The Emissions Trading Scheme Review Committee was a special committee of the Parliament of New Zealand which conducted a review of the Fifth Labour Government's Emissions Trading Scheme between December 2008 and late August 2009.
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Background
Immediately after the New Zealand general election, 2008, the new National-led government announced that, in accordance with its coalition agreement with the ACT Party, it would delay implementation of the New Zealand Emissions Trading Scheme ("NZ ETS") as established by the Labour Government in the Climate Change Response (Emissions Trading) Amendment Act 2008 and set up the Emissions Trading Scheme Review Committee to review the NZ ETS. In November 2008, the National Business Review reported that an international carbon trading company, EcoSecurities Group, had postponed opening an office in New Zealand because of the National Government’s decision to delay the NZ ETS.
Report of the Select Committee
On 31 August 2009, the Emissions Trading Scheme Review Committee reported back to Parliament, with Climate Change Issues Minister Nick Smith stating that the National-led Government was still intending to amend the NZ ETS. The report consisted of minority reports from the New Zealand Labour Party, the Green Party, the Māori Party and the ACT Party. The chairman of the Committee, Peter Dunne, described report as a 'middle road' through 'complex and contentious' material.
According to NZ Law firm Simpson Grierson, although the review report made 34 recommendations on climate change policy, it did not make any specific recommendations to amend either the NZ ETS or the Climate Change Response Act 2002. Simpson Grierson considered that the key findings of the review were that:
Rod Oram described the recommendations made by the report as "obvious, indecisive or generic". Oram considered that the politics of the review were to provide a "sop to the ACT party and a time-waster for National". Oram concluded that the review had 'failed to make any serious contribution towards improving the working of the ETS'.
On 14 September 2009, the National Government announced that it had reached an agreement with the Maori Party about revisions to the NZ ETS. On 24 September 2009, the Climate Change Response (Moderated Emissions Trading) Amendment Bill had its first reading in Parliament.