| LISA |
Thousands of shoppers are expected at the country's newest mall again today at the same time that rugby fans are making their way to the All Black test in Hamilton. Reporter Simon Pound joins us now from Auckland's Traffic Management Centre, how is it looking down there today Simon? |
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| SIMON |
Good morning Lisa, I'm here in the control room, from these screens they monitor Auckland's major motorways and arterial roads, with me is Acting Regional Manager Peter Spies. So a busy Thursday what are you expecting today? |
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| PETER SPIES |
Today we will have two events the rugby test match in Hamilton and then also continued interest in the shopping centre at Sylvia Park so we would anticipate probably mid afternoon there would be a peak of those two events but we do believe that we'll be able to manage the traffic through there. |
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| SIMON |
Well we'll be back with an update later on back to you Lisa. |
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| LISA |
Thanks very much Simon. Now roading was the big winner in this year's budget but the decision to spend more on roads didn’t please everyone, Green Co-Leader Jeanette Fitzsimons called it a mad petrol headed budget, instead the Greens wanted to see more on public transport and no city has had its hands up higher than Auckland. Michael Wright with this report. |
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| MICHAEL WRIGHT |
It might not be summer but unfortunately Auckland's traffic woes aren’t seasonal and a solution isn't appearing on the horizon. In short Auckland needs money, around 700 million dollars to improve public transport and its roading network. In recent weeks the idea of road pricing like congestion charges in London, and electronic tolling in Tauranga has been put to the public as a user pays way of funding the shortfall. The options cover everything from parking levies to motorway tolls. Transport expert and former Council Transport Planner Ross Rutherford says the idea of toll rings around the central city is the most appealing. |
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| ROSS RUTHERFORD |
I think if you are going to bring in road pricing they're both good schemes yes, it's easy to understand, easy to implement, particularly the cordon around the Auckland isthmus it's a straightforward system, the technologies are all ready. |
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| MICHAEL |
But Rutherford says Auckland's situation isn't nearly as bad as other cities where road pricing has been pursued and to consider it now only deflects attention from the problem. |
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| ROSS |
I think there's been too much emphasis on road pricing and too little emphasis on what is the problem that we're trying to solve. |
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| MICHAEL |
The problem is the 700 million dollars the city doesn’t have. Aucklanders overwhelmingly say they won't pay for road pricing until public transport is brought up to scratch leaving local government to look elsewhere for funding, and there's only one option. |
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| ROSS |
In the end it has to come down to government, it has to come down to the taxpayer, they have to recognise that the wellbeing of Auckland, Auckland's success is important to New Zealand. |
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| MICHAEL |
This year's budget has earmarked 1.3 billion dollars to be spent on roading projects but Auckland needs 700 million extra, money that Auckland Regional Council Chairman Michael Lee believes it will get. |
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| MICHAEL LEE |
I still ultimately believe the government will come to the party because our case makes a lot of sense and there's a lot of support for it. |
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| MICHAEL |
The relationship between Auckland and the government has come under scrutiny with the highly publicised pre budget meeting raising questions about how receptive each party was to the other's position. |
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| MICHAEL LEE |
We recently had a meeting with the Deputy Prime Minister and the Minister of Finance Dr Michael Cullen and we were surprised to hear him say that not only was he unenthusiastic about electrification but didn’t really believe in rail transport itself. |
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| MICHAEL |
And the longer the government holds out the more problematic it gets for those charged with solving the problem. |
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| ROSS |
Our long term vision is not changed by that figure but the rate at which we achieve the vision may be affected. |
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| MICHAEL |
North Shore Mayor George Wood says it's up to both parties to come up with the money needed. |
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| GEORGE WOOD |
The government has come up with this position that I think they think that if they're gonna be putting more money into the budgets for transport and public transport across Auckland, that Auckland has to contribute in a more meaningful way. |
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| MICHAEL |
Auckland Mayor Dick Hubbard seems to agree. |
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| DICK HUBBARD |
We've gotta make sure that the rest of New Zealand doesn’t see Auckland as gimme gimme gimme want want want, if we're prepared to step up and put something in the plate that actually helps the government to actually sell it to the rest of New Zealand. |
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| MICHAEL |
But Hubbard doesn’t see road pricing in Auckland's immediate future, in fact he says it's more a case of Auckland being seen as trying to do something rather than actually raising any money. |
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| DICK |
