Land Transport (Clean Vehicle Discount Scheme Repeal) Amendment Bill

I move, That the Land Transport (Clean Vehicle Discount Scheme Repeal) Amendment Bill be now read a third time.

This bill, which repeals Labour’s regressive ute tax—inequitable ute tax—scheme, is now before Parliament, ready to be passed into law, to end the ute tax on 31 December 2023. A happy New Year to our farmers and tradies, who have been punished by the former Government. This Government was elected with all three parties—National, ACT, and New Zealand First—committing to the repeal of the ute tax as part of our coalition agreement, and this bill gives effect to that as part of our 100-day plan. I want to acknowledge the ACT Party for their coalition agreement on this, and the support of New Zealand First as well on this particular piece of legislation.

As I’ve said in my other reading speeches on this particular piece of legislation, the policy which was put in place by the prior Government was fiscally irresponsible—a $300 million deficit left behind by the previous Government. It was inequitable, by taking money from people who have very little or no choice as to what type of vehicle they can use and giving money to people who can already afford to buy electric vehicles. That policy is something that this side of the House does not support. It also would constantly require changes that impact the car industry and car market significantly, creating uncertainty in the market, which is unnecessary.

The National Party, the ACT Party, and the New Zealand First Party are proud to stand here repealing that piece of legislation. We know that there will continue to be an increased uptake of electric vehicles as more and more car manufacturers produce more and more electric vehicles and bring them into New Zealand, and we will continue to invest in the electric vehicle charging infrastructure to support this uptake over time. I commend the bill to the House.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. It really is a sad day for this Parliament, which started on 12 December as the clocks in the Chamber do indicate, because this will, if successfully passed this evening, be the third piece of legislation that this new Government have brought to the House under urgency and it will make a huge difference in a negative way to families and communities all around Aotearoa, New Zealand.

You know, it’s often reflected upon—the use of urgency, which is a rare occurrence in the House’s experience. To set aside the time of the House to effectively sit through to midnight last night, to sit from this morning and right through to whenever we finish, is generally used for those issues that are the most pressing. Climate change is indeed an extremely pressing issue, but what the Government is doing with this piece of legislation is they are heading in the wrong direction when it comes to addressing climate change—providing an opportunity to meet the needs that our communities need to take up the responsibilities to do their bit when it comes to addressing that pressing issue of climate change.

This is a bill that is going to be devastating in terms of people’s opportunity and ability to make a difference. Small steps do actually matter. Small steps do actually count. What this is doing is it is removing, for households, the opportunity to make an easy choice around converting to a low-emission vehicle selection or choice. It’s really, really interesting that in the committee stage of this bill, members on this side of the House tried to put up—well, we did put up—amendments that were not accepted by the Government, amendments that would make it easier for our community.

I think of one particular amendment which was around an opportunity to provide those people who had taken the rebate since it had been introduced with an opportunity to return or refund to the taxpayer the money that they were very happy to pocket. Now, I’m sure that there are many in this particular community of ours that have taken the rebate and who may choose to speak out about it, but they do not want to support a proposal or a process that would easily allow people to if they choose to.

The Minister in the chair at the time, Minister Andrew Bayly, said, “Well, members are always able to do that, to return their moneys to the Crown.” Well, that is not exactly the case. And perhaps, actually, members opposite and others who are in that situation who don’t think that this rebate is actually required or necessary, may choose to do that if they wish to. But the legislative provision was voted down by this Government, so it’s not able to be included in there.

We heard a lot from the Minister of Transport recently around how this is a scheme that is fiscally unsustainable. Yet we know that with the changes that the Labour Government had put in place in July of this year, already the take of the rebate is $33 million higher than the actual cost. So what this Government is doing is in a point in time they are removing a particular amount of money that has been of benefit to the Government and the Crown when they are so concerned about things being fiscally more responsible and indeed unsustainable. It does not make any sense,

This is taking New Zealand backwards and it joins the other two pieces of legislation that this Government have rushed through this House over the last few days under urgency. There has not been a select committee opportunity for members to feed into this. There has not been an opportunity for organisations from within the sector and outside of the sector to make their views known on what they think about this bill. Of course, we have members opposite who believe they know better—they know better than communities around the country.

