10. Hon Dr NICK SMITH (National—Nelson) Link to this
to the Minister of Energy
Does he believe New Zealanders may have to accept initial volumes of biofuels from unsustainable sources, as reported in the New Zealand Herald on 3 April 2008 under the headline “Parker pushes biofuel agenda”?
Hon DAVID PARKER (Minister of Energy) Link to this
Like the Greens, I believe we can avoid importing unsustainable biofuels.
Hon Dr Nick Smith Link to this
Why on earth is his Government so insistent on introducing biofuels this year, before any sustainable standards are in place, when the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment has said that imported biofuels will put New Zealand’s clean, green image at risk and that his bill should be dropped, and when the United Kingdom House of Commons audit committee has called for a moratorium on biofuels until there are rules on their environmental integrity?
Existing biofuels produced and used in New Zealand are from sustainable sources. The member Dr Nick Smith has indeed noted that there are additional sources of biofuels, like tallow, that can also be brought forward for use sustainably. The Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment is, of course, right to be concerned about sustainability issues. The bill already includes provisions around that and, as I have previously said, we are happy for the committee to tighten these provisions.
Hon David Benson-Pope Link to this
Can the Minister share with the House the support he has seen for the Biofuel Bill to proceed?
I have seen reports that sustainable tallow to bio-diesel producers will be unable to proceed with their multimillion-dollar production plants without a mandatory sales obligation. A number of these are pleading for the bill to go ahead, and they assure the select committee that biofuels can be produced sustainably and in volume in New Zealand. Yet again we are seeing National wavering in its support, showing once again that it is all talk and just wants delay.
Hon Dr Nick Smith Link to this
How was it that the Prime Minister could cite “sustainability” 38 times when opening Parliament last year and the Government plasters all over billboards and publications the Government slogan “Everyone can have sustainability”, but its officials cannot define what it actually means until 2011?
Despite Dr Smith’s pretence at being blue-green, here we have National again being consistent, opposing every meaningful step the Government takes on sustainability—
Hon Dr Nick Smith Link to this
I raise a point of order, Madam Speaker. I would be very happy to answer Labour’s questions about the Bluegreens and our vision for New Zealand, but my question was about the definition of “sustainability” and the advice from the Minister’s officials that they cannot define what it means until 2011, despite the fact that the Government has repeated the phrase over and over again. I think that the Minister should address the question.
Madam SPEAKERThe member’s question related to sustainability. We have the member criticising us for taking insufficient amounts of electricity from renewable sources, while Mr Brownlee calls for more coal. Just last week we had Dr Smith saying to the New Zealand Herald that the emissions trading scheme should be delayed—[ Interruption]
Hon Dr Nick Smith Link to this
I raise a point of order, Madam Speaker. Those Ministers have responsibility for Government policy. They do not—thankfully—have responsibility for the National Party. Every time they get a difficult question, they recite all sorts of misinformation about National and they do not address the question. I simply ask you, Madam Speaker, to ask the Minister to address the question of how the Government can recite all this sustainability rhetoric when its officials say that they cannot define what it means until 2011.
Hon Dr Michael Cullen Link to this
I raise a point of order, Madam Speaker. Now that we have settled that issue, there was an interjection from Mr Brownlee, which I am sure you heard and for which he should apologise and withdraw.
Gerry BrownleeI withdraw and apologise. I raise a point of order, Madam Speaker. Mr Parker should expect that sort of comment across the House when he makes misleading statements. I have never called for an increase in the use of coal. This is some little piece of special thinking of his own, which, as many other people in the industry have noted, he is prone to.
Hon Dr Michael Cullen Link to this
The member makes quite a serious statement, when he says “you should expect” certain statements to be made when debating matter is introduced into the House. It is not for any member to take unto himself or herself the right to try to bully this House or to break the Standing Orders because that member does not like the nature of what is being said.
I thank the member. The point is, however, that members know that there is a certain way in which to address issues in this House. Matters are debatable in the House. Frequently statements are made about policies or people that are not agreed with. There are ways of responding to that, and that way is consistent with the Standing Orders. So I would ask all members to do that in the future.
My answer was interrupted. Last week we had Dr Smith saying to the New Zealand Herald that the emissions trading scheme should be delayed. Now he wants delays—
I raise a point of order, Madam Speaker. The question that the Hon David Parker is required to answer is quite simple: why can his officials not give a definition for what “sustainable” means in terms of biofuels until 2011? Whatever we might have said over a range of issues will, of course, be of great interest to the public, but it is of no relevance to the answer to this question.
