Gas (Information Disclosure and Penalties) Amendment Bill

Members, we now come to Part 2. This is the debate on clauses 19 to 23, “Amendments to regulations”. The question is that Part 2 stand part.

Yeah, I’d just like to talk to clause 19, around the regulations. The regulations, as we’ve heard tonight, are around disclosure. I’m really disappointed that the last part of the bill was cut short in the most open and transparent Government ever, particularly when the Minister actually took a swipe at me for talking about the Climate Change Commission, and saying it had nothing to do with climate, and then in her future call, she decided that she was going to use the climate and take a swipe at National as a basis. So I think it was really shut down so that the Minister didn’t have to ask the questions.

So the questions that I actually want to know is that this is about having a plan, this is about a regulation to ask the industry to disclose and be open and transparent about the amount of gas that is on hand. The Minister went through a whole lot of information before talking about what the industry had told the Gas Industry Company. They also told the Gas Industry Company and the select committee that they were concerned about all of the competitive information or the ability to go fishing—as Simon Court has actually mentioned already tonight.

So the Minister is expecting that this bill will be passed—and it probably will, because they have control over everything right now—and the industry will be expected to put the plan of how much gas is in front of the Minister. I have a really relevant question for the Minister. Given that when the Climate Change Commission—and it is relevant because she talked about the climate in her own speeches tonight—came out and said that it would be a good idea for the Government to have a plan to our future energy transition, the Minister actually agreed with the Climate Change Commission. Now, this is four years in to this Government. They actually made some very serious decisions in 2018. They call it a just transition. No one can see what the transition is. There is no plan. Is it unreasonable of the Minister to ask an industry to disclose and have a plan, when the Minister is unwilling to disclose what the Minister’s and the Government’s plan is?

My question to the Minister, based around that, is: did the Minister instigate this bill so that the Government would know where the gas is so that they can keep the lights on?

It might be helpful for the committee to talk through what it is that Part 2 of this bill does, and the regulations that are being changed by this. It is quite a tight part of the bill, in terms of the 2008 regulations that are being changed. So if we look at clause 19: that identifies the gas governance compliance regulations 2008 is the regulations amended in the subpart, that largely what Part 2 of the bill is talking about is the penalties regime. And what you will see through subsequent clauses round there is how it is that the bill is going to work in terms of that penalties regime.

Thank you, Minister for that explanation about the penalties regime. When we look a bit further down the track, what we see is a penalties regime which gives this Government regulator, regulating agency, authority—what do we call it? A regulating body. It actually says that they can ignore any civil penalties or civil agreements already reached and impose their own penalties. I guess that shows you what the tendency is of this Government to ignore the desire, the will, to collaborate, to solve problems for the benefit of communities, for the businesses that operate in those communities, for the businesses that support families and workers on high-paid jobs in some of New Zealand’s most interesting and challenging problem-solving sectors like the oil and gas sector. It appears that this Government prefers to take it upon itself to regulate and to come up with their own penalties regime rather than allowing, through contracts, through mediation, potentially even through litigation or arbitration between parties who may be affected by a shortage of gas, by announcements which they weren’t expecting—although given the information that the gas industry company already provides, it’s hard to imagine there would be a scenario where any kind of action would be necessary because all the information that will ever be needed is already out there in plain sight. That’s why the regulations that are proposed are completely unnecessary. The Minister should answer this question: what additional information that is not currently disclosed would the Minister want to know?

I did address that in answers to the previous part of the bill. It’s probably no surprise that that was addressed in answers to a previous part of the bill because Schedule 1AA that the member is referring to in the call that he just took is a consequence of clause 18, which is, in fact, in Part 1of the legislation.

So we are debating Part 2, and we are talking about the regulations which establish rulings panel, and my question to the Minister is what type of or what value or form of punishment would elicit the kind of information that is not currently available, because that’s what Part 2, in the Amendments to regulation, seeks to do, is to set up a rulings panel to order penalties and to define what offences and breaches are.

Let’s be clear, when we’ve heard the Minister tell us time and again that the Gas Industry Company itself asked for the privilege of being regulated, well, I’ve read a few bedtime stories to my kids in the past, and sometimes I get to a part of the book where the page is missing, and so I skip that bit, and I fill in the blanks. But children are smart, and they always know when a parent or a Government Minister is just making it up and filling in the blanks.

CHAIRPERSON (Adrian Rurawhe): Order! You can’t make that kind of accusation. I’m going to require you to withdraw and apologise.

I withdraw and apologise, Mr Chair. So look, to complete that analogy, this is no bedtime story. This is no fairy tale. It’s more like a nightmare for those organisations and those businesses required to comply. If we come back to the reason why they need to comply with this need for a regulation, when the Gas Industry Company supposedly offered this opportunity for regulation to the Minister, “Minister, please regulate us. We cannot manage ourselves.”—look, I’ve been in the principal’s office. I’ve been offered a month of detention or six of the best, and it’s not a pleasant choice to have to make. So I would like to ask the Minister—

💬 Hon Member: What did you choose?

I always chose six of the best because it seemed that it was sometimes quicker to get the punishment over. It’s quicker to get the punishment over rather than to suffer writing lines and suffering at the hands of the administration. But that’s a very good question.

So look, the question for the Minister: what level of penalties or other form of punishment would be required to force the industry to disclose information that is not currently being disclosed?

I’d remind the member that what Part 1 of the bill does, in terms of the penalties that we’re discussing in Part 2, of course, gives the Gas Industry Company, which is the industry-owned company that imposes the regulations, it empowers them to make the recommendations to the Minister around the regulation. So all of that will be worked through with the industry. Just as the member is saying the industry need to be involved in these decisions and those final policy decisions, that is exactly the regime that the committee has just passed after under Part 1 of the bill.

I move, That the question be now put.

Simon Court’s amendment to the Schedule, set out on Supplementary Order Paper 41, is ruled out of order as being inconsistent with a previous decision of the committee. The question is that the Schedule stand part.