Labour on clean and green
July 5th, 2012 at 12:00 pm by David Farrar
Grant Robertson has put out this pamphlet, which really needs a response. It is hard to know where to start, so let us take them in order.
Climate Change
Labour is great on rhetoric, but crap on results. In 1999 NZ’s gross emissions were 67,395 CO2e. Under nine years of Labour gross emissions went up 10% to 74,198 (and net emissions went up 13.4%). In the first two years under National gross emissions dropped 3.4% to 71,657. There was a failure to deal with climate change -Labour’s. Under National we are set to come in under our Kyoto Protocol target.
Labour’s policy blunders saw 30,000 hectares of deforestation in their fianl three years.
Maritime Disasters
This is a reference to the fact that National did not pass a law to give effect to the International Convention on Civil Liability for Bunker Oil Pollution Damage that would have doubled the liability of the Rena’s owners from $12m to $24m.
What Grant omits to mention is the convention was adopted in 2001, and Labour didn’t legislate for seven years on it, and the Labour Cabinet gave the legislation the lowest priority rating. Sure with perfect hindsight would have been good for National to have passed it, but for Grant and Labour to claim not passing the law has dented our clean green image is stupid. The impact of not having changed the law is potentially fiscal, not environmental.
EEZ environment
National has in fact passed a law to give give environment protection to the EEZ. Previously there was no protection at all. One can dispute the balance in the legislation, but again ironic and rich for the party that did nothing to protect the EEZ to be saying that actually passing a law to protect the EEZ damages NZ’s clean green reputation while having no law at all, bolstered it!
46 wells were drilled in the EEZ under Labour – all without any legislation at all to protect the environment.
Mining conservation land
Oh my God, National put out a discussion document on mining. Oh yeah, I am sure that really undermined NZ’s clean green image – a discussion document.
And do I even have to mention that Labour approved 218 permits for mining on conservation land – all done without harming NZ’s clean green image. You see in Labour world, it is only bad if National talks about it. It is good when Labour does it.
MFE Funding
Now this is just getting silly. No funding has been cut for environmental activities. The $1.75m budget cut was for 12 admin staff, after a review found their admin/non-admin staff ratio was 1:10 and in most agencies it was 1:20 to 1:40.
In Labourland, I guess there are hordes of foreign tourists thinking about coming to New Zealand because of its clean green reputation, and they decide not to come because 12 admin staff were got rid of in the Ministry for the Environment! Really, what planet do they think people live on.
I guess it is easy to stick five nonsensical bullet points on a postcard with a lovely picture as a backdrop. Far harder to actually have a track record that comes anywhere close to matching your rhetoric. I’ll take substance over rhetoric any day.
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July 5th, 2012 at 12:11 pm
It’s almost as if the economy shrunk slightly during that time…?
Vote:July 5th, 2012 at 12:16 pm
Do we have to fund crap like this??????
Robertson is a beltway pantywaist.
I doubt that anyone other than red melons will be influenced by his rubbish.
Vote:July 5th, 2012 at 12:21 pm
Emissions “dropped” under National because the LULUCF calculations were modified and the defined amount of forest cover was clarified thus resulting in a higher rate of removals. So an accounting amendment resulted in the drop, not policy. Also some of the drop can be attributed to a loss of livestock due to weather extremes and a rise in the cost of petrol.
[DPF: I think you are wrong. Those changes would impact net emissions, but not gross emissions.]
Vote:July 5th, 2012 at 12:30 pm
Actually, I was just looking this up and I think gross emissions dropped too – I’m guessing for the reasons y’all suggest. They’ve gone back up since and they and the net Kyoto position are higher than ever (which is still, weirdly, enough to meet the target). I think I saw the size of the forest sink dropped pretty quick between ’09 and ’10 too.
Vote:July 5th, 2012 at 12:30 pm
ETS is a scam.
Vote:National should wake up.
July 5th, 2012 at 12:39 pm
“In the first two years under National gross emissions dropped 3.4%….”
Who cares?