💬 Hon Members: It’s called an election.

They know better—and look, we hear about this all the time, and I think this is the third time that they’ve said, “It’s called an election”. Well, I look forward to their arguments about them progressing their smoke-free legislative change that they didn’t go to the community or to the electorate about, saying that they were going to change that—shame on them; shame on them.

There have been a number of people who have made contact with members on this side of the House to really express their concern around the pace within which this Government is actually making this change, and one such is Drive Electric—

💬 Hon Matt Doocey: Your union mates, that’s who.

Mr Doocey, don’t be afraid of the unions, they do some good work. Drive Electric is one example. But they have cited—and I used this earlier today—that the research that they’ve provided to all members of the House shows that the new Government’s policy that they are seeking to progress under urgency this evening, to remove the discount and also to weaken the Clean Car Standard, would mean between 100,000 and 350,000 fewer electric vehicles (EVs) on the roads in New Zealand by 2030. How is that going to help our country achieve our goals of doing what we need to?

💬 Hon Rachel Brooking: It’s not.

It is not going to achieve that—it is not going to achieve that. That is exactly why one proposal that was put forward in the committee of the whole House was to change the name of the bill, because it is about no action on climate—no action on climate change at all.

It’s also of interest that the Minister was not interested in providing this House or, indeed, anyone, for that matter, with a copy of the regulatory impact statement. Now there is a regulatory impact statement that has been prepared. The Minister has been quite clear about that. It is extremely unfortunate that the House has not had the benefit of being able to consider that alongside this particular bill. It’s also rather difficult for the community and folk all around the country to be able to participate in this process when they’re not around that. Yet we hear constantly that they’re all about process. Well, if this is an indication of the sort of process that they’re wanting to embark upon, it’s going to be a very, very difficult time for many, indeed.

This scheme that this Government seems so intent on removing is a scheme that is making a difference. It is a scheme that is working. It is a scheme that relates to and has been utilised by people from all walks of life. I’m sure we can all reflect on some members in our own constituencies who have, perhaps, had a conversation about the difference that it makes to their household, the difference that it makes to their daily lives. It is, as my colleague the Hon Damien O’Connor said, a good investment in reducing emissions. This is something for which we haven’t actually heard any alternative from the Government. They’re, on the one hand, quite happy to remove this incentive that is making a huge difference for households but, on the other hand, they are not coming up with what the alternative is going to be, how they are going to ensure that there are opportunities for households, for businesses, for community members to do what they need to do in order to address the real and confronting issues of climate change.

This is an interesting point because they have also talked about EV infrastructure, yet we haven’t heard from the Minister—although the Minister has had ample opportunity today to tell us about that, to address that issue. There have been no comments on the roll-out of EV infrastructure. Isn’t that interesting?

💬 Hon Member: Very.

It’s very interesting, because, I understand, that was something that the National Party decided they would campaign on as well. But now there’s an indication that there needs to be a cost-benefit analysis before they start actually rolling all of this out all around the country, in terms of EV infrastructure as well.

One of the things that this Government also is not comfortable on progressing is an opportunity for those who want to purchase an EV, if this bill is going to pass the hurdle tonight, to actually still have the opportunity for any purchase agreements that might be in place before midnight on 31 December this year to be honoured. Right? We were challenged by the Minister, who said, “Well, actually, people can just turn up to a lot and get a car and then it’s all tickety-boo.” Well, the reality is that a lot of people who actually utilise this as an incentive do not have the means to simply rock on up to a parking lot and buy an EV; they are individuals who want to do what they should be doing, to take their responsibility well and seriously. But this is a Government that is not empowering those very people to actually take up that responsibility that they want to deliver on.

It is a sad day in the Parliament when it progresses legislation that is regressive. It is a sad day in the Parliament where many of the things that have been worked hard on for communities over the years have been undone. It’s a sad day when that happens. I do not commend this bill to the House.

The question is that the motion be agreed to.

