Hughes Gareth: Energy (Fuels Levies and References) Amendment Bill — Third ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeHughes Gareth: Energy (Fuels Levies and References) Amendment Bill — Third Reading[Sitting date: 17 February 2015. Volume:703;Page:1652. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]GARETH HUGHES (Green):Kia ora Mr Deputy Speaker. Ngā mihi nui ki a koutou. Kia ora. I would like to share the condolences of other members for Celia Lashlie. I would like to acknowledge her passing and I send my love to her friends and whānau. I think it is quite clear that she was someone who made our country a better place and I think that if that is the least you can say about anyone it is an amazing achievement they havemade.To draw the two issues together one of her most remarkable feats and one that has had an influence on Kiwis’ lives is the book Growing Gorgeous Boys into Good Men. Reflecting on when I was a boy in high school—and talking about oil which is what this legislation is about—I have got to say that I burnt my fair share of oil up and down Gladstone Road which is Gisborne’s main street. There are a lot of first-term members in the House who may not be aware of this but my passion in high school was my red Mark I Ford Escort. It was lowered it had mag wheels and we had modified the engine. I loved it. So I burnt my fair share of oil driving up and down the main street every Friday night.I am the first to acknowledge oil’s important role in our economy. I used to love nothing better than getting my hands dirty in oil. It was such a bad car to be honest I learnt very fast that you had to work on the engine. In the end I was able to change a gearbox and even a motor not very well but it was still a great experience. I learnt mechanical skills which are so important in our economy.What we know is that oil is the lifeblood of our modern economy. It does not mean that it always will be. It definitely has not always been but it is the situation we find ourselves in now. When you look across the last four decades every major recession or depression has been preceded by a global oil shock.The Green Party supports this bill. We support oil security and having the oil stock ticket system as part of the international arrangement to deal with oil price shortages but I do want to pick up on a couple of points.The first point is from the last member Brett Hudson. He said that the answer to increasing our security and resiliency is to drill for more oil. That is logically inconsistent because what we know is that our oil grade is a totally different type from what we can refine. Even if we found a whole bunch of oil—and despite Simon Bridges’ best endeavours they are still looking—we could not refine it in the current refinery.Brett Hudson: We can sell it.GARETH HUGHES: Even if we found it and they tried to sell it—that is right—we would still be selling it at the global market price. This does not increase our security.The fact is that there is a live debate about what is the best way to pay for the oil security of offshore oil stocks. Should it be stored in New Zealand? I think there is a valid argument. It is a little bit more expensive but we could be guaranteed that the supply would be assured. Should biofuels be allowed as Z Energy has contended and which the Green Party supported—and which sadly the Government members voted against both in the select committee and in the House?What we know is that this security stock has a cost. We know the cost is rising to around $15 million I believe in the 2016-17 financial year. Who is going to pay for it? At the moment it is paid for out of general taxation and the Green Party believes that it is fair in this case that costs fall where they lie. We like the idea that there is transparency—that those people using oil are paying their fair share. There is the equity argument that Mr Hudson talked about which is that those who are taking our fantastic electric trains or buses in Wellington and who are not using oil do not have to pay for it. That is sending a market signal a price signal and incentivising it. I am not saying that it is a large market signal but it is a market signal all the same. This is what the Green Party supports. We have been open about saying that markets have their role in the economy. We think price signals have an important role in a smart Green transition to a greener economy because at the moment those externalities—those costs—are being paid by anyone and no one has that economic incentive to invest in efficient vehicles for example.The analogy I would like to use when it comes to this bill—although supporting it—is that New Zealand is an oil addict. We are one of the most oil-dependent economies in the Western World. It is incredible. We have got one of the oldest vehicle fleets in the developed world. We drive some of the longest kilometres with some of the fewest passengers in some of the oldest least efficient cars in the world. Despite our amazing—and we should celebrate it—three-quarters renewable electricity production when it comes to oil we are still one of the most oil-dependent economies in the world. The analogy is that we are like an alcoholic. When it comes to an alcoholic’s security of getting the next drink with this legislation it is just like an alcoholic storing some bottles at a mate’s place—a place where they know they can always get some bottles. What you should be doing if you are an addict be it an oil addict or an alcoholic is getting treatment acknowledging you have a problem and finding strategies to reduce consumption. What the climate scientists—the doctors—urge us to do is to reduce our consumption to as close to zero as possible.The major missed opportunity of this legislation is that biofuels—sustainable clean biofuels—are still going to get lumped with the same charge. That entirely negates the economic price signals that we should be sending through having a fair transparent mechanism which is what this legislation tries to do—that is costs should fall where they lie when it comes to paying for the oil stocks overseas. To keep the alcoholism analogy going imagine if as part of their treatment the alcoholic was not storing bottles of alcohol at their mate’s place but that they did in fact have better healthier alternatives there so that when they went around to their friend’s house there was something good there that would not lead them to drink. This principle is why we should be encouraging biofuels. It would increase our resiliency it would reduce our dependency on oil and lastly there are all the associated subsidiary benefits of producing jobs developing our regional economy and boosting the national economy.Looking at this legislation we have to ask ourselves why it is in front of the House. Why has this bill been identified by the Government as such an urgent piece of action? This is a great example of third-term tinkering. The Government has run out of ideas. Where is the big picture to deal with the serious strategic and economic challenge of our oil dependency? This is all that the Government has come up with. When we have so many solutions available when technology is changing the world so rapidly and when disruptive technology is having such an impact already National is looking at the small picture.We are a country that imports $8 billion of oil per annum. Effectively the income from our entire tourism sector one of our biggest income earners just gets the oil to New Zealand. It is incredible that a country that is as well-developed as smart and as entrepreneurial as ours is wasting the entire tourism sector income on oil imports. We should be having a discussion on how we grow jobs how we boost the economy and how we do more with less oil.The fact is that we have a huge number of solutions available to us which I want to run through very quickly. We have the efficiency of the vehicle fleet. New Zealand has just imported almost more cars than we have since the early 1970s—it is a record during my lifetime—yet we are still importing relatively fuel-inefficient Japanese imports. We could be doing so much more by upping our fuel economy standards as America Japan and Europe have done which would save the entire country money would save consumers money and would also reduce the hundreds of deaths that are caused by particulate pollution from oil.When it comes to electric vehicles we have a huge opportunity as a country to use our clean green renewable electricity to power our vehicle fleet. For the cost of the oil stocks we could be rolling out a national network of fast-charging stations. There are more Ladas on our road than there are electric cars. There is a chicken and an egg problem. People are not buying electric cars because there are not the charging stations and people are not installing the charging stations at cafes or supermarkets or malls because people are not driving electric cars. There is a chicken and an egg problem. But when you look around the world the growth is phenomenal particularly in countries such as the US and Norway.For the cost of this oil ticket system and security we could be rolling out a State highway network for the 21st century with fast-charging stations. We could be helping New Zealanders get into electric cars. The equivalent of the price of a tank of petrol—you know say 80 or 100 bucks—is about $2.50 in an electric car. We could be rolling out public transport across the country such as what we had in today’s Dominion Post in Wellington which was a five-point plan for better cleaner cheaper buses and the central business district rail link for Auckland. We could be reinvesting in our regional rail network and in cycle infrastructure so that people could cycle aroundsafely. We have got such clean-energy potential—be it solar which is growing at 330 percent in the last 2 years through to wind where there is more than 2000 megawatts just waiting to be built—and we would have the potential to grow jobs and save money and reduce the current account deficit by having an oil reduction plan.When you look across the country there are many many businesses and councilsthat have oil reduction plans and when you look across the world there are militaries and Governments that have oil reduction plans but all we have—and we heard it from Brett Hudson—is an oil production plan. It is time for less third-term tinkering. It is time for some big solutions that are going to make a real difference. That is why despite supporting this bill tonight the Green Party is going to be putting the case to New Zealanders that we can tackle climate change we can grow jobs we can reduce oil imports and we can give people more options to get around the way they want to. Kia ora Mr Deputy Speaker.