Land Transport Management Bill

The Land Transport Management Bill sounds great but, as we have found during the Committee debate, it will do nothing at all to solve the transport needs of New Zealand. In fact, it is a politically correct, woolly-woofterish sop to the Green Party. Anybody who reads this bill will see all the Greens’ provisions in it—provisions that most New Zealanders do not know anything about. They think their petrol taxes actually go into building roads and improving the infrastructure of New Zealand. When they read this bill, or when it is enacted and takes effect in their local area, they will find out it is quite different.

Let me give an example. One of the bill’s provisions is that Transfund, Transit, local authorities, and every approved public organisation must consider the needs of persons who are transport disadvantaged. One of the rules of passing good legislation is to make sure it spells out very clearly what it means. I ask the Minister of Transport to explain what “transport disadvantaged” means. Does it mean somebody who does not have a footpath? Does it mean somebody who does not have a bicycle track? Does it mean somebody who cannot catch a bus, or a train, or a ferry, or who does not have a car? Maybe it means somebody who has a Skoda instead of a different car. Maybe it means somebody who cannot drive. The problem with this provision is that local authorities will have to try to figure it out. They will have to go through endless rounds of consultation, litigation, or whatever it takes actually to figure out what “transport disadvantaged’ means.

I can tell the Minister in the chair, Mr Swain, that local authorities are already sick to the teeth of the costs this Government has imposed on them. The Local Government Act, the Gambling Act, and the Prostitution Reform Act are examples of legislation that puts millions and millions of dollars of compliance costs and consultation costs on the back of ratepayers up and down New Zealand. The problem is that ratepayers do not know that, because all that stuff has happened in just the last couple of years. It is disgraceful.

When the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee worked through Part 3—which is quite a substantial part of the bill—the submitters raised a couple of issues that I would like the Minister of Transport to consider.

One relates to clause 70, “Objective of Transfund”. It is quite important that the Minister notes in the Committee today that the select committee heard a near-unanimous view from submitters that they wanted Transfund to have the objective of considering the economic benefit of its spending decisions. I know that the Minister is prone to say that that is all about benefit-cost ratios, which depend on how many people have been killed on a piece of road, and that the Government is not going to do that, because it means a new road is built only if someone has been killed on the old one. Well, that actually was the case; if someone was killed on a dangerous corner, that meant that corner might be more dangerous than one down the road, and Transfund might spend some money on fixing it. That makes common sense. What the Minister is careful not to tell New Zealanders is that Transfund still takes that into account, even though it does not use a benefit-cost ratio—that where a road is dangerous it will fix it. The Minister nods. I do not think for one moment he would stand and say that just because someone was killed there, we will ignore it.

I say to him that, given that the Government does not want to go back to the benefit-cost ratio, he should at least include in clause 70 words to the effect that Transfund should have regard to the economic benefits of any spending decision. Otherwise, we will get into the situation whereby Governments will be accused of pork-barrelling. Already, Labour has appointed its campaign organiser and president to Transfund. Already, Mr Mike Williams, the person who sits down and decides how Labour will hold the Otago seat, is deciding how Transfund will allocate its money. [Interruption] Jill Pettis, of the marginal Whanganui seat, says: “Don’t you wish that National had thought of that?”. I say to Jill Pettis that I do not believe that Transfund should be using its petrol tax money as some sort of large, Labour Party re-election slush fund. That will now be able to happen, because Transfund does not have to have regard to any economic impact at all. It can just decide that the seats that are marginal will get the bridges and the new money. I, for one, believe that is exactly what Labour will do. That is exactly what Mike Williams will do.

