THE EMISSIONS TRADING SCHEME – WHERE TO FROM HERE?
AUTHOR: Peter Dunne
It has at last been possible to submit the report of the emissions trading scheme review select committee to Parliament, and the immediate question is where to from here. Given the range of minority reports, it is not immediately clear to see the next steps, although there are a few important bottom lines.
For a start, every party but ACT accepts climate change is a real issue New Zealand has to respond to. Every party except ACT and the Maori Party favour an emissions trading scheme over the blunter instrument of a carbon tax. Every party, again excluding ACT, favours an all-gases, all sectors approach. Indeed, the National and Labour parties agree on 32 of the committee’s 34 recommendations. That is why I said when tabling the report that it was very much a “middle road” through some “complex and contentious material”, and gave the government the mandate it needed to move forward.
The best way in which that can happen is for National and Labour to set aside their political differences and reach a broad agreement on the future of the emissions trading scheme, both to put in place a durable regime, and also to send a clear signal of certainty to major sectors of the economy about New Zealand’s approach. My strong view is that can only happen through Prime Minister John Key and Labour leader Phil Goff getting together to hammer out an agreement, and that it is now time for them to do so.
I am aware of the informal discussions to date between the Climate Change Minister and his Labour counterpart but, frankly, the incentives were never there for them to go very far. The Minister is seen by some of his colleagues as too much of a zealot on the issue, and the Labour spokesperson is simply too junior for his views to actually matter.
Climate change is arguably the most important long-term issue facing New Zealand today. Establishing a viable and durable political response is vitally important, because, as I said when Labour first introduced the emissions trading scheme legislation in 2007, this issue is “bigger than any particular political party, this Parliament, or any Parliament.” Setting that tone can only come through the active involvement of the Prime Minister and Labour leader right now. They need to take personal responsibility now for the next stages of the emissions trading scheme.
This should not be too difficult for either of them, given that the issues between them are hardly insurmountable, and their profession that they want to negotiate in good faith. On that basis, they should be able to quickly agree the high level parameters of the ETS and the changes to be made to it. Once that has happened, their respective climate change spokespeople should be able to finalise the details very quickly, given that there is really little distance between their current positions.
The select committee’s report gives Mr Key and Mr Goff the platform – now it is their challenge and responsibility to use that to resolve the matter.