Tēnā koe, Madam Speaker. Tēnā koutou te Whare. There are many events happening right now in the world that are directly relevant to this legislation and the repeal of this legislation. The Conference of Parties at the UN has made an agreement and made it very clear that we have to transition away from fossil fuels as quickly as possible. The wording in that agreement is not as strong as it should be because there’s still too many vested interests—in some cases, controlling States like the State hosting it—who want to carry on burning fossil fuels as long as possible.

But our children are relying on us to be responsible. Our children are relying on us to take the steps that we can take now because they will not be able to take them in the future; it will be too late. If we don’t radically reduce our greenhouse gas emissions, it will not be possible to adapt to a future in a world where we have increasing storms and droughts and floods. It will affect food prices, it will affect food production, it will affect security of people right around the world. It’s already affecting geopolitical stability in many parts of the world. I don’t know if the members in the new National - ACT - New Zealand First Government realise just how serious and urgent the situation is.

In truth, the Clean Car Discount should have been brought in 20 years ago. If it had been brought in 20 years ago, we would be far more advanced in terms of having a zero-emissions fleet that would allow people to move around our country without having to rely on fossil fuels. And we would directly be benefiting from that, because we’d be spending less money on imported oil, petrol, and diesel to power our vehicles.

The truth is that this legislation is repealing an incredibly practical, positive step that was leading to real change in New Zealand, a positive change in terms of reducing emissions of the vehicles coming into the fleet and, with it, less pollution, lower petrol bills. If the Government—the National - ACT - New Zealand First Government—cared one bit for equity, they wouldn’t be proposing substantial tax cuts for the people who have the most money. They wouldn’t be proposing tax breaks for landlords. They wouldn’t be proposing or actually undertaking the repeal of fair pay agreements. They don’t care about equity. That is a distraction; it’s a red herring.

The reality is this policy works to reduce emissions, and that’s why you have it in place. If you care about equity, we can address that through our tax system and through the public support that we give to people, through the way that we invest in our people, with our social welfare system, our public health system, our education system.

The policy was addressing a lack that we had of both fuel economy standards and a price incentive at the point of purchase. As I’ve already made clear, and as members will soon see, if you don’t have the price incentive at the point of purchase, you will get less uptake of the low-emissions vehicles, and then, if you’re relying on the emissions trading scheme, you will see higher fuel prices and people will have no choice to avoid those higher fuel prices because they’ve already purchased a vehicle that isn’t as fuel-efficient as it could be. So the evidence is that the policy was working really well, and I’m proud of the fact that we brought in such a constructive, positive policy that did make a real difference to a huge number of New Zealanders, and I’m sorry to see that progress not happening.

The new National - ACT - New Zealand First Government was elected on a hodgepodge of culture war slogans that were seeking to divide New Zealand rather than constructive positive, practical, evidence-based policies that will help us address the challenges that we actually have. For those who identify as blue-green, I say to you that there was not a better policy in terms of its marginal abatement cost. That is, we gained money; New Zealand gained economic benefit from this policy, for the carbon emissions reduction.

Now, the National Party and the ACT Party and the New Zealand First Party do not want agriculture to do anything to reduce emissions and yet, at the same time, they’re not doing anything for transport to reduce emissions. You would think for parties that believe that their entire strategy is electrification of cars, rather than actually making public transport work in our towns and cities and making active transport possible and making it possible for people to undertake the many, many short trips in our urban areas on foot, by bike, by e-scooter, by whatever means they choose that doesn’t happen to be in a car—they are car zealots. They’re obsessed with forcing New Zealanders to use cars for every single trip, and we see that through everything.

💬 James Meager: That’s choice.

No, that’s not choice. It’s the opposite of choice, I say to the member. It is the opposite of choice. If people don’t have the ability to walk, cycle, or take public transport, they don’t have a choice. National wants to take away people’s choice and force them into cars, which they have to spend thousands of dollars a year to run and maintain.

But, see, this is the difficulty in dealing—they’re so far down the rabbit hole, so out of touch with reality, that this new dinosaur Government doesn’t understand that decades of Government policy have led to a situation where New Zealanders have no choice but to use a car. The whole point that the Green Party has constantly brought here is that if you actually invest in the alternatives to using a car—like the top five best countries in the world for roads that the National Party liked to cite before the election, until they realised all of those places were implementing Green-style transport and urban development policies, and that’s why they’re such good countries for people to drive cars in.

