The virtues and vices of oil

The phrase ‘‘virtue signalling’’ has become a tired trope of the online Right, who use it to refer to pious but empty gestures by the Left. For some reason few understand, it has become one of the National Opposition’s favoured attack lines to paint the Labour Government as politically correct grandstanders rather than real world actors.

At least two of National’s senior MPs have used the phrase to describe the Government’s decision to end offshore oil and gas exploration. But this is unfair. Had Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern appeared on a magazine cover wearing an ‘‘end oil now’’ T-shirt, that would be virtue signalling. To confirm that oil and gas have no long-time future in New Zealand is to take genuine action.

There are political risks. Opposition leader Simon Bridges has already said he would reverse the action in government, which is a more decisive position than he was able to take on fuel taxes. Regional Economic Development Minister Shane Jones’ job has just become a little bit harder.

Jobs are not going to start disappearing from Taranaki tomorrow, as current permits will continue until at least 2030 and some onshore permits will be offered in a compromise to the industry. But new green tourism in Taranaki, paid for out of Jones’ provincial growth fund, will not cover for more than 4000 well-paid jobs in extractive industries.

Claims from some that the industry was blindsided seem dramatic or politically mischievous. There is no question that the Government has urged oil companies to consider a clean energy future, which is already being pursued by many worldwide. In reality, there is little serious interest in new oil exploration in New Zealand, with only one permit issued in each of the past two years.

The news was signalled, perhaps virtuously, when Ardern received a petition from Greenpeace urging an end to oil exploration, and it is obviously a dramatic policy win for the Green Party, whose co-leader James Shaw basked in the news limelight with Ardern, Jones and Climate Change Minister Megan Woods. It provides certainty and has been rapturously received in the environmental sector. As Greenpeace New Zealand’s executive director Russel Norman explained, the fourth-largest exclusive economic zone in the world is now off limits for new fossil fuel exploitation.

Few credibly doubt that a transition from fossil fuels is urgent and vital. Put simply, oil is on the way out. The Government’s clearly stated ambition is to have 100 per cent of electricity generated by renewable sources by 2035 and a carbon-neutral economy by 2050.

While it might be argued that New Zealand’s action will make little difference to the global picture, it is also true that a position must sometimes be taken because it is the right one.

In this case, it is an example that has left the Opposition confused about whether to call it an empty gesture or wholesale destruction of a regional economy. It cannot be both.

Few credibly doubt that a transition from fossil fuels is urgent and vital.