It is and that’s the evidence of all major cities overseas, rates and revenue generated within a city won't pay for the city's infrastructure ... |
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| MICHAEL |
So that means forging a good working relationship with the government. |
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| DICK |
Well first of all we've gotta make sure that we're on the same page or even in the same book – I don’t think we are at the moment, I don’t think that’s any state secret. |
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| MICHAEL |
A statement from the office of Dr Cullen describes the dialogue as robust but constructive, and says despite the public perception the two were in loggerheads in fact the relationships are very good. |
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| ROSS |
We have been if you like arguing with the government over funding and at the same time we have discovered that there's no fundamental agreement on where we're meant to go. |
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| LISA |
And the Minister of Transport Annette King joins me now. Well Minister is the government going to pay out this 700 million dollar shortfall for Auckland's public transport funding? |
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| ANNETTE KING – Minister of Transport |
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Good morning Lisa, and it's good to be on your show to talk about transport and I think first of all the socalled 700 million gap is one that’s debated in itself. I think one of the most interesting things, important things that were said in the interviews you’ve just seen particularly with the Mayors is that between the Auckland region and the leaders in the Auckland region and the government we are in serious discussions to agree on the way forward and one of the frustrations I spose for local government but certainly for central government has been the lack of agreement on how to solve Auckland's transport problems. |
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| LISA |
So put the disagreement about the size of the shortfall aside, no one reckons there's not a shortfall so who's gonna pay for the shortfall is that the government's responsibility do you think? |
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| ANNETTE |
Well I agree with the Mayors I think there's a join responsibility, certainly the government has committed considerable funding to Auckland and if you look at funding we're putting into the Auckland area, in fact if you look at funding going into Land Transport, this government has committed a lot of money into rebuilding the transport infrastructure because we realise how important that is for our economic transformation. We need the transport infrastructure development but we've got two problems, one is filling the backlog of need and there certainly was a deficit here in Auckland in terms of investment into transport and that’s well over a decade old or more, and then looking forward, and we know that in the next 20 years there's gonna be another half a million people living here in Auckland, so we're dealing with two problems, the extra money that is going in first in this budget but over the next five years is to build as quickly as we can not only the roads that we need in Auckland to get the network linked up which isn't linked, but also in public transport, and when the issue of public transport is raised part of the funding goes into public transport. |
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| LISA |
So where is this money going to come from then, what is the solution, there's been the issue raised of local taxation which the Mayors reckon that would be 7% rate increase every year for ten years and they still wouldn’t cover the shortfall, so is that the way to go, local taxation through rates? Do you support that? |
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| ANNETTE |
We haven’t made a decision on that, you're probably aware that… |
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| LISA |
What are your feelings on it though? |
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| ANNETTE |
Well we've put out a study, the Auckland road pricing evaluation study and there were five options in that that looked at different ways we could road price here in Auckland to add some additional money to the coffers if you like. Now I gather there's something like 800 submissions on that, I haven’t yet received the report. The government will look at what people are saying but it's quite obvious that we're going to need a combination of central government funding and money from the region, now the way we do that we're prepared to talk about and look at. |
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| LISA |
So how can Labour afford to charge Aucklanders as such for public transport, I mean 32% of enrolled voters are in Auckland, 29% of your support at the last election came from Auckland do you think they’ll wear that, I mean if you hurt them in the pocket they potentially could hurt you at the next election. |
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| ANNETTE |
I think what Aucklanders and all New Zealand are looking at are long terms solutions to transport problems, particularly in Auckland, and we know that Auckland is a powerhouse of our economy, people like to make jokes about Auckland if they're not in Auckland, but we do know that we're all New Zealanders and this is a really important part of our economy and we've gotta get it right in Auckland, but we also have to realise that everybody has to contribute to the solution including Aucklanders and finding the right way to do that whether it is in toll charges, whether it is in some pricing mechanism or fuel tax or whatever, those issues do need to be worked through, it won't happen just with government funding alone, there has to be a local contribution. |
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| LISA |
So how much does the local contribution need to be and are you not walking the tight rope there because too high could potentially be political suicide for you. |
