How will Labour get the votes for the ETS?

Labour has 49 votes and needs 61. Add on Jim Anderton and you are at 50.

NZ First will back the scheme. They will mainly be looking for some payoffs for their support base. This gets Labour to 57 votes.

The only way to get to 61 from there is either the Maori Party (4) or the Green Party (6). Taito Phillip Field by himself makes no difference.

The Maori Party is facing great pressure from Maori forest and land owners. The select committee has said it agrees with some of their concerns but has mainly left it to future Ministers to set regulations, rather than guarantee things in the legislation- and I am not sure that will be enough.

The Greens are asking for agriculture and energy sectors to enter the ETS at an earlier date. It is hard to see the Government agreeing to either of these, so the question is will the Greens blink first and support the scheme even if they gain only tokenistic changes?

The Herald covers some of the issues.

Colin Espiner in The Press labels the ETS a “big green cash machine”

Treasury figures released yesterday show officials expect the Government to reap $21 billion from its controversial emissions trading scheme (ETS) over the next 20 years and it could make as much as $42.6b under some scenarios. …

The projections show that by 2030 the Government’s coffers could swell by up to $42b assuming a carbon price of $100 a tonne. …

Ironically, the worse the country performs at meeting its Kyoto commitments the more money the Government makes, since industry would be forced to buy more carbon credits.

NZ has no chance at all of meeting its Kyoto commitments, so I would look for those windfall profits to occur, if it is passed in its current form.