The question started by quoting the Prime Minister’s record on sustainability in referencing sustainability. I am also doing that and contrasting it with the position taken by National, which says one thing and then does another.
After having called for a delay in the emissions trading scheme, he now wants delays in biofuels. It is obvious that National is deeply divided on these issues.
Hon Dr Nick Smith Link to this
I raise a point of order, Madam Speaker. My question is not about the emissions trading system, and it is not about National Party policy. It is actually about Government policy. The simple question is: when the Government has given all this advertising and air time to sustainability, why cannot his officials define what it means, in respect of biofuels, until 2011? The Minister has had five goes at addressing the question. Every single time he has attempted to answer it, he has started by bagging the National Party, for which he is not responsible. I simply ask, and you should ask, that he address the question of Government policy, for which he has responsibility.
There is a habit developing from the National Party that when I have the temerity to contrast its members’ rhetoric with their action, they break up my answers. These are the notes I was speaking from. They are not unduly long. I was quoting from a New Zealand Herald article, they quoted from a New Zealand Herald article in the primary question, and I see nothing out of order in my answer.
How can the Minister claim to have prepared notes for a supplementary question? If, in fact, he does, and they are so clever and so succinct, why does he not just table them and sit down?
Hon Dr Michael Cullen Link to this
That just shows how lacking in experience the front bench of the National Party is. Ministers prepare for question time and it is usually not hard to guess what kinds of supplementary questions members opposite will ask, because they lack any imagination, and therefore Ministers prepare their answers to those prepared supplementary questions, usually typed out for the Opposition by their research unit.
Hon Dr Nick Smith Link to this
I raise a point of order, Madam Speaker. The Minister is not responsible for what National’s view might be. What is disturbing in his prepared answers is that it seems that question time has now deteriorated, to the point where regardless of what the supplementary question is, the Government is going to recite some sort of damning of National policy, rather than the Minister doing Parliament’s proper job of answering in terms of his ministerial responsibility.
Rt Hon Winston Peters Link to this
Madam Speaker, I think if you took the trouble to go through the Hansard you would find that on more occasions than infrequently this member of Parliament always challenges, by way of a point of order, the answers coming from Ministers. He does it all the darn time, as though he is somebody special and someone who has a special licence in this House to carry on in that way. [ Interruption] He is right about the humbug, because that is what he engages in. He cannot take it. The Minister spoke only four words the last time, and the member was on his feet, taking a point of order. I say “If you can’t take it, sunshine, find a new job.”
That is not a point of order. I just remind members that the Minister is to address the question. The Speaker is not responsible for the answer. The Standing Orders ask for that. Normally, however, it would be useful if the Minister could finish his answer.
I will conclude by saying that New Zealand should start, and is starting, the transition to sustainable transport fuels.
Hon Dr Nick Smith Link to this
Has not his biofuels policy, damned by the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment and by his own admission that it is going to result in the importing of unsustainable biofuels, joined the long list of embarrassing climate change policy failures, of the billion-dollar Kyoto bungle, the “fart tax” fiasco, the carbon tax debacle, the solar water heating flop, the deforestation disaster, and its thermal electricity ban being overturned by its own State-owned enterprise?
Not at all. In the last week, of course, we have had a release from Biodiesel New Zealand saying it can meet all of New Zealand’s bio-diesel requirements by the end of the year with a product that is sustainably sourced from tallow. National is, I repeat, obviously divided on these issues. Despite Dr Nick Smith’s rhetoric, the senior fossils on his front bench, like Mr Williamson and Dr Lockwood Smith, are in the ascendancy and blue-green is increasingly black and slippery.
I raise a point of order, Madam Speaker. I realise you are working your way through the interests that various parties have in getting particular positions over question time, but I point you to Speakers’ rulings 139/3 and 139/6. I do not think Mr Parker’s answers have met those requirements at all this afternoon.
Thank you. I thought the member was going to raise what I think is a legitimate point of order, which is that the Minister is not responsible for National Party policy, and I just remind members of that.
Jeanette Fitzsimons Link to this
I do not think I have ever done this before, but I seek leave for an additional supplementary question—we have used up our allocation—because I think there is an issue at the essence of this argument that is being disguised by what is happening, and I would like to try to clarify it with one additional supplementary question.
