Mike Hosking: Government's economic sabotage with oil, gas exploration ban

COMMENT: Can we mount a case of economic sabotage against the Government, now we know the cost of wrecking the offshore oil industry here could be $28 billion over 30 years?

That's what the report into one of their more catastrophic, if not the most catastrophic, decisions tells us - $28 billion gone. The hundreds of millions in licence fees and exploration rights each and every year, and the feed through to the local economies, like Taranaki.

And if you remember, it was an early call from a new government. No consultation, no input, none of the open, honest transparency that they made such as big deal of defining themselves with.

And what did we say at the time? We said companies would pack up and leave.

'No they won't,' said the Government. The claim was the licences don't end for years. They said that, of course, not understanding how business works. Business want support and certainty, they want to know whether to renew deals, they want to know whether to, as the industry calls it, drop or drill.

They dropped. They're leaving, and the report tells us now the impact of that is nearly $30 billion. The Government's only defence is the usual, blind virtue-signally bollocks about working with the region on new ideas, on job opportunities, and renewable options.

Well, what are they? Where are they? How many do they employ? How much are they worth? You will note there is no detail. Do you know why? Because there are no jobs, no business, and no ideas.

They're full of it. Like it or not, the world runs on fossil fuels. Maybe it won't one day, but right now it does. But the Government doesn't like it, hence they acted the way they did.

Australia knows it, their biggest receipts last year came from stuff in the ground. That's why they rolled Malcolm Turnbull, he kept banging on about Paris and climate. And all they want is a surplus, work, and money in the bank. Dare I suggest Taranaki, and every other region affected by this, does to?

And this is where the credibility of this Government is being so badly undermined in the facts.

Once they spout the theory, utter the grandiose promises, and headlines, reality hits. If they had an idea around renewables to cover a $30b gap do you think we might have heard about it now?

Decimating a region for ideological reasons - while spouting hot air about the solutions to the hole you've just dug - is dishonest, deceptive, and economically ruinous.