That is exactly why the Minister will not put economic benefits into this clause. It has nothing at all to do with his going on about someone having to be killed in order to get a piece of road done. The Minister wants to ensure that Transfund has the ability to make political decisions. That is absolutely outrageous. I tell the Committee and that Minister that we will undo that. Roading decisions should be based on the economic benefit, not on the political benefit for the Labour Party. That is why we will be strongly opposing Part 3. I would like the Minister to take a call and explain why he will not support an amendment that stops political decisions from being made by the board of Transfund; that stops the Labour Party president and campaign manager from making decisions about where large amounts of Government funding for roading are allocated. I say to the Minister that it is outrageous that he has allowed that to happen. Never before has a party political president and campaign manager sat on a board, dishing out funds, like Mike Williams is doing with Transfund. The Minister could put a clause in here to stop it.

💬 Jill Pettis: I bet that’s a first.

It is a first. I know that Jill Pettis supports it. She thinks it is the best way to get roading projects done in Whanganui. She tells the people in Whanganui not to worry about that bridge, because she can get it done. It is a marginal seat, and she can ring the Labour Party president and get it done. [Interruption] Well, she asks about the “Road to Nowhere”, or whatever it was—the road that Sandra Lee had money spent on, even though it was not a public road. Taxpayer money went on that road because of a political decision that the Minister made in order to keep the Alliance in the tent. He spent taxpayers’ money for political purposes on that road, and he will do it again to try to buy David Parker the Otago seat. He will try to do it again to buy Jill Pettis the Whanganui seat.

We will be watching where that money goes. I suspect the money will not be going to areas that are of economic benefit for this country; it will be going to areas that are of political benefit. That is outrageous. That is why the system was made transparent. The one sneaky, underhand thing that this bill does is to take his political appointments one step further. It says to the Labour Party president and campaign manager that not only is he appointed—and paid—to sit on the board of Transfund, but he is able to make decisions about where the money goes without being accountable on any economic criteria at all. He just has to have his eyes on the politics of it, and that will keep this Minister satisfied.

I would like the Minister to take a call. I bet he will not take a call and deny it. I bet the Minister will not take a call and defend the Labour Party president’s appointment to Transfund. I bet the Minister will not take a call and defend the Labour Party president’s allocation of money to projects all over New Zealand, based on political patronage—not based on the economic benefit of roading. That Minister will not do that, and that tells us a lot. [Interruption] Jill Pettis is already saying she wants a new road. We will see whether she gets it.

I also want to raise the issues in Supplementary Order Paper 165. There is a large Supplementary Order Paper with a range of clauses to be read into this part. Once again, this Government behaves in this sneaky sort of way: it has submissions, listens to everybody, makes decisions, and reports back, then races off and does some sort of deal with the Greens, and throws that in without anybody having an opportunity to have a say on it. That is what this Minister has done with this Supplementary Order Paper.

I want the Minister to get up and explain why, on Part 3, we have five pages of amendments about, largely, the transitional provisions. The committee went through those transitional provisions very carefully. The officials agreed. So why do we have an amount of backsliding from this Minister on those transitional provisions? Why have these amendments been written? Is it so that Labour can have a quick review of some of the funding decisions, just to make sure? Do Mr Williams and the Minister want to have a look, just to make sure that the money is going to their pet political projects? Is that why these transitional provisions are being rewritten in this way? That is what it looks like to me. I would like the Minister to take a call and explain those issues to us, as well. He has not taken the chance to do that.

Finally, I note the provision that says a board member may well be on both Transfund and Transit, at the Minister’s discretion. I predict that the Labour Party president and campaign manager will be dishing the money out and deciding the projects. He will be on Transfund and Transit, deciding which project gets the money. That is political patronage at its worst.

I move, That the question be now put.

That was quite an enlightening speech from the Hon Roger Sowry. He talked about building roads for the economic benefit of this country. I remind members that National was in power for something like 9 or 10 years before Labour came in.

💬 Hon Lianne Dalziel: Nine long years.

Nine long years—and it did nothing. In fact, a former Minister of Transport stood in this Chamber yesterday afternoon and made two claims to fame. One was that he had split Transit into two, to become Transit and Transfund—one being the practical side of roadmaking and the other being the funding side. In the commercial world, that would be laughable, and I question the need for a two-pronged attack, so to speak.

His second claim was that he produced a book: Better Transport, Better Roads. I read the book with interest. As I recall, it illustrated quite clearly that road design, road fault, was responsible for 15.1 percent of road deaths in this country, yet the National Government did nothing—so much so that the Minister, the Hon Maurice Williamson, would not even turn up to the select committee to talk about the book! At that time I was a new MP, in my first term, and I was really disappointed by that.

What we in this country have to do—and this bill will not do it—is to identify the problems, identify the roads that need to be maintained and the roads that need to be built, specify the timeframe in which we need to do all of that, determine the cost, and work on a system that will provide the finance. First and foremost, New Zealand First advocates that the excise tax that goes from petrol into the consolidated account is used for the betterment of roads and the motorist. We accept that there might be some justification for not using all of it; there might be a genuine reason why some of it should be diverted to the consolidated account, but we want to see the rationale. We want the report that the Minister referred to some months ago to be tabled so that we can understand the argument. We believe that Transfund should have the ability to borrow. I believe that it has it now, but this bill seems to prevent it. If the funding is adequate—if we can get that 18.5c from the consolidated account and use it on roading—then our problem is well on the way to being solved. If it is not adequate, then Transfund should borrow the money, and we will repay the debt against future traffic volumes. Traffic in this country is increasing at a reasonable percentage, and so is fuel use. We all know that.

If all of that fails, or none of it stacks up—but that is our first option—then New Zealand First is prepared to look positively at a regional fuel tax. In other words, we could ask the motorist to pay a bit more to accommodate the concern.

💬 Clayton Cosgrove: How much?

I keep coming back to it, because I do not think that member over there quite understands things: first and foremost, we want to use the 18.5c that goes from the petrol motorist into the consolidated account. We believe there is a legitimate reason for using it.

💬 Hon Lianne Dalziel: When the member’s leader was Treasurer, what did he do then?

I think the Minister asked what my leader did when he was Treasurer, but she was eating at the time. I am not sure whether members are allowed to eat in this Chamber.

💬 Hon Lianne Dalziel: I’ve got a terrible cold.

I do not think she can eat, whether or not she has a cold. My leader did transfer some money from the consolidated account into the roading account. I do not know how many times we have to tell her that. In fact, he transferred 2.1c a litre from the consolidated account into the roading account. The intention was to continue doing that.

💬 Jeanette Fitzsimons: How come that didn’t fix it?

It was the first movement from the consolidated account to the road account for years.

I move, That the question be now put.

I want to carry on the little theme I began to develop last night about the tool-box. I think the Mayor of Auckland said it as well I have heard it said. He was looking for a tool-box with a range of features and functions to fix Auckland’s problems. Auckland’s problems have, without doubt, got to catastrophic levels. Major congestion used to be at peak times and at certain locations, but now it is anywhere, anytime—and if it rains, it is everywhere all the time. In Auckland, the traffic just locks, blocks, and stops.

When this Government came to power, it was given a pretty damn good blueprint to start from called Better Transport, Better Roads. Because of its ideological views, the Government said some of it was too right wing. I warned the Minister last night—and I keep warning him—that if he wants to get stuck into me about the right-wing tolling projects we were proposing, I have wonderful quotes from some of his senior party people, including his Prime Minister, about how dreadful and evil it was to have toll roads, and this bill has some of it. However, 4 years down the track—and, believe me, Auckland could not wait 4 months to progress this; when the Government came to power in 1999, its first priority should have been to pick up on that and move—we see an emaciated looking bill called the Land Transport Management Bill entered into Parliament, then gutted by Green members because of their opposition to the motorcar.

I found that opposition the most bizarre part. When I was Minister, I went to a number of public meetings when we were standing at election time. Green members would show up in their caftans and sandals and get stuck into me about why I was not funding public transport better, and about how the car was an outrage. I used to get someone in my team, or I would do it myself, to wait outside the hall and watch people arrive. I used to ask the question at the end of the meeting: “Could I have a show of hands please? How many people came to the meeting tonight using public transport?” I never had one hand go up, even though we sometimes met in a hall right on a major bus route with a bus stop straight outside.

