"But it's our opportunity to lead and be seen to be green, where the impact can be great."

Not in this economic environment. First, we can't afford to waste any money and second, neither can any other Government and they won't be taking a blind bit of notice of any empty gestures our Government is foolish enough to make in the present circumstances.

I think Dr Smith's actions were pargamatic and justifiable.

The amount of resource MFE had dedicated to running what were pretty simple programmes under Govt3 was simply shameful. I have seen similar programmes successfully implemented by private sector businesses with much more challenging and diverse impacts without recruiting new staff.

Private sector environemntal programmes succeed because there is an economic benefit to most ecological efficiencies. It is a natural business discipline to use resources efficiently because resources cost money and less resource use = less cost = more profit.

Government doesn't have this discipline, because in government mamnagers don't have to make a profit, they norally try to spend all their budgets because less cost this year = smaller budget next year, and no-one wants a smaller budget.

Governments are therefore inherently inefficient in their use of resources. This is not a criticism of the NZ governemnt it is just how governments are - the nature of the beast if you will. The business of government is expensive.

An organsiation that is not resource efficient can never hope to be ecologically efficient. Its good to see a pragmatic minister who recognises that.

I'm really pleased to see that that recycling in pubic places initiatives are also to be scaled back. That was taking things just a little to far for the gummint to regulate...

Why aim to be carbon neutral? Carbon is a key structural foundation to life as we know it. Do we really think tourists will hoard here in droves just because we may of achieved( we won't) such a pointless goal?. First how will those tourists get here? on sail ships or jet planes? and even if we were cabon neutral do we really believe the big coutries would give a s**t? Maybe they will IF we are continueing to sell them our coal!. Yes, the will care alright, so much so they will call us "hypocrites" on the world stage.

Some cutbacks in environmental priorities seems fine. And Key overall seems reasonable and likeable. But I start to sense the tug of the minorities, specifically ACT. Some of this environmental stuff, ACC, and the prisons. They are going to tug him all the way out of power in three years. Bye John. Nice knowing you.

I do believe reducing public service staffing is contrary to Nationals promises. The dozey public will wake up to this and it will speed the process furthur. It looks to be a quick goodbye. It took labour about 6 years to get arrogant. I suspect it will take National 6 months.

"I start to sense the tug of the minorities, specifically ACT."

Would that it were so but you are dreaming, Nigel. ACT has zero leverage on Key in both the current configuration and likely future scenarios. Instead it is the financial crisis that is driving rational policy decisions. There is simply no room for ideological baggage when need drives.

Check out history if you doubt that.

I had to laugh last time I was working in gummint. There were posters all over the building about the Govt3 initiative... and they were each printed out in A3 full colour. You'd think the first thing would be cut down on printing big posters.

It seems quite similar to spending $10million on carbon neutrality only to have your carbon footprint increase under the program by more than 15%.

Cut the dead wood out of gummint and we'll really see some savings,both in public spending as well as carbon emissions.

Alan Wilkinson

I would have thought History shows the direct opposite, namely that crises routinely generate the biggest ideological responses and battles we have seen. The Russian Revolution, the French Revolution, the 1930s, 1987 here, etc. The only exception would be war. There is a lot of practical needs driven response mixed in with a lot of ideology. Naieve to claim or pretend otherwise.

How can being Carbon Neutral work out in practice? Let's take a couple of examples:

First: A veey wealthy businessman, owns 2 very large houses and luxury automobiles, travels the world on business with his large entourage, flies first/business class, stays in luxury suites in top hotels and travels locally in luxury limousines. He pays to offset his carbon emissions.

Second: A retired engineer, by choice owns a modest house and car, uses way below average power per year, by choice doesn't have TV/DVD/Video/Surround Sound, recycles and composts where possible, and has one long haul overseas holiday per year. He has the means to pay to offset his emissions but by choice doesn't because he's not convinced that they are the main cause of climate change.

This second person is me. The first is Al Gore and he's carbon neutral. Does he have the more sustainable lifestyle?

Nigel, you hopelessly confuse cause and effect. Ideology created the crises you mention. Realistic pragmatism eventually ended them.