National Party leader Christopher Luxon has taken action after one of his MPs, Maureen Pugh, expressed scepticism about the human causes of climate change.
Luxon announced that he is sending Pugh to the "reading room" to study up on the issue.
Luxon's move came after Pugh said that she was waiting for evidence that climate change was caused by human activity. The comments sparked criticism from climate activists, who accused Pugh of ignoring the overwhelming scientific consensus on the issue.
Rachel Smalley spoke with climate and weather researcher James Renwick from Victoria University on Monday morning. Smalley put the big question to Renwick and asked if climate change is caused by how we live.
"Climate change is a result of human activity, the [idea the] storms would have happened that's true," Renwick said.
He said the weather and the climate have been around for a very long time but human activity is changing the climate, burning fossil fuels, mostly.
"We're adding gases to the air that cause the climate to warm up and give moisture to the air - that gives more fuel to storms so it makes these extreme events more extreme.
"We're not causing storms to happen but we're causing them to be more damaging because of the way we're changing things."
Renwick said this is the impact people are having on climate change.
Smalley asked Renwick if we can "categorically state" what's just happened in New Zealand with the Auckland anniversary floods and the cyclone to be related to climate change and human action.
"Yes, we can, but it takes a bit of research to work out how much of the rain that fell, for instance, was because of the warmer climate," he said.
"NIWA are working on this as we speak. We know already that the anniversary weekend rainfall in Auckland, a first estimate is maybe 20 percent higher than it would have been without climate change.
"That's the kind of thing that you hear and again, the storm would have happened anyway, but we've added punch to it by warming the climate."
Listen to the full interview between James Renwick and Rachel Smalley filling in for Tova above.
You can also download the full interview on the Tova podcast, and listen on the go.
