12 AUGUST 2015

Electricity Authority’s Unacceptable Line Charge Rort

The Wellington-based Electricity Authority has been criticised by New Zealand First’s submission on its Transmission Pricing Methodology, which will hike up lines charges for most New Zealand homes, businesses and farmers.

“By the authority’s own forecasts, electricity users living in Northland will face a staggering 172% increase in what they will now pay towards national grid charges,” says Mr Peters. “That is the rort.”

“The authority’s ‘user pays’ philosophy is absurd when it penalises people for living in Northland, Auckland or the South Island’s West Coast. Many provincial regions will get walloped in favour of the generators and big energy users.

“Rubbing salt into the wound are the huge after-tax profits of state-owned Transpower. The government could easily use the $73.8 million it earned in just the six months to 31 December 2014 to smooth electricity line charges.

“And, there needs to be close scrutiny of the Electricity Authority itself.

“This taxpayer-funded body spends about $10 million on salaries, contractors and board fees. In the 2013/14 Financial Year its chair, Dr Brent Layton, was paid $207,000 for a part-time job.

“And this year the National Party appointed, five-member board is forecast to share $582,000, including an ex-National Party Minister, Roger Sowry.

“It is hard to fathom how the authority can claim to act within its mandate to the benefit of consumers, when the biggest ‘winners’ from this review are large profitable generators and some of the largest businesses operating in New Zealand, many foreign owned.

“The authority’s long running review has dragged on since 2012. It exposes a gold-plated regulator pontificating in a Wellington ivory tower on how best to rort power users,” says Mr Peters.

“This, after all, was a system that present power users, parents and grandparents built before the free-market model came along to price gouge them for obscene profits.”

ENDS

© Scoop Media