The Finance and Expenditure Select Committee has been unable to come to a majority decision on the proposed emissions trading bill.

The bill will be returned to Parliament unchanged. The Government is negotiating with the Maori Party over support for the bill.

The committee also does not report on policy or drafting issues, citing widely divergent views and time constraints.

Select Committee Report: DBSCH_SCR_4520_ClimateChangeResponseModeratedEmiss.pdf

Climate Change Response (Moderated Emissions Trading) Amendment Bill

The Finance and Expenditure Committee has examined the Climate Change Response (Moderated Emissions Trading) Amendment Bill and recommends that the House take note of its report.

Conclusions

We were unable to reach agreement on whether to recommend that the Climate Change Response (Moderated Emissions Trading) Amendment Bill be passed, because of members’ differing views as to the suitability of the bill’s proposed changes to the design of the New Zealand Emissions Trading Scheme (NZ ETS). We also could not agree on the kinds of amendments from which the bill might benefit if it were to be passed.

Our report sets out the process that we followed in considering the bill, the main changes proposed to the NZ ETS under the bill, and the minority views of the members from New Zealand National, New Zealand Labour, the Green Party, the Māori Party, and ACT New Zealand.

We recognise that a select committee’s report on a bill usually canvasses the committee’s views on the substantive policy and drafting issues that the committee confronted in the course of its consideration. However, widely divergent views on this bill amongst our members and time constraints prevented us from reaching agreement on the content of such a committee report. We concluded that it would be more appropriate for each party represented on the committee to have an opportunity to express separately its view on the proposals in the bill and the policy issues raised during our hearings of evidence.

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Deaf Ears: Speaker On Support For Mojo Mathers

Scoop Audio: In a press conference this afternoon Speaker Lockwood Smith defended his handling of requests for support for profoundly deaf MP Mojo Mathers' participation in Parliament, and said he was "deeply concerned" by the way the issue had been portrayed.

Earlier today the Greens said they had been told they would have to fund support Mathers requires out of their own budget. More>>