Grigg NicolaNICOLA GRIGG (National—Selwyn): To a degree I do agree with Tāmati Coffey in that I think a lot of the essence of what we're debating here today has been lost. In actual fact we are here today to debate the Environment Committee's report on the emissions budgets that were published in this year and of course the emissions reduction plan. All of that has had a genesis in the signing that the National Party did of the Paris Agreement to limit global warming to below 2 degrees Celsius; that is where this has begun in more modern memory. We do acknowledge and thank the members of the Environment Committee and of course all the officials for the time and effort that they've put into producing this report. It is a very good report and I will get to that shortly. It should be noted that the Environment Committee often works very closely and hears inquiries with the Primary Production Committee on which I sit. The reason we do that is because I think both committees recognise the very deep interlinked and interwoven body of work that the two committees have together and we do appreciate and acknowledge that and those submitters that do come before us.I think it would be fair to say that in this report it does identify some themes that are at the very core of the National Party position and that is that we do support these targets; we signed up to them and so I don't like to hear accusations of being tribal in politics when actually this is the result of work that the National Government started. We support the targets but it's the plan that we question. Todd Muller very eloquently suggested before that we will not see this country bankrupted in pursuit of those plans. I'd go a step further and say we're not going to see this country bankrupted in pursuit of one of the Prime Minister's nuclear-free moments.The fundamental problem—and we do agree that the emissions trading scheme is the tool that will do the heavy lifting for emissions reductions in this country but within the emissions reduction plan we feel that it's going to threaten enormous cost for little or no emissions reduction. That is what we can and must see: the emissions reduction.There has been so much hyperbole around various sectors within New Zealand. There has been such a blame game that has been going on and on and on for a number of years and I would say particularly targeting the agricultural sector. It was explained to me many years ago by a former National Minister for the Environment that the reason the agriculture emissions profile appears as high as it does is because thankfully we have an incredibly high amount of renewable energy generated. Were we to be generating energy heavily reliant on coal then that would skew the two different profiles. So I do contest the blame game that's been going on towards the agricultural industry.I note that there has actually been some irony in the Prime Minister going to New York to launch carbon-zero beef and within 10 days she's back in New Zealand with the Government announcing its counterproposal to the He Waka Eke Noa emissions reduction plan. So in one breath she's saying We can produce carbon-zero beef"; in the next she's saying "Well we're going to tax you guys because you're not doing a good enough job."When we talk about contradictions of statement I refer back to David Parker's comment about "a very gentle price signal"—I quote "a very gentle price signal." By the Government's own numbers that "very gentle price signal" is going to put 20 percent of sheep and beef farms out of business—5 percent of dairy farms. I don't know in what world we would call that a "very gentle price signal."It is not just the emissions reduction and mitigations that we need to focus on; it's investment into technology. Technology and science will find our solutions to our climate change commitments.Motion agreed to.Report noted."