Percentage of Carbon dioxide (CO2) in the Earth’s atmosphere
0.039% * 100.0% = 0.039%
Percentage of Anthropogenic CO2 in the Earth’s atmosphere
0.117% * 0.039% = 0.00004563%
New Zealand’s share of Anthropogenic CO2 in the Earth’s atmosphere
0.110%* 0.00004563% = 0.00000005%
A drop of 3.5%
3.5%*0.00000005% = 0.00000000175%
So the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere has now been reduced by 0.00000000175%
What will the resulting drop in ‘Global Average Temperature” be as a result?
Vote:July 5th, 2012 at 12:39 pm
Link: up to ’10 at http://www.mfe.govt.nz/publications/climate/greenhouse-gas-inventory-2012-snapshot/index.html total emissions started dropping in ’06. More recent figure will be in the position statements, but as I say, I think they’ve stopped going down now.
And they have gutted the ETS.
Personally, given this government’s environmental record you could write this card five times over.
Vote:July 5th, 2012 at 12:41 pm
Clean green IMAGE.
That’s the point here,image….a lie,a deception.
Get the dumb bastards to spend their money on our false advertising. No morality.
Hopefully Abbot gets in soon over there,ditches the crazy carbon dioxide tax and thereby give some spine to National to bin the effing ETS.
Vote:July 5th, 2012 at 12:46 pm
Typical Lying Wanker.
Vote:Labour can’t even lie straight in bed.
July 5th, 2012 at 1:32 pm
As soon as somebody starts rabbiting on about “New Zealand’s clean green image” I know they will end up talking about control. How “we” need to stop [insert offending action here] as it violates this alleged image.
Vote:July 5th, 2012 at 1:41 pm
Furthermore the weather was getting warmer under Labour and it has been getting co0lder since National started cutting back on carbon emissions.
No doubt the mass media will comment on the in-accuracies in the pamphlet.
Vote:July 5th, 2012 at 1:54 pm
Kiwi Greg#
I agree.
The left have been saying of late “The 100% Pure label is now misleading.”
It has always been misleading. NZ will never be 100% Pure. I’ve said that for a year or two now.
The Left simply use statements like these to play with the emotions of the gullable and ignorant.
Vote:July 5th, 2012 at 2:38 pm
Labour party now the Green’s lapdog. Norman told Robertson to bark
Vote:July 5th, 2012 at 2:55 pm
These numbers you have quoted need to be spread DPF. The lying liars are in denial about their rubbish environmental record. It’s the same kind of lying about the price of power under SOE’s versus private ownership. They really do live on another planet. National’s environmental record is much better then Labour’s.
I await with interest the Labour party position on the 2 billion dollar gold mine prospect that recently was highlighted here. Ah me, they truly are a pack of duplicitous wankers aren’t they? They never cease to reinforce this.
Vote:July 5th, 2012 at 3:07 pm
Unless there are two sets of devil’s boots he got the picture wrong. The real devil’s boots
Vote:July 5th, 2012 at 5:17 pm
Fuck off Greenies.
Vote:July 5th, 2012 at 9:00 pm
What do you mean ‘no legislation to protect the environment’ with respect to drilling offshore?
Maritime protections rules, part 200: http://www.maritimenz.govt.nz/Environmental/Environmental-requirements/Requirements-for-installations/Requirements-for-installations.asp
Vote:July 5th, 2012 at 9:12 pm
The reason gross emissions drop is because of drought or reduced economic activity, neither of those things are anything to crow about.
Vote:NZ meets its Kyoto commitment because our gross emissions in 1990 were 61.8 million tonnes, and that then sets our commitment of 309 million tonnes over 5 years 2008 to 2012 (61.8 times 5) Now our commitment is met using net emissions not gross emissions. So as long as our net emissions 2008 to 2012 are less than our gross emissions in 1990 we have met our commitment. it is nothing more than a carbon accounting trick. If it was used for money it would be callled fraud and someone would be locked up.
The reason we are meeting our commitment is because we pretend we did not have any forests in 1990. The whole thing is a con and a cheat, the ETS achieves nothing other than take food out of the mouths of hungry children and give it to multi national forestry companies so that John Key can say he is doing something about global warming. And the only thing in John Keys favour is that while he might be prepared to stifle the NZ economy and make people suffer with this nonsense, the Green’s and Labour are even more heartless.
July 5th, 2012 at 10:31 pm
This is a whole lot less about what National have not done than what Labour will do and it’s not aimed at the “swing voter” but the voters lost to the Greens over the last year or so.
Vote: