Setting up Parliament
The order paper reveals some useful things:
- Lindsay Tisch is to be Deputy Speaker
- Assistant Speakers will be Eric Roy and Rick Barker. A pity Ross Robertson is not carrying on, as he was good in that role.
The full list of Select Committee memberships has not yet been revealed, but they do propose the Committee to review the ETS, and it is:
- National – Craig Foss, Nicky Wagner, Paul Hitchison, Hekia Parata (4)
- Labour – David Parker, Moana Mackey, Charles Chauvel (3)
- ACT – Rodney Hide (1)
- Greens – Jeanette Fitzsimons (1)
- United Future – Peter Dunne (1)
- Maori Party – yet to be named (1)
It will be nice to hope there will be a some broad agreements on the best way forward, but I do note that National has a majority with any two of its three support partners.
The proposed terms of reference for the committee do not include an explicit review of the science, however as they look at issues such as mitigation vs adaptation, demerits of the science will no doubt be considered as the robustness of the scientific scenarios will influence decision making.
The House is underway now. Michael Cullen tripped Gerry Brownlee up on some procedural issue. While I am sure Labour liked tripping Gerry up, I have to say the absolutely patronising and condescending tone from Cullen was him at his worst, and would probably knock Labour down 5% in the polls if more people saw it. Cullen can be the funniest wittiest MP in the House, but he can also be the most offputting.
In response Gerry made the point that he did stuff up, but he can admit his mistakes, and the reason Labour is now on the Opposition benches is because they never could admit their mistakes. So true.
The House is adjourned until 2 pm when the address in reply will start.