Point of Order: Buzz from the Beehive - 11/12/24

Jones opens $16.5m Maori-owned seafood processing plant while Reti presses on with Iwi Maori Partnership boards

Porirua, a thriving fishing port. Who knew?

Well, maybe not a thriving fishing port – but Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones today advised that a new seafood processing factory in Porirua north of Wellington will bring export revenue, jobs and opportunities for the community.

Point of Order: Buzz from the Beehive - 18/7/24

Simon Watts is chuffed with emissions reduction plan – but climate experts have hastened to expose the shortcomings

Long before it was posted on the government’s official website today, the ministerial press statement with the greatest implications for the nation’s wellbeing no longer was news.

This is Climate Change Minister Simon Watts’ claim (it is a matter open to argument) that the Government’s draft Emissions Reduction Plan shows we can stay within the limits of the first two emissions budgets while growing the economy.

Bryce Edwards: Was the Government’s climate plan watered down by lobbying?

Was last week’s major climate change announcement a case of vested interests getting their way? The sweet deal that agriculture and dairying got from the Green Party Minister for Climate Change certainly struck many as extraordinary.

Writing today in the Herald, lobbyist and commentator Matthew Hooton reflects on the Government’s Emissions Reduction Plan, and says the industry-friendly announcement was the result of extraordinarily powerful lobbying. He says that corporate lobbyists managed to assert their clients’ interests with the Greens: “New Zealand farmers are the world’s best but their lobbyists are even better. While it’s not true today’s Green Party is a wholly owned subsidiary of Fonterra, it’s understandable some environmental activists are starting to think so.”

NZCPR Newsletter: Splashing the Cash

On Saturday, Australians voted for change.

While some claim the electorate had become tired of a three-term government and others believe there was a pro-climate change aspect to the vote, what was evident was a growing disenchantment with ‘establishment’ parties and a shift towards alternatives.

The same patterns of disenchantment is evident here. There is no doubt that an “anyone but Jacinda” groundswell has emerged and is gaining momentum. The question is can the Ardern Labour Government reverse the sentiment for change before the next election? With eighteen months to go, they have time on their side, but the two major announcements they made last week reinforce doubts about their competence to rescue their sinking ship.

Roger Partridge: Blowing the budget

Yesterday’s budget was not the only budget in town. It followed hot on the heels of Climate Change Minister James Shaw’s announcement on Monday of the Government’s $2.9 billion Emissions Reduction Plan. The plan sets out the steps the Government will take to meet the first of three national emissions budgets.

Like yesterday’s budget from the Minister of Finance, Shaw’s announcement showed an alarming air of unreality.

The Finance Minister’s error was failing to respond to the change in the country’s economic predicament. Shaw’s error was failing to realise the Government has already implemented a policy to achieve the very objectives proposed for his costly Emissions Reduction Plan – at least for non-agricultural emissions.

Point of Order: Greenpeace gripes at govt’s greenhouse gas agenda but agriculture leaders welcome it (and push genetic technologies)

Despite pouring $2.9 billion of taxpayer funds into the battle against climate change, the Ardern government won few plaudits from climate change lobbies – and copped a severe caning from Greenpeace for refusing to cut dairy herds.

As Radio NZ reported,

“Climate activists say the government’s landmark plan to curb emissions is light on detail, full of fluff, and lets the worst polluters off the hook”.

Government ministers were nevertheless ebullient about their package, believing they had delivered a master stroke in earmarking $569 million to help low-income families get cleaner cars while winning over farmers with a new agricultural emissions centre.