From Hansard

Over the past 18 months I have worked as Labour’s energy spokesperson. I relinquished that role yesterday to my colleague Nanaia Mahuta, whom I wish all the best in the role. I also wish Chris Hipkins well in his role as the associate energy spokesperson, because he is continuing in that role, and he has done an excellent job. If anybody needed any evidence of his energy and commitment to the portfolio, they would need to look no further than the work he has done to get the Electricity (Renewable Preference) Amendment Bill introduced to the House.

I will deal with some of the myths that were plentiful in the speech we have just heard, because what the Minister of Internal Affairs did not understand—it is pretty obvious—is that the bill applies only to baseload generation, and does not apply to any generation that is as efficient as renewable generation. So the two examples that the Minister used in his speech were simply not caught by the legislation that has been proposed by my colleague. That shows the poor level of analysis on that side of the House that has gone into the thinking behind the decision to oppose this legislation.

This bill reintroduces the 10-year restriction that Labour enacted as part of its emissions trading scheme in 2008. I chaired the Finance and Expenditure Committee that heard submissions on that legislation. It is quite clear to me that, having heard the industry, in particular, on the legislation, the restriction is the only meaningful way to ensure that the Government will give preference to renewable energy sources. The scrapping of that preference under urgency by the Government within a month or so of its coming into office was eloquent testament to its disregard for New Zealand’s environment.

We back this bill because we understand the need for New Zealand to maximise our existing renewable energy advantage. Already we derive between two-thirds and three-quarters of our electricity generation from renewable sources, and whether it is two-thirds or three-quarters depends on the time of the year, whether we are talking about baseload or peaking capacity, which are clearly concepts that the Minister is not familiar with.

I was proud to have been a director at Meridian Energy when that company made a decision to go 100-percent renewable, and when it made a commitment to build the Te ?piti Wind Farm, the West Wind project, and others. It is great to see other companies going into renewable generation, for example Mighty River Power going into the geothermal business in a big way, and others looking at concepts like tidal power. Those technologies represent the pathway towards getting to 90-percent baseload generation and beyond. They show that in the area of electricity generation we can have the growth we need in generation capacity while enhancing our environment.

It is a tragedy that Gerry Brownlee appears to have shelved the New Zealand Energy Strategy, because that document very carefully sets out the pathway by which we would achieve the 90-percent target by 2025, by retiring inefficient, old, fossil-fuelled plants.

Mrs Collins is bored, because she does not like the environment. For those of us who care about these things, I commend that document to her. It would be really good if she were to read the document to see that it does set out that pathway. It is a shame that Gerry Brownlee has just put it on the shelf and that he is ignoring it.

As well as preserving security of supply and supporting the environment, this bill would allow New Zealand to make significant strides towards lowering our country’s greenhouse gas emissions—something the current Government has abandoned any intention of doing. It was quite frank about that at the climate conference in Bonn last week. We just have to focus on developing more renewable forms of electricity, instead of burning more and more fossil fuels. I am yet to hear a plausible justification from the Government as to why it is voting down this bill. The bill’s proposals are not radical, it recognises the importance of security of supply, and it has sensible exemption provisions for situations like power crises.

Mrs Collins asks why we did not do it in 9 years. She has obviously missed the point that we did exactly that, and that her Government voted to repeal it. She obviously forgot she voted for that. It is all very well for Gerry Brownlee and Nathan Guy to stand up and aspire to having 90 percent of our energy generated by renewables, but their words need to be backed up by action, and that has not been forthcoming so far. If the Government has any desire to be serious about that goal, it should support this bill.