Simon Court
ACT Climate Change spokesperson
The Climate Change Minister has spent more time in isolation than he spent in Glasgow announcing things that will make no real change to New Zealand’s pre-existing policies.
Shaw left New Zealand on November 6 and returned on November 15. After nine days away, including travel, he then had to spend 10 days isolating.
None of the announcements he made in Glasgow affect our domestic policies.
Shaw “announced” an updated Nationally Determined Contributions and that New Zealand will join the Global Methane Pledge.
When asked about the costs and benefits of the updated NDC and Global Methane Pledge, Shaw simply refers back to the Climate Change Commission and pre-existing commitments.
This begs the question, why he bothered to burn jet fuel heading to Glasgow to announce things New Zealand had already announced.
While committing to reducing hot air, all he did was spurt it out.
ACT proposes a realistic, no-nonsense climate change policy that matches our efforts with our trading partners’ with minimal bureaucracy. We should set a cap on total emissions in line with the actual reductions of our trading partners, then allow New Zealanders to import high quality foreign carbon credits so we pay the world price, not an artificial price.