Climate change symposium: stealing a march

Today I attended the Climate Change: the Policy Challenges Symposium in Wellington. I'll post on the wonkery later, but in this one I'll do the highlights: David Parker and Nick Smith.

Climate Change Minister David Parker was the first speaker, having had his talk on The way forward on climate change moved forward by six hours to pre-empt National's policy announcement later in the day. Unfortunately, the timing didn't hide the fact that it was absolutely underwhelming. I'd been expecting Parker to make use of the excellent platform provided by the policy symposium to announce some policy of his own. Instead, in keeping with the government's (too) cautious post-carbon tax approach, he "announced" a list of "strategic principles" so obvious as to be practically banal:

1. Recognising that while action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions will have moderate costs, the predicted costs and risks of inaction are unacceptably high
2. Recognising that effective international action is needed to reduce global greenhouse gas emissions, New Zealand should help by reducing its own emissions, and by encouraging other countries to act.
3. Recognising that New Zealand's response should maximise the economic advantages of using energy and resources more efficiently.
4. Agreeing that our response should start with the most easily-achieved and least-cost solutions.
5. Agreeing that a combination of sectoral and economy-wide measures, including voluntary, price-based and regulatory measures, is likely to be needed, and
6. Agreeing that all sectors of the economy should play an equitable part in the nation's response to climate change, reflecting the fact that some sectors are able to achieve emissions reductions more easily than others. It's important to consider there are sectors in which there are few low-emissions technologies available at reasonable cost.

Or, in English, "we should do something, and it should be cheap and practical". This is the sort of thing Cabinet agrees at the earliest stages of the policy development process, before it starts looking at actual policy (or even options for actual policy). And if this is where the government is at the moment, then we're pretty much back where we were in early 2000 (and early 1998, and early 1992). In other words, nowhere.

Actually, that's not quite fair on Parker. The government does have policies(the biofuels obligation, for example), and they are clearly headed in the right direction (albeit slowly). But what they mostly have at the moment is a lot of fiddling around the edges, with little in the way of core policy to produce emissions reduction or sink absorption. It is a sign of the emptiness at the heart of government policy that a) they're forced to refer to a "12-page list of government initiatives already underway" (attached here) in the hope that the public will accept "quantity over quality"; and b) the most important announcement Parker could make today was the establishment of a "Climate Change Advisory Panel".

Which brings me to National's Nick Smith. Where Parker was tepid and underwhelming, Smith was the opposite. The National Party has had its conversion on the road to Kyoto, and they want everyone to know it. Quite apart from their credibility problem, the chutzpah is astounding. Having spent the last six years trying to deny the reality of climate change, they now admit that the case is strong, "[the] uncertainties are not an excuse for doing nothing", and that the risks must be managed. Having railed against Labour's decision to ratify the Kyoto Protocol, they now support participation because it is the only way to get larger countries to act. And having done everything possible to undermine the carbon tax and "fart" tax (including driving a tractor up the steps of Parliament), they are now criticising the government for abandoning those policies. About the only thing missing was the statement that Oceania has always been at war with East Asia.

As for their policy, its a marvellous piece of political ju-jitsu. The ultimate destination of government policy has been fairly clear for the last six months or so: some form of limited carbon tax or pilot emissions trading scheme applying to the energy sector and possibly large industrial emitters as a precursor to full emissions trading post 2012; vehicle fuel efficiency standards or a "feebate" scheme, a biofuels obligation, a backdown on the disastrous deforestation cap, and more agricultural R&D. So, National has basically stolen those policies - and a march on the government - announcing support for energy-sector emissions trading "immediately", a feebate scheme to boost vehicle efficiency, biofuels, an end to the deforestation cap, and more agricultural R&D. About the only point of difference is that National favours gutting the RMA "to promote renewable energy". And now they're "hop[ing] the government will steal their ideas".

So now it seems that we have a convergence of climate change policy between the two main parties. Unfortunately, this means that action is probably even further away than ever. Quite apart from the fact that Labour will probably shift its policies to try and create a point of difference with National (throwing their careful process of policy development into disarray), there's also the fact that real action on climate change seems to be a line in the sand for Peter Dunne, while Winston opposes any policy which might raise electricity prices for pensioners. So even if Labour wanted to call National's bluff and use their announcement to put a limited cap and trade regime in place before the start of CP1, they probably couldn't. Which is, I suspect, National's point.