Editorial: Sensible move
OPINION: The Government's decision to rule out changes to Fringe Benefit Tax (FBT) that would cost every farmer thousands of dollars annually, is sensible.
Feds President Andrew Hoggard told Dairy News that while they agree with some of the narrative in the overall HWEN submission, they decided to go their own way for fear their message around targets might be construed as being diluted in some way.
"In the past we have agreed to words and it's all got watered down," he says.
"We wanted to make it clear that we would not agree to anything unless there was a review of the targets. Feds didn't want them to say you have agreed to this in the joint submission so we will go with that," he says.
In the past Hoggard had made it clear that Feds wanted to "go hard" in its submission, but acknowledges that some industry organisations have also gone quite hard in their individual submissions.
"At this point in time, my feeling and the feeling of others is that we needed to be crystal clear in what we are saying," he says.
It should be pointed out that DairyNZ and B+LNZ have also made separate submissions in addition to signing the HWEN submission.
In the joint submission, the remaining ten partners are calling on the Government to change key aspects of its proposal on agricultural emissions pricing.
They say they want an emissions pricing system that creates incentives and opportunities to reduce agricultural emissions, while maintaining the viability of the primary sector.
This would include changes to price setting, governance and transitional arrangements that would see decision-making on emissions pricing balance the socio-economic impacts on the primary sector and wider economy with emissions reductions.
The group says that the Government proposals as they stand are not acceptable to the partners or the farmers and growers they represent.
They say they remain committed to working in good faith with government and Māori to design a practical cost-effective, farm-level system for enabling the agricultural sector to play its part in responding to climate change.
Independent chair Sarah Paterson says partners have worked hard to develop a shared view on issues raised by the Government proposals and it is disappointing Federated Farmers has chosen not to sign the joint submission.
"The partnership came together because partners could see that by working together they could achieve a better outcome for the primary sector as a whole than they could have done separately. We are much stronger as a sector when we all work together," she says.
Paterson says the partners will continue to work constructively and collectively in the spirit of partnership to explore common ground and solutions.
