Environmentalists claim $2.9b strategy still leaves ‘long way to go’
EVs aren’t going to solve the climate crisis.
A good start but a lot more needs to be done — that’s the view of Northland environmental advocates quizzed about Budget 2022.
Most of the Government’s $2.9 billion plan to tackle climate change was revealed in Monday’s Emissions Reduction Plan, which will be paid for by the Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) — but the Budget delivered a few extras.
Those measures included extending half-price public transport and expanded native forest planting for carbon capture.
Monday’s biggest announcement was a $569m scrap-and-replace scheme to help low-income households ditch their old gasguzzlers and switch to hybrid or electric vehicles (EVs).
Paihia EV advocate Craig Salmon said he believed electric cars were only part of the answer.
Making half-price public transport permanent for Community Service Card holders was “an absolute nobrainer” that should have been done long ago, he said.
It was also a social justice issue because the poor often had to travel the furthest, and hence pay the most, to get to their workplaces.
“EVs aren’t going to solve the climate crisis. They’re only one part of decarbonisation, with EVs for places like Northland where mass transit doesn’t make sense financially but in places like Auckland it’s about getting people from A to B as efficiently as possible — and that’s really about cheap public transport,” Salmon said.
Bob Bingham, who writes about climate issues for the Kaitaia-based Northland Age, said it was the first time the Government had presented a plan to the New Zealand public which attempted to meet internationally agreed emissions targets.
The EV rebates and “cash for
Craig Salmon, EV advocate
clunkers” scheme would finally lead to progress in switching to electric transport, though the big problem would be importing sufficient supplies of EVs.
Other concerns with the plan included New Zealand needing to buy carbon credits from abroad to meet its targets, and the complicated proposal for calculating farm emissions.
“It’s a good start but a long way to go,” Bingham said.
Forest & Bird Northland manager Dean Baigent-Mercer welcomed yesterday’s announcement of $145m over four years for large-scale native forest restoration.
Another $111m would be spent on researching carbon storage in native forests and extra predator control.
“Native forest restoration is a big winner in the Budget but it needs to go hand in hand with pest control, otherwise we’re just laying out lunch for possums and goats,” BaigentMercer said.
With 80 per cent of New Zealand’s almost 800 marae built on low-lying coastal land or near flood-prone rivers, Māori cultural sites are particularly vulnerable to climate change.
That’s particularly true for coastal iwi such as Northland’s Ngātiwai.
Te Poari o Ngātiwai chairman Aperahama Kerepeti-Edwards welcomed the Government’s commitment to combating climate change via the Climate Emergency Response Fund.
“As a coastal iwi we’re keen to understand how this fund will be applied to support kāinga [homes], marae and communities who need support to plan their futures, as we know many of our kāinga and hapū will be affected by sea level rises.”
Northland Regional councillor Amy Macdonald chairs the Joint Climate Change Adaptation Committee, the first group in the country to bring all councils in one region together under the banner of climate change.
She said working with communities on local climate change issues was a challenging and costly job.
“It’s reassuring to see central government resourcing climate change in this Budget. There’s a lot more detail needed before we can say exactly what this means for Northland, but any Government support for reducing emissions in our region will be valuable.”
Kerikeri’s Rolf Mueller-Glodde, a founder of Carbon Neutral New Zealand, welcomed the Budget’s extension of half-price public transport but felt it was “too tame” when it came to tackling climate change.