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| ANNETTE |
Well obviously we don’t want too much, we want enough to be able to do the work that needs to be done. |
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| LISA |
How much is enough Dr Cullen has said 5% rate increase is not enough, in your mind how much is enough? |
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| ANNETTE |
I couldn’t tell you enough, I don’t think anyone knows what the gap is and that is why the long term work that’s being done now that was agreed at the meeting that was talked about on the clip you showed, a meeting where the Prime Minister the Minister of Finance and I was also there, having been in the job about three days, but we looked at how we could go forward to the longer term planning and that’s what the Mayors were talking about, we've gotta get agreement on what we want to do, then cost what that shortfall is and work out the way we fund that, and we're both side are committed to doing that and having before us by the end of the year a report to show the way forward. |
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| LISA |
Let's look beyond Auckland and to other areas that have transport issues, Wellington Transmission Gully, Taupo Bypass, what's the government doing to encourage public private partnerships when it comes to roading and transport, what are you doing to get people to invest in the infrastructure? |
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| ANNETTE |
Well of course public private partnerships are one way that you could fund roads but it is only one mechanism, what this government has done in the Land Transport Management Act passed in 2003 was to allow public private partnerships to emerge. I gather we've got one proposal from Rodney actually close to coming to government for us to consider but to date since the act was passed we have not had any put to us, it is only one part of a solution, as is tolls or … |
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| LISA |
The Rodney District, but that is just one, I mean why is it so unattractive to private enterprise to come on board, what people are telling us is that it's been made unattractive by the government. |
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| ANNETTE |
Well I think that’s rubbish, I mean I don’t know who says that, I would imagine political opponents would say that, of course the National Party could have put in the legislation for public private partnerships in the nine years they were in government before we got here, it took this government three years after we became the government to put the legislation in place but I think it is a new thing for New Zealand, some countries have tried as they called them PPPs and there are some who believe there is you know lack of success with them and they point to the tunnels in Sydney for example, but I think it is always hard to get the first one going and I look forward to receiving the proposal from the Rodney Council, I think once we crack this one then others will be able to see how it works and perhaps there'll be less resistance, certainly the government's opened the door for public private partnerships. |
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| LISA |
Well developers tell us that they can only say get tolls from a road for 35, 45 years maximum and in Australia they can do that for 75 years, they're saying they can't get the money back that they're putting into the road using that kind of system and another example the Puhoi motorway, seven years to get a consent. |
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| ANNETTE |
But let's look what's happening there, that is the Albany to Puhoi which is a toll road, our first toll road which also is allowed to happen now under the same amendments to the Land Transport Management Act that we passed as the government. The fact that they're able to toll that and it is the most expensive road we're building in New Zealand about 350 million dollars for that road, it's been able to be brought forward ten years because it's going to have a toll on it, so the ability to be able to do things differently is happening, now that toll road, that particular toll road is an example of that, the consents always are difficult issues because you're going through people's property. |
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| LISA |
Laborious some would argue in the extreme. |
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| ANNETTE |
Some would argue but also there are – one of the things that’s interesting to me about Auckland, everyone says we need more roads in Auckland, better roads, being able to move traffic more quickly but of course along that process if you take the western re-route as an example there will be people who will object to joining up that part of the road, so you’ve gotta have the opportunity for people to hear the proposal, object to the proposal, agree to the proposal and so on. |
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| LISA |
Alright, what about borrowing or selling assets, why not borrow to get the country moving? |
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| ANNETTE |
Well of course one of the things that we're doing in terms of putting the additional money into this years budget to bring forward the funding from a ten year funding track to a five year funding track with certainty is for infrastructure bonds where the Minister of Finance will issue infrastructure bonds to enable us to put more money in, and that is I think a very good thing and it does enable us to bring forward the funding for roads but it also enables us to give certainty to the contractors who build our roads, and one of our problems in the past was could New Zealand contractors actually go about building the roads if your accelerating your expenditure and your needs, and the good news about that is they believe they can, they need certainty of funding, they need to be able to put more time and effort into training and so on and that work is being done through work that started in about 2003 in a joint project with the government. |
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| LISA |
What about selling assets I mean the amount of money given to roading in the budget this year that was heralded by your government as a great thing I mean a lion share of that came from the sale of Meridian's Australian operation which assets – you're the Minister – which assets? |
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| ANNETTE |
We haven’t got assets for sale in New Zealand, in fact in terms of transport we have been busy ensuring that we have a strong transport network not just roads, but rail and air, and this government as you know have bought back the tracks for New Zealand Rail and Air New Zealand because we do have to have a strong network of transport systems, we often just talk about roads but we do need the three, so the government doesn’t have on the agenda sale of assets for a one off hit, you're right in the Meridian sale we were able to use that money to put into roads as a one off, but also as I said through the issuing of infrastructure bonds, but no I think we've gotta face up to the fact New Zealanders do not like the sale of the silver, they like their state assets and they like them to be able to return dividend to the government that they then can use for other purposes, so we're going to have to be sensible about how we fund our land transport in the future and it's a combination funding. |
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| LISA |
Minister how safe is it fly on small aircraft in New Zealand given recent events? |
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| ANNETTE |
Well I've been assured by all the members of the board of the CAA that’s the Civil Aviation Authority through the Ministry of Transport, they have no safety concerns. That doesn’t mean that we can't do things better for a small group of those who are in what's called general aviation, the small aircrafts as you outlined. I need to reassure New Zealand that we have very safe flying, our Air New Zealand our Qantas our Freedom Air and so on, we're talking class. We're talking of a small number of operators who need close supervision in my view and we need to ensure through the Director of Civil Aviation that they do abide by the rules and they are compliant with what they are supposed to be doing. |
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| LISA |
To get that done though through the Director of the Civil Aviation John Jones who's the chap who was in the position when we had this tragic air crash he's still there, what confidence can the public have in him? |
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| ANNETTE |
Well that’s not an issue for me because I don’t employ him and he doesn’t have a relationship with me, I have a relationship with the board and I made it clear as you know at the beginning… |
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| LISA |
It's about perception though isn't it when it comes to these kinds of things and what do you think the public perception is going to be? |
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| ANNETTE |
Well I think the public feel pretty confident in flying in New Zealand and that’s obvious by the number of New Zealanders who fly but what I wanted to ensure through my relationship with the board is that they make it very clear to the director that we will not tolerate non compliance of rules or the exposition the way they're sposed to fly the plan they have for flying and that they need to ensure if people don’t comply that action is taken. Now there were 31 recommendations out of that Coroner's Report, I have ensured that they are going to be implemented but not only implemented be seen to be implemented by the public and that I think is going to give some certainty that we are taking every opportunity we can to ensure that there is safety in this industry. |
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| LISA |
Why is it that you're still prepared to some would argue gamble on a rules based self regulation system when it hasn’t worked arguably when you look at this case, it's like leaving the mice to watch the cheese isn't it? |
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| ANNETTE |
No it has worked, let's put some facts on the table, we've had a 30% reduction in air accidents in New Zealand over the last few years, it is working, the model I think is okay but there are a very few people, and you find it, we saw it this week with the taxi industry, there are some who think they don’t have to abide by the rules, those people need to know they will abide by the rules. |
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| LISA |
Twenty complaints about this pilot Mr Bannerman and he was still flying. |
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| ANNETTE |
Yes it depends what the complaint was I mean what I realise is that you could have something from very small to something that is much more serious, when it's non compliant – you’ve gotta conform with a programme and you’ve gotta sign up if you're a pilot to what they call their exposition and you’ve got to abide by the rules and if you're found in an audit not to conform to that then you're told to comply. My view is if you don’t comply then action needs to be taken, not warnings, action needs to be taken. |
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| LISA |
Immediate action? |
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| ANNETTE |
Yes, and I've made that clear to the board. I've also asked them to make sure that we don’t have operators that aren’t complying with their exposition and the rules and so on, and that work has been done by the director. |
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| LISA |
Let's bring our panel in, this morning Bernard Hickey what's on your mind from that interview Bernard? |
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| BERNARD HICKEY – Managing Editor, Fairfax |
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Well I was very interested in your comments about public private partnerships and bringing in private investors, having worked in Britain and Australia and seen the value of private investors putting money into motorways and rail operations, I just wonder why it's so hard for this to get up and running in New Zealand and there is for example huge amounts of pension money in Australia that’s desperate to invest in infrastructure projects in New Zealand, why aren’t we getting Australia's pensioners to pay for building our own road system? |
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| ANNETTE |
Well up until 2003 we didn’t have the legislation in place to allow it to happen, so you’ve had years where there hasn’t been legislation in place for it to happen, in the Land Transport Management Act in 2003 we put in the ability for that to happen, and so I think we're really talking in quite a short space of time for New Zealanders to get their head around it and perhaps those who would invest to know that it's possible in New Zealand. As I said to Lisa we have got the first proposal very close to coming to government, the Rodney Council have got a PPP they want to bring to us. I think once we crack one it won't be so foreign to us, I think it is a new concept for us and it's relatively new in Australia and of course New Zealanders do read Australian papers and there's quite a lot of debate about the problems with the PPP in say the Sydney tunnels and so you know I think that once we crack one of them it won't be so alien to people. |
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| LISA |
So one on the table look John can I bring you in on the discussion here, your question. |
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| JOHN ROUGHAN - Columnist, NZ Herald |
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I'm interested in knowing what really the attitude in Wellington is to Auckland's public transport scheme, what's your view of it what's your department's view of it, do you really have confidence that a rail based public transport scheme is Auckland's solution? |
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| ANNETTE |
Well first of all I think there's a recognition in Wellington if you're talking about the government that Auckland is a very important part of our economy, in fact we know that Auckland has to work for the rest of New Zealand to work and New Zealanders know that too, we do like to make fun and I don’t mean politicians but New Zealanders will make jokes about Auckland but they know you are very important to us and transport infrastructure is an important part of any economic transformation we've got so there's recognition and commitment in Wellington to work on Auckland's road transport problems, the rail is not the only answer, now in answer to your question the idea that rail will answer all the problems in Auckland we don’t agree with. First of all you’ve got less than 1% of people travelling on rail, you’ve got 4% going on 5% people on buses, so you know even if you double rail you're still not going to make a dent, it has to be a combination of things, the rail, your ferries, your buses, your public transport and your roads. Now one of the reasons why a lot is talked about the roads is the road network in Auckland isn't a completed network, and so a lot of emphasis and talk is around the roads but it is a combination of all those things. |
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| LISA |
Can I just say how embarrassing was it for Auckland to be brought to its knees by the opening of a mega mall? |
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| ANNETTE |
Well you know people sort of scratched their head and wondered… |
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| LISA |
Is that an international level of transport in a city? |
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| ANNETTE |
Well a friend of mine remembers the day and John might remember this when the Concord came to Auckland the same thing happened everybody rushed to the airport and he told me he sat for four hours waiting to get out there. |
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| JOHN |
I was actually on the Concord so I didn’t see the traffic. |
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| LISA |
Are we going to have that same problem with the Rugby World Cup, with the Rowing Championships that are now going to be in the Waikato district and can we afford to have that happen on an international stage? |
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| ANNETTE |
We are working very hard in terms of Auckland's transport issues in relation to 2011 and the World Cup, but obviously there has to be a longer term strategy for Auckland, if you're going to have another half a million people here in 20 years we've gotta plan for the long term as well as try to address back issues and the problems we have here and now, so were working on all of those, it is a joint effort though and it's a joint effort not just with Auckland and the government but with all New Zealanders. |
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| LISA |
Thank you very much to our Transport Minister Annette King who in fact is rushing off to catch a plane. |
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| LISA |
Welcome back we're going to cross now to the Traffic Management Centre where Simon Pound our reporter on the spot's going to update us on what's going on there. Simon what's the situation looking like? |
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| SIMON |
Thanks Lisa it's still quite quiet Peter how are things? |
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| PETER SPIES – Acting Regional Manager, Transit NZ |
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Yes, the motorway is all flowing freely so it's a quite Saturday morning for us here. |
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| SIMON |
Now if we look at Thursday the Sylvia Park what actually happened there? |
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| PETER |
Well Thursday was the opening of the shopping centre and it certainly was a lot of congestion in the area. |
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| SIMON |
How many people were affected how many cars? |
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| PETER |
At the peak we were having congestion on the northbound direction of some three to four kilometres and if you assume that there's about 200 vehicles that you could fit into a kilometre of lane that’s upwards of somewhere between 1200 and 1600 vehicles attempting to get into the area. |
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| SIMON |
How long were these cars stuck in traffic? |
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| PETER |
We were having congestions through the area from probably about 9.30 at the end of what would normally have been a morning peak, we had continued congestion and that ran through probably till about one o'clock until we had a motorways free flowing again. |
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| SIMON |
What kind of measures did you have to put into place? |
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| PETER |
We had a range of measures our first options we implemented was making use of our variable message signs to indicate to people to use alternative accesses, we also had portable signs which were indicating to people that the car parks were full and there was no point in trying to get into the area, those didn’t appear to be having the desired effect people were still trying to access the shopping centre and we had to physically close some of the off ramps. |
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| SIMON |
Who did you get in to close the off ramps? |
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| PETER |
We made use or our network management contractors who went in and physically closed them in conjunction with the Police. |
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| SIMON |
There was a Police presence there? |
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| PETER |
That’s correct, we did it as I say in conjunction with the Police, the Police requested that we do those closures. |
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| SIMON |
Now what lessons have you taken from Thursday? |
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| PETER |
I think probably one of the key lessons we've learnt is that people don’t necessarily take heed of some of the warnings, we're certainly looking at things keenly today and I think one of the issues that we could learn from Thursday is to anticipate the events and perhaps step in a bit earlier than we did on Thursday. |
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| SIMON |
I see, now that was a weekday and we're now on a weekend, are you expecting things to be more difficult or? |
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| PETER |
We believe that the opening day frenzy won't occur again on Saturday there'll still be an interest today and added to that there is the rugby in Hamilton so we are watching both events keenly and we do have contingencies in place to if need be close the ramps again. |
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| SIMON |
Excellent well good luck Peter thank you, back to you Lisa. |
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| LISA |
Thanks very much Simon, now turning again to our panel, Bernard Hickey what were your concerns there about the private public partnerships and getting outside investment into roading infrastructure in New Zealand? |
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| BERNARD |
I just wonder how really committed the government is to bringing private money into public infrastructure, you sense that essentially the government doesn’t really want the private sector to own public assets and it's a missed opportunity, if you look overseas there are literally hundreds of billions of dollars of cash flowing around the world looking for these sorts of infrastructure projects, all they need is the right conditions in place and the likes of Macquarie Bank, I'm sure they’ve looked at New Zealand in the last three years and there's been three years that’s a fair amount of time, there is plenty of money around but they just don’t see New Zealand as attractive. |
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| LISA |
Why, why do you think? |
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| BERNARD |
Well as you pointed out in your earlier interview the rules say that you have to have a public road right next to the toll road so that people can have a choice and there just isn't the timeframe, a long enough timeframe for people to invest the money and get a return. I just wonder whether the government is really committed to it. The other option for the government, okay if they're not that keen on bringing private money in why not just actually go for it and borrow the money and this is what you do when you build a long term asset that is gonna pay off and they talk about transformation and improving productivity, the best way to do it is to build some infrastructure that’s what governments do, why not just borrow the money, and New Zealand needs for example, there've been the infrastructure bonds announced but we're talking about a tiny amount really, we needs tens of billions of dollars of these things issued, and New Zealand's capital markets need for example the ability for people to invest in bonds like this on some sort of public market instead of putting them into finance companies and I'm sure New Zealand savers would put their money into these sorts of infrastructure bonds if they were available and the government was really committed to doing it, there's nothing wrong with raising debt to build a long term asset. |
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| LISA |
John, your thoughts? |
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| JOHN |
It's very easy to raise money really and spend it but you know for economic stability you’ve really got to make sure you're investing in the right things, and I think in transport there's a basic argument going on between Auckland and Wellington about what Auckland's solution really is that’s the problem. Our local bodies believe in public transport or say they do, they want to spend heavily there, obviously Mrs King's department is not as convinced about that and they look more at roads and so while the argument goes on not a lot, or not enough is happening anyway. |
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| LISA |
I mean just that example of the Sylvia Park Mall I know the Minister laughed it off lightly, but I mean how embarrassing is that on the international stage when we do have something like the Rugby World Cup we do have the Rowing Championships can we afford to have all those people coming in here and having wall to wall gridlock? |
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| BERNARD |
It's not very attractive but having said that I've lived in London and Sydney and the traffic her it's bad and it's probably on a par with those sorts of places, but it's not as bad as it could be, but the issue is not so much how it looks it's actually how much it costs day to day in lost time and it's pretty easy to measure this stuff and people have done it and if you look at the pay offs of investing in this infrastructure and it's not just road, it's rail, Auckland definitely needs a much better rail system and buses need to be improved as well, and there is investment in that, I mean if you look at Infratil they're investing in Stagecoach and want to get involved and they're very keen to invest more. If you invest you do get the payoff in the productivity and this government is supposedly all about improving productivity, they talk about transformation, well put the money down on infrastructure and get the payoff. |
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| JOHN |
Yes well I mean we might get the payoff but if we spend a lot of money on a rail system that serves only a very small percentage of Auckland's commuters we may end up paying for years to keep that operating and it just simply isn't worth the money, that’s the risk. |
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| LISA |
We understand that Maurice Williamson is drafting some legislation to get more private money in, United Future has got a private members bill do we need some change in the legislation do you think to get the ball rolling with these companies that we might want to bring money to New Zealand? |
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| BERNARD |
It sounds like a great idea and the beauty now of this parliament where it is possible for smaller parties to gather a coalition and do something that the government's not that keen on is there, and if there's anything that can be done to improve the level of investment in this and bring the private sector in it must be a good thing. |
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| JOHN |
You're talking tolls though and I think it should be done too, but tolls are politically awkward and private money will need a return in a short time, it'll need quite high tolls in many cases, I think it would work but it's a big thing for a government to sort of bite the bullet on. |
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| LISA |
Because voters would walk at that, it's gonna hurt next time you got to the election. |
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| JOHN |
Yeah people don’t like paying tolls but I think that in Auckland if we had the option sometimes of paying a toll to avoid congestion it wouldn’t be as unpopular as people think. |
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| FINAL THOUGHTS |
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| BERNARD |
Yeah I thought it was interesting to hear the Minister talk at length about what the government's doing about transport and the thing that struck me is how aggressive is the government really about transforming the economy making it more productive, there just seems to be a lot of arguments between city councils and governments and no real commitment to invest, they can the government's in a strong fiscal position they should go out there either borrow the money or really do something to bring the private sector in, there seems to be a lot of fiddling and twiddling that goes on when New Zealand needs serious investment in its infrastructure. |
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| LISA |
So Rome's burning while we shift from one foot to the next. |
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| BERNARD |
I wouldn’t say it's burning but it's smouldering and it needs that investment, New Zealand's economy will not expand at the growth rate we want unless we've got the infrastructure to make it work and this is what governments should be doing building infrastructure. |
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| JOHN |
It struck me on Civil Aviation you know it would be so easy for a government or the Civil Aviation Authority to enforce compliance by small airlines it would only take a threat to them that if they don’t comply absolutely with what's required that the authority goes public or issues some sort of public warning about it and every airline would rapidly fill in all the dots. |
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| LISA |
So point the finger of shame, shame them publicly. |
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| JOHN |
Yeah a little bit of that goes a long way you know. |
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| LISA |
And your thoughts on the transport issue then? |
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| JOHN |
Oh I think we're no further ahead, the problem really is that the government doesn’t have much faith in Auckland local bodies and I tend to share that lack of faith I'm afraid, the government is frightened that the Auckland Regional Council and the city councils are chasing a hare called a rail based scheme that’s hugely expensive and gonna have huge ongoing expense and Transit New Zealand wants of build roads, and I'm on the side of Transit quite frankly. |
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| LISA |
Thank you very much for joining us this morning gentlemen. |