Green members used to say: “We couldn’t, because we’ve got to go on to another meeting.” What they were saying was: “It’s not us—it’s them.” There is some nebulous “them” out there who should not use their cars, but not “us”, because we have another meeting to go to. I tell Green members that everybody in Auckland has another meeting to go to. They have to pick their kids up, go to soccer, or to the supermarket.

The motorcar will be the central product for delivering transport in Auckland, regardless of any pie-in-the-sky Green members who think that cycleways or walking tracks will fix the problem. Yes, I would like to see a move towards making public transport better, and quality public transport will help fix the problem, but it is not the panacea it is made out to be. Jeanette Fitzsimons and other Green members would have us believe that if we did this bill properly, everyone would give up their cars tomorrow and walk to work. It will not happen, and this bill does not provide anywhere near the tools that are needed to fund it properly.

The public-private partnership provisions of this bill are the weakest and most ineffectual I have ever seen. Larry Baldock told the House yesterday that he knows lots of people who will get into public-private partnerships, yet he was challenged over and over again to name one company that says that if this bill goes through, it will put money into a public-private partnership. The silence is deafening, as members can hear if they listen carefully. It is the flutter of the wings as the chickens come home to roost. This bill does nothing. It does not give us the tool-box of tools. John Banks says so, employers and manufacturers say so, and the Automobile Association says so. To go through the list of interested parties, we would have to seek an extension of the whole debate into tomorrow.

Then there is the next bit with regard to consents. My God, it takes so long to get consent for anything now—even something ordinary! But if the Government wants to fix Auckland’s major arterial routes, it has to circumvent the old Resource Management Act processes, or in 10 years it will still not have got those consents and there will be outrage from Auckland. If members of the Labour Party think the public do not want to pay for this, I challenge any one of them to come with me on a Friday night at 5 o’clock and stand in somewhere like Stanley Street as the cars are trying to get up on to the motorway. They are locked, blocked, stopped, and going nowhere. I challenge them to come with me and tap on all the car windows and say: “Would you pay 5 bucks cash right now to be home within the next 10 minutes?”. There would not be a car that would not say yes. This bill does nothing to fix that problem.

I move, That the question be now put.

I took another call because I was really hopeful that the Minister would take the chance to take a call. We are now in a situation where Ministers decide that they will just not bother answering questions or talking about their legislation—it is all far too much trouble. This Minister is far too important to be bothered by answering questions around the detail of Part 3. He was too important to come to the select committee to explain the policy decisions behind the bill, so he did not do that.

💬 Hon Paul Swain: I wasn’t invited.

That is because the Labour members voted not to invite him.

💬 Hon Lianne Dalziel: It was a majority decision.

It was a majority decision, so all the Labour members voted not to have the Minister attend. I can understand that, they know him better than we do. They know his performance, and they probably felt it was better to have the officials explain. But now the Minister has an opportunity to stand up on his hind legs and tell members why he is allowing board members to be on both Transit and Transfund boards. I want him to explain that so that New Zealanders understand. Just as the Labour Party appoints its campaign chairman and president—who happen to be the same person—a person can also be on Transfund and Transit, and we should know why.

💬 Jill Pettis: Write to him and he might respond.

We know that that does not happen. I actually wrote to the Minister a few weeks ago and told him that if he wanted sensible land transport legislation, National would work with him and vote with him, and we would not have to be beholden to the sort of round-the-back-of-the-bikeshed deal that he has done with the Greens. The Minister has not even bothered to respond. I know from dealing with the Minister’s office on Land Transport Safety Authority and other issues that people bring to me that it takes somewhere between 4 and 5 months to get a response from the Minister’s office. It is not one of the quickest offices—but I have to say it is not the slowest. One always gets an acknowledgement within 4 or 5 days, but no answer for 4 or 5 months.

