Call To PM To Sack Nick Smith

The New Zealand Climate Science Coalition

Hon Secretary, Terry Dunleavy MBE,

9 October 2009

Call to PM to sack Nick Smith from climate change portfolio A call to Prime Minister to relieve Nick Smith of the climate change issues portfolio has been made today by the New Zealand Climate Science Coalition’s secretary, Terry Dunleavy. “It’s time to call a halt to this farce, in which Minister Smith treats New Zealanders as though we are a pack of gullible fools. Here we are, late on a Friday afternoon, just two working days before the close of submissions to Parliament’s Finance & Select Committee on the Government’s latest emissions trading bill, the Climate Change Response (Moderated Emissions Trading) Amendment Bill, and the Minister sees fit to release what ‘Carbon News’ describes as ‘an avalanche of documents’ about the costs of the scheme. This is not just shoddy maladministration by an incompetent Minister, it is as outrageous an abuse of power as any we had to endure under the previous Labour government,” said Mr Dunleavy.

“There are two steps the Prime Minister must take without delay:

“The first will be to instruct the chairman of the Finance & Expenditure Select Committee to extend by at least a week the closing date for submissions on the Climate Change Response (Moderated Emissions Trading) Amendment Bill to allow for submitters to take into account the cost figures released late today. There is no reason for the unseemly haste with which Nick Smith has been trying to drive this legislation, using as a pretext the UN COPP meeting in Copenhagen in December, when already UN officials themselves have admitted that no final decisions are likely to be taken in the absence of agreement by the United States and with the continued opposition of developing nations led by China, India and Brazil.

“The second will be to relieve Nick Smith of this portfolio, and pass it to Tim Groser, who seems to have a more balanced grasp of climate change issues as they affect New Zealand and our relations with the rest of the world. With the world cooling for the past nine years, and more international scientists by the day joining those who assert that climate variations are natural and mostly influenced by the sun, the whole climate change debate is moving away from the discredited science of the bureaucratic UN IPCC and more toward what nations can agree among themselves is the fairest and most cost beneficial solutions,. This is time for New Zealand’s official response to be in the hands of someone like Tim Groser, with his impeccable negotiating experience and expertise at international level.

“The Prime Minister should also be asking himself why Treasury found it necessary to say in its commentary on this latest Bill that it had ‘formed the view that the level and quality of analysis presented is not commensurate with the significance of the proposals, which represent major design changes to the Emissions Trading Scheme, and that the RIS does not provide an adequate basis for informed decision-making’.

“Treasury said that some key risks identified include (but are not limited to) the following: • there is no clear analytical basis for the proposal to align some key design elements of the New Zealand ETS with those in the currently proposed Australian Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme (CPRS). For example, there is no discussion of the overall suitability or benefits of applying these elements to New Zealand’s unique emissions profile and industrial structures: • there is no discussion of the risks of harmonising with an overseas scheme that has not yet been finalised or agreed and may yet be subject to significant revision. Such risks may include the potential impacts on business certainty and investment decisions, and the overall credibility, sustainability and effectiveness of the NZ ETS: • there is no information on the implied transition path for firms over the medium-to-long term, particularly given that the proposal is for a temporary period of greater assistance coupled with an ambitious long-term emissions reduction target. Without this, it is hard to assess whether it is likely that the design changes will allow for a smoother transition for business.”

Mr Dunleavy said that every New Zealander should look very carefully at the comments by our own Government’s most senior watchdog, Treasury. “Treasury wouldn’t use such everyday terms, but what they are saying, in effect, is that this Bill is a dog’s breakfast and we all need our heads read if we allow it to proceed at all, let alone with such undignified and unjustified haste. It’s time for the Prime Minister to step in and take charge of a situation which is simply well out of hand.”

ends

© Scoop Media