Hon Dr Nick Smith Link to this
The Secretary-General of the United Nations, Ban Ki-moon, called last month for a halt on the rush to biofuels, the British Government’s chief scientific adviser says that biofuels are threatening the lives of billions of people, the G8 last month called for strict biofuel standards, the European Union has admitted its biofuel policy has caused serious environmental problems, and the German environment Minister, only last week, stopped plans to require additional biofuels, so why on earth is this Government insisting on proceeding with a policy before standards for sustainability are in place, and when, by his own admission, the policy is going to result in the importation of unsustainable biofuels?
Before the Minister answers, I must say that that was an example of a very long question. If members have long questions, they are likely to get long answers.
It is because the mandatory sales obligation, far from being as extreme as the member proposes, is for a modest 0.5 percent of transport fuel in the first year.
Hon Dr Nick Smith Link to this
I seek leave to table the House of Commons’ environmental audit report on the difficulties, and the call for a moratorium on biofuels in the United Kingdom.
Hon Dr Nick Smith Link to this
I seek leave to table the statement by the Secretary-General of the United Nations calling for a comprehensive halt on the implementation of biofuels as a consequence of the global crisis in food prices.
Rt Hon Winston Peters Link to this
I raise a point of order, Madam Speaker. You have just seen a member of Parliament take almost 30 minutes, mucking around with the House and raising numerous points of order, and before the question is even answered for the satisfaction of all the House—because there is a colleague here who wants to ask a question—that member rises to his feet in his inimitable, arrogant way and seeks to table all the documents. That is a disgraceful set of proceedings, and he should be brought to heel by his leader rather than behaving like the clown he is. Only he gets away with it, and I would like you to tell me why that is.
I will admit that this has been an interesting start to the week with lots of points of order, which have come back into fashion and most of which are not points of order. However, we will persevere. Are there any more questions? There are.
Peter BrownDoes the Minister have any concerns, at all, about the principle of growing crops to fuel motor vehicles, knowing that it will increase the price of food and that a significant proportion of the people of this world are starving?
Yes, I do. That is one of the things that should be addressed in sustainability criteria. I point out that the existing biofuels being produced in New Zealand do not have that effect; tallow to bio-diesel would not have that effect, and neither does sugar cane to ethanol from Brazil.
Jeanette Fitzsimons Link to this
Has the Minister been informed by anybody on the select committee of whether his officials informed the committee that they could not define sustainability before 2011 or did they say that that was the year when they expected the international standard to be ready, and does he agree with the Green Party that a New Zealand sustainability standard could actually be ready in a few months?
Yes, I agree with both of those propositions. I note that it is actually Green members who have been at the forefront of their wish to see sustainability standards developed and applied for New Zealand.
Hon Dr Nick Smith Link to this
I seek leave to table the advice from the Ministry of Economic Development saying that sustainability standards for biofuels could not be developed until 1 January 2011.
Rt Hon Winston Peters Link to this
I raise a point of order, Madam Speaker. Despite the last point of order raised by New Zealand First, that member got up and did it again. There is a member of the Māori Party who is seeking to ask a question, and without any regard for him, that member gets up and raises another point of order to seek leave. He knows the convention here that when the questions are finished, a member can seek leave to table—not beforehand.
I quite agree, and I have noted this before. It is a convention, but not more than a convention, that leave is sought at the end of the time, when the supplementary questions are over. But it is only a convention. Members are perfectly entitled to do what they like in this House—and normally they do—as long as it is more or less within the Standing Orders.
I raise a point of order, Madam Speaker. I wonder whether it would be worth your while pointing out to the Rt Hon Winston Peters that it also once used to be a convention for the Minister of Foreign Affairs to agree with Government policy.
Te Ururoa Flavell Link to this
Tēnā anō koe, Madam Speaker. Ki te Minita, he aha tā te Kāwanatanga hei tautoko i ngā kamupene penehīni ki te hanga kaupapa kia taea ai e rātou te toha whānui ngā paraumu hinu ā ngā rā e heke iho nei?
[An interpretation in English was given to the House.]
[Greetings once again to you, Madam Speaker. To the Minister, what is the Government doing to support fuel companies establish a distribution infrastructure necessary to enable widespread use of biofuels in the future?]