But now the Minister has an opportunity to explain to us exactly why he is so keen on Part 3, which enables people to sit on both boards. He can explain to us why he will not let one of the objectives of Transfund be an economic objective. The Minister has every other objective in there. Paragraph (b) of clause 70(2) states that Transfund has to take into account the views of affected communities. We are inclined to define that as being just about anyone, anywhere in the country. It has to take into account the need for environmental responsibility, and exhibit a sense of social responsibility. The board of Transfund is sitting down with a large amount of money—hundreds of millions of dollars—and has to show that the decision it makes is environmentally responsible, socially responsible, and—

💬 Jeanette Fitzsimons: Shame!

The Greens say “shame”. OK, that is fine. Let us have those provisions in there—we are not asking that they be taken out. But why not put in “economic”? Or do the Greens believe that one cannot be economically responsible and at the same time socially and environmentally responsible? That is the issue. The Greens have convinced the Minister that one cannot do things for the economy, socially, and for the environment at the same time, so that is why “economic” decision-making has come out.

Of course we do not have the clause that says that Transfund must not have regard to the political circumstances of the Government. I would like the Minister to stand up and assure the Committee that the Labour Party will not use Transfund as its marginal seat retention scheme, because that is certainly the view in the community. It is the view in the industry that this is being restructured so that the Labour Party can put its snout in the trough and use it for that purpose.

I welcome this second call this afternoon to clarify New Zealand First’s views on funding road transport. First and foremost, we are advocates of using the 18.5c petrol tax that goes into the Crown account. If that is not justified or fair, and if there is a genuine reason that all of it or some of it should go into the Crown account, we would live with that if we could see a report that supported that assertion. Then we would look reasonably favourably at a regional fuel tax. It is important that we address the roading problems in this country. We hear that over $1 billion a year is lost to the commercial community in Auckland. I think the new leader of the National Party said that congestion in Auckland costs $1.4 billion a year. We say that the congestion problem is long past being reasonable.

We do not support tolling, across the board. We would support road tolling on an individual basis exactly as we have now, where the legislation comes before the House and a case is put for a particular road to be tolled, and only that road. It is not to go on to other roads, etc. That is the case with Route K in Tauranga. We do not believe that the public-private partnership scenario in this bill will work. Larry Baldock asked yesterday, as I recall, why we are voting against this legislation if we do not believe it will work. Well, in short it will not work because it is not flexible enough. It will not work because the risks are too high. It will not work because the profit is too low, or is likely to be.

But all that can be changed with a stroke of a pen, and then the average New Zealander could be faced with road tolls, here, there, and everywhere. We say “No” to that. We say that for every dollar that goes into a toll plaza, firstly, in part it has to pay for the physical cost of that plaza; secondly, it has to pay for the manning of the plaza; thirdly, it has to pay for the administration of the roading scheme; fourthly, it has to pay the debt that the private investor has incurred by borrowing money to fund the plaza; and finally, it has to pay for the profit—no profit, no investment. Maurice Williamson alluded to no profit, no investment; he not only alluded to it, he stated it in very, very firm terms, and I agree with him wholeheartedly. If there is no profit, investors cannot see money coming back to them, and they will not invest in the scheme. Virtually every dollar that goes through a regional petrol tax or fuel tax goes directly into roading. The best part of half the dollars that go through toll structures, I suggest, would be lost. The best part of half goes into administration, capital costs, and what have you, but every cent in every dollar that goes through the fuel tax system will go into roading.

If Transfund had the ability from the Minister to borrow, it could borrow sufficient money at reasonable terms to address the roading needs of this country in a relatively short time frame. We would pay it back through our petrol tax. As I say, if a petrol tax of 18.5c going into the consolidated account can be justified, and we have real doubts about it, then we would be prepared to support a regional fuel tax. I say “regional fuel tax” because we seek to have it imposed on more than just the petrol motorist. It would be collected through a fuel tax on the petrol motorist and—

I move, That the question be now put.