Prime Minister’s Office asked Z Energy to hand-deliver climate law briefing, CEO says
Tuesday, 14 July 2026
A decision to hand-deliver the industry briefing note at the centre of the Government's Smith v Fonterra lobbying scandal was made at the request of the Prime Minister's Office (PMO), Z Energy’s chief executive says.
In an interview with The Post ahead of a select committee hearing on a proposed law change to prevent polluters being sued for damages, Lindis Jones also distanced the fuel company from parallel correspondence sent to chief policy adviser Matt Burgess’ private email address.
The comments come as newly released economic modelling estimates that allowing the litigation to proceed could deal a $30 billion annual hit to the economy.
Earlier this month Chief Ombudsman John Allen found PMO failed to identify and release the politically sensitive document provided by lobbyists for Fonterra and Z Energy during the climate litigation. He has referred the matter to the chief archivist, Anahera Morehu.
Read more:
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“The top line is that the PMO asked for the information that way,” Jones said on Tuesday. “The information provided to the Government and how it was provided was at the request of the individuals in government that we were dealing with. We followed the requests of those individuals.”
Jones also said Z Energy was not involved in routing digital copies to Burgess.
“The first clarification [I would] provide is no-one in Z Energy sends an email to anyone’s private email address or from their own private email address. So that was clearly not Z.”
Ask if this implicated the dairy giant, Jones did not give a direct yes or no answer. Fonterra has been approached for comment.
Z Energy and Fonterra were two of six companies facing a landmark climate lawsuit. The note proposed an amendment to the Climate Change Response Act to block climate-related tort claims, later pursued by the Government.
But the document was not returned in earlier Official Information Act requests about the Government’s handling of the case and only surfaced through court discovery, raising questions about transparency, lobbying and whether officials properly recorded their dealings with industry.
Defending the appropriateness of the briefing, Jones said there was “nothing new” in what was shared .The company had stated its position publicly and in court, and previously to the Government, he said.
“What was shared is really important, and there's nothing underhand about that.”
A spokesperson for Prime Minister Christopher Luxon said he had nothing further to add. Luxon previously accepted Burgess erred in using his private email, but has said he hasn’t seen “widespread evidence” that government staff use personal email addresses for work purposes.
Model predicts $30b annual hit
Jones is presenting to the Justice select committee modelling by economist Niven Winchester, co-funded by Z Energy, Fonterra and Genesis Energy.
The report evaluates the impact of the court injunctions sought by Northland iwi leader Mike Smith, who is asking the defendants immediately reduce or offset their emissions to net zero.
Winchester’s modelling indicates an immediate net-zero injunction restricted only to the defendants would contract New Zealand's GDP by $21.9b over five years, with an immediate $7.5b drop in the first year alone. If applied across the defendants' wider industries, the five-year cumulative GDP loss rises to $112.6b.
Jones warned that if the case targeted the wider sectors, the financial fallout would be severe.
“If this case did proceed and it was successful, then it's predictable that litigation for other members of this industry would follow, and the impact that we would then see on the economy is … closer to $30 billion per year.
“That's catastrophic, and at least twice the level of the impact of Covid on the New Zealand economy. So that’s something that's relevant to all New Zealanders.”
Jones also revealed the legal uncertainty had triggered alarm bells overseas, with an international financial partner placing Z Energy on a global risk register following the Supreme Court's 2024 decision to allow the case to proceed.
While the move is “not restricting capital at this point in time”, Jones warned: “If it [the trial] proceeds, I think it's predictable that it would.”
When asked how Z Energy managed to reassure international lenders to maintain their current credit facilities, Jones said backers were effectively banking on Parliament passing the legislative intervention to overwrite the courts.
“I think what the financing providers are relying on is the existing laws and regulations that govern how New Zealand is managing its emissions, and that's the Climate Change Response Act,” he said. “So there's existing legislation in place that has the cross-party support… We rely on that as do our providers of capital.”
He also highlighted a contradiction between the lawsuit’s demands and Z Energy’s statutory obligations as a government-designated lifeline utility.
Under the Fuel Industry Act 2020, the company faces strict rules regarding fuel security and minimum stock holding requirements.
An immediate halt or court-approved offset of all emissions, would make it operationally impossible to conduct core business, he said.
“I can't see a pathway where we could continue business as normal and meet the expectations as a critical fuel supplier … whether that's our minimum stock holding obligations or just the reasonable expectations of our customers.”
This would also compromise green investment, such as EV charging infrastructure. “It would compromise investment not only in our core business and the energy security that provides, but also our investment in assets that help our customers transition, such as our EV charging infrastructure.”
Retrospective law ‘practically needs to happen’
The Government’s amendment bill, which is being passed under urgency, will retrospectively block all current and future climate tort claims, shutting down Smith’s claim.
Responding to criticism of the retrospective cancellation of a live court case, Jones argued the clause was necessary to prevent severe market distortion.
“If the legislation is passed, but if [it] wasn't retrospective, and this case continued, then all that would happen would be the remedies would be applied to Z, and there’d be no decrease in demand. There'd be no decrease in emissions. That fuel would just be sold by another industry participant,” he said, naming competitors ExxonMobil and BP.
“I totally understand that it's a distinctive choice, but practically it needs to happen.”
Jones said economy-wide emissions management must remain with lawmakers rather than the judiciary.
“We'd be wandering down a path of kind of arbitrary decisions made by kind of ad hoc litigation. And that would be determined kind of plaintiff by plaintiff, judge by judge.
“Meeting the challenge of reducing emissions across the economy is a particularly complex problem that requires trade-offs, and the democratically elected government is the best party to organize that effort,” he said.
Discovery documents barred
Jones also confirmed the corporate defendants co-ordinated over the weekend to block Smith from presenting internal company documents to the select committee this week. Those documents had been provided to the plaintiff under court-ordered discovery, he said.
“There's a whole lot of documentation now available to him, and … there's some parts that he would like to release to the Government for discussion. We just don't think it’s appropriate to kind of cherry-pick sentences or information out of context.”
Last month, Smith applied to the High Court for a judicial review, alleging the Government acted unlawfully when it moved to retrospectively block his landmark climate lawsuit.
He claims the Government’s decision breached constitutional safeguards by attempting to extinguish legal rights after proceedings were already well advanced.