Tonight Parliament voted on New Zealand’s Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS). The National Party, with the support of the Maori Party, had 63 votes while the Opposition – Labour, the Greens and ACT – had only 58 votes. Earlier this week, the government gave five Maori iwi (tribes) the right to grow trees on Conservation land so that they can get carbon credits for the trees. In exchange for this, the Maori Party agreed to vote with the government.

The ETS is very complicated. We will be paying more for electricity and petrol from July next year. Listen to September 24th 2009 for more information about the details of the ETS.

In the 18 years between 1990 and 2008, our greenhouse gases have increased by 24%. In 2007, we had 16 tonnes of carbon emissions for every person in New Zealand. About half of New Zealand’s greenhouse gases come from farm animals but agriculture is not included in this ETS until 2015.

This law was passed just in time for the Climate Change conference in Copenhagen, Denmark, which opens on December 7th. The Prime Minister is not going to the conference but two Ministers will be going.