and seriously consider exiting the retail market if this bill is passed”. 
How much more serious can one get? How much more arrogant can a Government be? It just says: “To hell with all of their views; we know best.” The Minister thinks he knows better than any of the submissioners. 
Hon Ken Shirley 
: And we know that’s not true. 
Hon ROGER SOWRY 
: Exactly. Effectively he instructed the Labour MPs on the committee to roll over and they did. The legislation was meant to be rushed through but was slowed up by the committee. It now emerges in the House for its third reading in a way that has TrustPower saying it will seriously consider exiting the New Zealand retail market if it goes through—and it will. Mighty River Power is opposing this legislation. It is a State-owned enterprise. Genesis the company I started with which has the Labour Party president on its board is opposing the legislation. Energy Trusts of New Zealand is opposing it. Vector is opposing the legislation. And the list goes on and on. 
One of the contentious parts of the legislation is the structure of the Electricity Commission. That was what most of the submitters were saying. We tried to amend it in the Committee stage— unsuccessfully because Labour has decided that the structure of the commission is to stay as the Minister has deemed it to be. The commission is responsible to the Minister and has to get ministerial sign-off of its plan and work programme. Effectively it becomes liable to the dictates of the Minister. It has no independence. The Minister appoints people on to the commission. The commission then appoints its own committees to look at and examine issues. We have already seen the commission make decisions and recommendations around reserve energy without even consulting its own committee. So the Minister appoints the commission and approves its work programme and it has independent committees to look at things like reserve energy—how much energy we should have sitting there ready to be turned on if the rain does not fall. The commission has decided we need no extra reserve energy for the next 2 years but did it consult its own independent committee on that? No it just made the decision. 
That is arrogance from the Electricity Commission but one has to go one step further to see the ultimate in arrogance and that is the Minister deciding that the Government will underwrite a new generation facility by Genesis. The Government will do the deal with Genesis underwrite it and bypass the Electricity Commission which the Minister is establishing in this legislation. Why does he do that? Why does the Minister decide to ignore the commission? The commission is obviously angry at being snubbed on the first decision of major importance to the energy sector. In the biggest decision made this year in respect of the energy sector the vehicle that the Minister has established to look at energy was ignored. The commission came out and said: “Hey what about us? We weren’t consulted.” The Minister said: “Oh no and I wouldn’t want to make a habit of not consulting you.” 
What does that mean? It means that he will consult the industry only when he wants to. We have set up a puppet organisation. It is an organisation that is in no way independent and the Minister has shown in his first act in respect of the sector that he does not take it seriously—just like he does not take the House seriously. He wandered in read his speech then left ignoring the debate and letting everybody else get on with it. That is the arrogance he displays all the time around the sector. People in the sector talk about it all the time. 
Hon Ken Shirley 
: They don’t like him. 
Hon ROGER SOWRY 
: They do not like him. They do not like the arrogance. They do not like being treated like this the commission does not like being treated like this and soon I believe we will see that New Zealanders do not like that degree of arrogance either. 
In the speech the Minister read to the House he talked about the new 50 megawatt limit on the amount that lines companies could generate. He said it was wonderful and we would not want to go any further without consultation. Well the amount was doubled and that is significant if one is a tiny or small lines company but the issue is why it was doubled. Mr Copeland with much chest-beating will no doubt tell us later on that it was doubled because he wrote a letter to the select committee on it. No that is not why the amount was doubled. National announced in March our policy of not having any restriction on it at all and that was greeted with unanimous applause from the sector. I think there was one critic whose name escapes me at the moment. The rest of the people totally agreed with it as did the political parties of the centre-right. I know that ACT is of the same view—[ 
Interruption 
] That is right; they think we went a tad too far in the first place they are happy with where we have ended up now and we agree with them. That was why the Minister following National’s announcement went to the conference and told people not to worry because the Government would make some movement on the limit—just a little step. 
A little step to the Minister was to double the limit. Why does he not get rid of it completely? Why not allow the lines companies to invest in the retail and generation sectors—in particular the generation sector? Vector is now buying the National Gas Corporation. Powerco is investing in Australia. Those lines companies will invest in New Zealand if they are given the opportunity.