The Finance and Expenditure Committee has released their report on the Emissions Trading Scheme bill being pushed by the National Government.
There’s a great deal covered in the report itself, and I will try to avoid reiterating everything, but I wanted to give my two cents.
The whole process, from the ETS review committee (which was a waste of time), to the walkout by National on a grand coalition with Labour (which would have settled the issue months ago), to the backroom deals with the Maori party (who knows what else has been agreed to), and now with the select committee (carried out under extreme haste) and upcoming debates in the House is tantamount to a collusion of deception and greed.
The evidence clearly shows that National had always intended to get a watered down ETS, while trying to convince the NZ public and other countries at Copenhagen the complete opposite. They were able to enlist the support of the Maori party, in a deal that will in my opinion come back to haunt them.
The strategy was to slam the changes through before the public would have a chance to learn better. National has refused to release background information and they have permitted superficial departmental advice to be issued to MPs in the select committee. In fact, even the Parliamentary Counsel office (who help write the legislation – people who help avoid bad laws from being written) could provide only an untested draft on the day of deliberation
Therefore, what does this all mean – here are the numbers:
379
Written submissions, the majority of which were from individuals.
128
Oral submissions over five days between 15 October and 27 October 2009
23 hours 35 minutes
The amount of time given for those 128 submissions. Compare this to the 58 hours of hearings for the 161 oral submissions heard when the original bill was put to the House by the Fifth Labour Government
6-6
National failed to get a majority for its proposed changes in the FEC Select Committee. They do not speak for the majority on their own bill.
82%
Response from ShapeNZ survey who say that emitters should pay their share of the costs from climate change. In addition, nearly half of National voters and 75% of Maori Party voters opposed extending free emission credits assistance to large emitters. Kiwis are overwhelmingly not in favour of National’s proposed changes.
$109,000
The minimum amount speculated by Dr Suzi Kerr, Visiting Professor of Economics, Stanford University that the taxpayer would subsidise to each worker at the Rio Tinto Aluminium Smelter at Tiwai Point, under the proposed changes to the allocation regime and phase-out of free units suggested by National.
90 years
According to the Minister of Agriculture, the Government plans to provide free carbon credits for 90 years. In fact, There is no specified date when allocation of free carbon credits will end under National’s proposal (the status quo is 30 years)
$100 billion.
Including borrowing, the cost to the NZ taxpayer of the higher allocation to major emitters will be $100 billion by 2050. A back of the envelope calculation means this works out to 25,000 per person, each year, for 40 years.
As you can see, we will all have to pay for National’s haste. What a waste.
Tis a blunder from top to bottom…
How much would Labour’s ETS cost us till 2050..?
Is Labour undertaking to amend this ETS if elected in 2011..?
So should i go and get a job down at the smelter? recession-proof myself
Remind me – why did Labour set up the trading scheme casino instead of a carbon tax?
Regardless of one’s opinion of the merits of the bill, the flawed process is absolutely disgraceful. The Labour minority report makes for interesting reading for sure: http://www.parliament.nz/NR/rdonlyres/8D420C04-20A4-4D3E-9808-B23FE475AF9A/117089/DBSCH_SCR_4520_ClimateChangeResponseModeratedEmiss.pdf
Now while I am sure there’s probably a bit of “hyper-ventilating” in there (after all, that’s what all politicians do, no criticism there), it really does seem as though the process here has been a disgraceful lip-service to the democratic process. I think THAT is the angle Labour should push.
At least Australia has it right even the Greens agree.
http://theland.farmonline.com.au/news/nationalrural/agribusiness-and-general/political/farmers-greenies-and-nats-back-ets-exemption/1677799.aspx
Speaks for itself doesn’t it, can’t respond too angry.
I see that Stuff is quoting that ‘Labour refused support’…a bit of spin there perhaps?
Yep it is spin. On the other hand I would be annoyed if Labour had supported this process. It has been clearly rushed through with a pre-decided agenda.
It is more than just a fast process creating poor legalisation. In this case it is fast process creating staggeringly poor outcome.
On whose advice is this considered a good idea, who took point in pushing if forward, the Minister of Energy and Resources, and Minister of Economic Development Gerald Brownlee by any chance?
I’m glad they did, what a shambles.
If National had taken up Labour’s offer to engage then the process would have been more thoughtful – the mere need to find consensus from both sides of the political spectrum means that issues would have needed to be discussed and we wouldn’t have this dog’s breakfast that currently sits on the floor in front of us.
I think National realise that this will be really ugly 10 years down the track, but they don’t care because it will be left to someone else to change the law and clean up the mess. Clearly this legislation will only be in place for a few years, and the Nats realise that. This way they can keep their funders happy, and as for the future I really don’t think Nick Smith gives a damn.