Wednesday, 16 February 2005
Baldock urges commonsense over Kyoto protocol
While the debate rages on in the scientific community on whether in fact any recorded climate change is the result of
greenhouse gas emissions, United Future’s environment spokesman Larry Baldock believes we must take a pragmatic
approach.
“It is prudent in the absence of clear facts either way to do what can sensibly be done to reduce greenhouse gas
emissions.
“However, we utterly reject scaremongering reports from doomsday merchants predicting the end of the world, and saying
we must treat CO² as a pollutant rather than a natural part of the atmosphere.”
Raising the issue with the Prime Minister during Parliamentary Questions today, Mr Baldock suggested more could be
achieved by an internal carbon trading mechanism that did not place New Zealand at a disadvantage to its trading
partners which is the result of signing up to the unwieldy overly-bureaucratic Kyoto system.
The Prime Minister agreed it might be easier to ban polluting motor vehicles rather than polluting cows – which are the
main source of New Zealand’s greenhouse gases – but insisted it was better for New Zealand to be part of mainstream
international agreements, such as the Kyoto protocol.
Mr Baldock said “Maximising technological advances like getting rid of clapped-out old cars with GE-free stickers on
them and replacing them with more efficient vehicles will make greater progress on reducing greenhouse gas emissions
than all the Green’s policies put together.”
ENDS