Ghastly Green Goading

Oh Green Party, why do you goad me so?

So often I want to agree with you, really I do. You used to support an emissions tax over an ETS – quite rightly – then cast that into the wind for some reason as far as I can tell.

But luckily you kept some of your wits about you, and are calling for some fairly obvious changes to the ETS, with regard to intensity based allocations, price caps, etc. Again, you are right on calling for these changes – thank you.

But then you go and manage, in the space of one sentence, to turn off all the goodwill you’ve built up as I read your statement.
You say this:

“It would be easier and cheaper if the National Party just wrote some big cheques and handed them to our largest foreign-owned companies.”

What did you add, by slagging off the foreign ownership? You mean it would be OK to have massive corporate welfare to NZ-owned corporations? That’s the only implication I can take from this. Unless possibly you hadn’t reached your required degree of xenophobia within a press statement. Do you actually have a quota?

Lets get this clear now. If you want to be against corporate welfare, then be against it. The problem, surely, is the socialising of funding for something that will benefit corporates. Not that some of these corporates may or may not be foreign owned.

Please stop randomly throwing in buzzwords that you think appeal to hip, free thinking urban dwellers like using “foreign-owned” as a pejorative term when it adds nothing to what you are saying – and is more or less totally tangential to your argument.

The full text of the statement, released around 6.15am today, is below.

The Government’s plan for the Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) will mean that ordinary kiwis will have to pay twice for their emissions, the Green Party said today.

“Far from choosing the most cost effective option, the Government is planning for failure, with kiwis picking up the tab,” said Jeanette Fitzsimons, Green Party Climate Change Spokesperson.

“It will see our emissions continue to climb unchecked, with no incentive to reduce them.

“Kiwis will have to pay for their own emissions up front via their electricity and petrol bills, and then pay for those of our largest polluters, via their taxes.”

The Report of the Emissions Trading Scheme Review Committee shows that National’s plan is for polluters to get more free credits the more they pollute, and for a price cap to be put on carbon, shutting forestry out of the market.

“The current ETS will become the sceptic’s ETS, as only the Act Party could support intensity based allocation,” Ms Fitzsimons said.

“What the Government is proposing is the biggest wealth transfer in New Zealand history from the taxpayer to the big polluters.

“It would be easier and cheaper if the National Party just wrote some big cheques and handed them to our largest foreign-owned companies.

“It is an outrage that a scheme meant to tackle the most pressing issue of our generation has been high jacked to line the pockets of the wealthy corporations, rather than protect the most vulnerable, our children.

“The Green Party had great difficulty supporting the weak scheme put forward by Labour. It will be much easier to reject this time around,” Ms Fitzsimons said.

For the full report back to the House, (see page 66):

http://www.parliament.nz/NR/rdonlyres/83AC973B-6FDE-4260-846E-E7CCFBD3FE21/113444/DBSCH_SCR_4485_ReviewoftheEmissionsTradingSchemean.pdf

ENDS