We don’t have the option for people to use public transport, because subsequent Governments have failed to invest in it and that has taken away people’s choice to get around without a car. So their entire strategy now is electrification of cars, and yet they’re taking away the one policy that was actually supporting and making it easier for New Zealanders to get into electric cars. The mind boggles.

But the reality is—and I know they must be really high on the success of the election and feeling good with all their repeals—that at some point, this Government is going to have to figure out how to actually solve the problem. The Prime Minister says he’s committed to the carbon budgets. He’s committed to achieving them, and yet all of the evidence we’ve received from the Climate Change Commission and the Ministry of Transport says that in order to achieve those carbon budgets, we need a price signal at the point of purchase of vehicles so that people can find it easier to get into more electric vehicles. And that’s what the Clean Car Discount was. It was a price incentive at the point of purchase and import into the country. Because once you’ve already purchased the vehicle, having the price incentive on a bit of fuel doesn’t work to influence the cars that are coming into the country.

I have done my best to share the evidence, to share the rationale, to explain to the members in the Government how they had an opportunity to do something that was good for the climate, that was good for people, and that people would have supported, and the saddest thing for me is that they chose to make people feel bad about contributing to the Clean Car Discount, when people could have felt good about it. I think New Zealanders do want to do the right thing. They want to be part of the solution, and if they—[Interruption] And they absolutely had the ability to buy the high-polluting vehicles. They had that ability.

They can also continue to contribute to cleaning up the other vehicles on the road. Because if they need that ute or if they need that Range Rover, that $150,000 Range Rover—if they need that to drop the kids off in Remuera and, you know, then if that’s what they need—and I respect that’s their need—then it’s fair to ask those people buying brand-new Range Rovers to contribute something to getting more zero-emissions cars on the road. Because we won’t be able to solve the climate crisis as individuals; we will do it together. We will do it by working together. People can feel proud of their contribution to the stunning increase in zero- and low-emissions vehicles that we’ve seen over the past two years. I want to give a shoutout—of course, many of the members of the Government, including the Prime Minister and a few senior Ministers, their families took the rebate for their electric vehicles. But then now they’ve repealed it, so other people can’t access that benefit, which is another stunning example of hypocrisy from this Government.

But people should feel good about the increase that we’ve had to electric vehicles on the road, and if they paid a little bit more for their high-emissions vehicle, they can know they were part of the solution and they were, for a brief time, part of a policy that actually radically reduced the average emissions of the vehicles coming into the New Zealand fleet.

We will hold the Government to account as we see what the consequences of repealing this are, but, no matter what, they can’t take away the two megatonne of carbon emissions that we saved. They can’t take away the fact that we kickstarted, in a big way, the rush to electric vehicles and electrification. They will slow it down, but they can’t take it away.

I just want to, finally, shout out to the Hon Michael Wood, who brought this policy through, who listened to the evidence even though the Labour Party hadn’t campaigned on the policy. He listened to the officials and said we have to have this price incentive, and he brought the policy in. So good on the Hon Michael Wood for doing that and sticking to his guns. The Green Party will continue to promote the positive, practical solutions that our country needs to address the real challenges.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. I want to thank the Minister for bringing this bill to the House and honouring the coalition agreement between ACT and National. ACT campaigned strongly on the repeal of this law. It disproportionately affects some of the constituents we are most keen to represent, particularly the rural community, who this ute tax unfairly affected.

What I’ve just heard is—I mean, this has been an incoherent policy, as we’ve heard throughout the day. It’s unsustainable and it actually doesn’t make sense. What this Government is doing is actually restoring a sensible, coherent climate change policy that will actually work.

So I want to say ACT is very proud to be a part of the Government and to get this law repealed, and I want to say it’s actually a demonstration of where we identified bad public policy and we’re addressing it and actually putting correct public policy in place to address the serious issues that have faced New Zealand. I commend this bill to the House.

