MEDIA STATEMENT

Monday 16 April 2007

For Immediate Release

Goff Told Foreign Governments Foresters Would Own Credits

Cabinet papers released under the Official Information Act show that former Foreign Minister Phil Goff told foreign governments that New Zealand forestry investors would own Kyoto carbon credits and be able to trade them freely on international markets, the Kyoto Forestry Association (KFA) revealed today.

KFA spokesman Roger Dickie said the Cabinet papers contradict claims in Parliament by Prime Minister Helen Clark that there was never any commitment by the Government that forestry investors would own the credits, but are entirely consistent with what Government officials told the forestry industry throughout the 1990s and early part of this decade.

Cabinet paper POL (00) 26, which was written by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs & Trade (MFAT), after consultation with the Ministry of Agriculture & Forestry (MAF), the Ministry for the Environment, the Ministry for Economic Development (MED), the Ministry of Transport, the Treasury and the Department of the Prime Minister & Cabinet (DPMC), and signed by Mr Goff on 27 April 2000, states at paragraph 18 that:

“We also seek to maintain a high level of environmental discipline by allowing owners of sink credits to trade them freely on the international market. New Zealand made it clear during the Kyoto negotiations that we do not intend to use sink credits to – in effect – cross-subsidising our emitting sectors, allowing them to avoid taking action.”

“What Mr Goff was telling foreign governments in 2000 was no different from what officials told forest owners through the 1990s but it suggests the Prime Minister may have misled Parliament on 4 April when she denied any such commitment had ever been made,” Mr Dickie said.

Mr Dickie said the forestry industry was sick of being told by the Government it was greedy for simply wanting what successive governments promised it through the 1990s and 2000s, and which fuelled a planting boom during that time.

“Until the Government keeps its promises on carbon credits no one in the industry is going to have confidence in anything it says on anything else, and there will be no reversal of the rapid deforestation New Zealand is now experiencing,” he said. “People with 25-30 year investment horizons need assurances governments will keep their promises, and this Government has clearly not dealt with us fairly. Instead, it plans to use our credits to subsidise polluting industries, at odds with the commitments it made to its Kyoto partners internationally.”

Mr Dickie said the position on carbon credit ownership outlined by MFAT, MAF, the Ministry for the Environment, MED, the Ministry of Transport, the Treasury and DPMC in the Cabinet paper was consistent with the position on the issue of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation & Development (OECD), the National Party, the Green Party, the Maori Party and ACT.

Mr Dickie said the forestry industry was increasingly confident of gaining a parliamentary majority in favour of recognising forestry investors’ interests in the carbon credits.

END

nb. A copy of the Cabinet paper can be found at:
http://www.kfoa.co.nz/PDF/CAB%20100%202000.pdf

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