Home Energy Fund<\/a>.<\/p>\nBrown says the price of electricity itself is only one part of a power bill.<\/p>\n
\u201cLines charges, red tape, weak competition, and the cost of keeping the lights on in a dry year all add to what Kiwis pay. Our nine-point plan takes on each of them.\u201d<\/p>\n
Line charges accounted for about two-thirds of the rise in the average power bill over the past year, Brown says.<\/p>\n
“They’re set under an outdated law, so we’ll review it and make necessary changes ahead of the next price reset. We\u2019ll also let Kiwis choose who does the connection work they’re paying for.\u201d<\/p>\n
Reliability also matters, he says. \u00a0<\/p>\n
“We need backup for when the lakes are low, but a few big power companies hold most of it, largely for their own use, and smaller power companies have no easy way to buy the backup they need to get through a dry year.<\/p>\n
“We’ve already moved to give independent retailers fairer access to the contracts they need to compete with the big players. Opening up backup supply is the next step to levelling the playing field.\u201d<\/p>\n
And new demand needs new supply too, he says, so AI data centres would need to bring their own power \u201crather than push up bills for everyone else\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cLabour would put all of that progress at risk,\u201d Brown says.<\/p>\n
National says: \u201cNew Zealand is on the right track. A re-elected National Government will keep delivering the secure, affordable energy, and the jobs that New Zealanders need.\u201d<\/p>\n
In response to National’s plan, Labour says it’s an absolute fizzer.<\/p>\n
Labour energy spokesperson Megan Woods says: \u201cAfter three years in Government, Simeon Brown should be delivering cheaper electricity, not another grab-bag of ideas and excuses.”<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is not a plan to bring power bills down. It\u2019s an admission National hasn\u2019t got a clue how to do it,” she says.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cNew Zealand needs reliable, affordable power that gives businesses confidence to invest, grow and create good jobs. Instead, National is offering more of the same: more promises, more deregulation and more excuses.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"If re-elected into government, National says it has a nine-point plan to help deliver more energy supply, competition…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":617989,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[138,219,111,139,69],"class_list":["post-617988","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-economy","tag-business","tag-economy","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/617988","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=617988"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/617988\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/617989"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=617988"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=617988"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=617988"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}