I rise on behalf of New Zealand First to support this bill through the third reading. I have made in the first two—what are they called these days? I haven’t been here for—the first two readings, thank you. It was a late night last night. In the first two readings I’ve articulated my case, so I won’t.

But one thing I will do—as the new Minister for Rural Communities, I want to take issue with Julie Anne Genter. She talked about this taking options away. It’s taking no options away for urban people. They can still buy their Teslas. This is a deeply regressive tax for rural communities. It is a direct transfer of money from rural to urban, particularly utes. They’re not lifestyle choices, as the member over there tried to articulate before. They carry tools, they carry stock feed, they carry the dogs, they carry injured stock at times, and those utes don’t have viable alternatives. They don’t live near a cycle lane.

I went out on my first visit as Minister to Tairāwhiti last week. I went out to the Bruce Road, about an hour out of Gisborne. There were four families out there, all represented, all waiting on the other side of a river. Their bridge had been washed away. The culvert bridge that was put up as a replacement that they had to wait six months for had been washed away as well in an ensuing rainfall event. I’d like any of the members opposite to go and visit those families, who were really deeply distressed, who had to handle infrastructure that was absolutely devastated by, yes, a weather event and, yes, impacted by climate change. They don’t have the option. They have to get to town. They have to get to work. They have to get supplies in. They have to get stock out and get their kids to school and get them home.

So those are the sort of people that you’re not thinking about when you’re having your intellectual arguments about whether urban people have choices. If they want to have the choice of buying a Tesla, they can buy one, but don’t punish those that need a ute. Thank you very much, Mr Speaker.

Madam Speaker, colleagues in the Whare, I would like to just start by acknowledging the honourable members who gave their maiden speech today in the Whare. It was really moving. One of the things that stood out for me in the kōrero was the need to listen to each other. I’ll confess, being a newbie MP in this space, I’ve been a little surprised, I suppose, at the behaviour, for what passes for rigorous debate. I would just like to echo the words of a new member spoken earlier this afternoon about the need to just listen to what is being said.

We are in a climate crisis. Irrespective of, you know, what’s going to go down today with respect to this bill, 2 megatonnes of carbon dioxide were saved thanks to this policy. This Government had an opportunity to achieve a net marginal abatement cost, and, frankly, I find that stunning coming from that side of the Whare which purports to know something about business. Earlier in the day, during the second reading, I suggested that we read the user manual on how to navigate the Clean Car Discount fee rebate system. We’ve missed a beat by getting us this far. I’m very interested to hear what the regulatory impact statement, when it is finally finalised, has to say about the fiscal neutrality of this policy. We see many overseas examples where the mechanism has been in place for more than 20 years and they have achieved fiscal neutrality.

I want to celebrate a little bit on behalf of New Zealanders who, thanks to the Clean Car Discount and Clean Car Standard, have a greater choice thanks to applying those mechanisms at the supply side so that the vehicle importers could bring a wider choice of electric vehicles into the country and at a faster rate.

💬 Carl Bates: There’s nothing stopping them.

There is nothing stopping them, you’re right, but the thing is it was too early to pull the plug. As I say, I’m looking forward to hearing what the regulatory impact statement has to say about that.

I’m going to close. We do not commend this bill at all, but I would like to thank you all for listening to my kōrero this afternoon. Tēnā tātou.

Today is a good day. The Land Transport (Clean Vehicle Discount Scheme Repeal) Amendment Bill will get rid of the fiscally irresponsible and blatantly unfair Clean Car Discount scheme, also known as the “ute tax”. This ute tax and Clean Car Discount is a reverse Robin Hood scheme which is taxing hard-working Kiwis, for the vehicles they need, to subsidise other people to buy new cars.

To our hard-working famers and tradies: you have done it tough for the last six years. Under the previous Government, you were public enemy number one. Well, under this Government, we back you. You are the backbone of our country, and we are here to work for you and support you. I’m proud to commend this bill to the House.

The House stands adjourned until 2 p.m. on Tuesday, 19 December 2023. Thank you, everyone.

The House adjourned at 6.22 p.m.