New Zealand Infrastructure Commission/Te Waihanga Bill

Kei te kōkiri ahau, e Te Māngai o Te Whare, kia pānuitia tuatorungia ai ko te pire karangahia nei ki Te Reo Māori ko te pire waihanga, ki te reo Pākehā ko Te New Zealand Infrastructure Commission.

[I move, That the New Zealand Infrastructure Commission/Te Waihanga Bill be now read a third time.]

I stand to offer a full third reading speech pertaining to this Government bill, the New Zealand Infrastructure Commission/Te Waihanga Bill. I’m going to break my speech up into a number of segments. I want to first acknowledge the efforts of the Finance and Expenditure Committee, and I also want to acknowledge my colleagues on the other side of the House—collegial in the sense that we are all a part of Parliament.

This bill, I think it might be said, was conceived by the last administration, or, at least, the Leader of the Opposition boasts that it was his idea. It was certainly something that New Zealand First also brought to the table. I’m proud to announce that it’s an overdue development.

So what exactly are we passing here? We are passing a piece of legislation that creates an independent institution—and the names of whom I shall read out shortly—that has a host of functions that really will help both this Government and future Governments cope with ongoing knotty infrastructure challenges.

So what are those challenges? Well, firstly, how do investors, how do planners, and how do advocates assemble enough information in a single location and build an avenue or a corridor through which people can come to the Government, or the Government can travel and amplify the message as to what’s happening in infrastructure in New Zealand? Now, it may sound a slightly trite thing to say that this is important, but it doesn’t exist and it’s very important. There is a need to give certainty for at least a 30-year plan pertaining to our infrastructure. Sadly, it will be contested space, and perhaps that contest of ideas is particularly evident in the accent that I and our Government, our Cabinet Ministers, are putting on KiwiRail. But these are infrastructure projects that ought to be debated, information amassed, and possibly costings tested in a single place, and that place, in the future, will be the Infrastructure Commission.

How will the Infrastructure Commission amass this information? Well, it will enjoy a host of information-gathering powers. Now, there was some disappointment on the other side of the House during the committee stage that we didn’t embolden the commission further to deliberately creep into the space—well, not “creep”—deliberately wade into the space of procurement difficulties that the industry are concerned about, and I dare say a few Ministers over the years have vented their spleen about it. But it’s important that the House acknowledge that inherent within the powers of the Infrastructure Commission will be the ability to wade into the troubles associated with getting the right balance between risk minimisation for the Crown and enough confidence for the Crown’s building and infrastructure partners. So that work—although we were unable to vote for the Supplementary Order Paper—will and can continue.

I’ll say three things in that respect. I look forward to tabling, if necessary, a letter articulating what I expect in that regard from the Infrastructure Commission. Secondly, outlining some of the work that’s already taking place within the infrastructure staff—which, if you look at the bill, you’ll see those staff were part of Treasury. Now, they’re being transferred over through a process that I don’t want to involve myself with, so that they become employees of the Infrastructure Commission. The third thing is to identify what other Ministers are doing in the broad space of procurement, but there’s in all this opportunities for it to improved.

I think that it’s important also that we give confidence to the actual sector that are willing to invest, that are the builders and the service providers. There have been allegations made, certainly to my good self, that because we have not continued on and guaranteed the extension of four-lane highways—and I’ll talk about the Tai Tokerau that might stretch from Warkworth up to Whangarei, or in my case my preference is from Whangarei down. But politics is about making choices, and the $45 billion that is associated with the 10-year spending horizon for the New Zealand Transport Agency—there are choices that Governments will want and reflect through their policy documents to such an institution. But this institution will enable politicians to turn towards a body of expertise and some kites may need to be put in the air. Who knows what they may be over the next few years.

Now, in relation to some of the big unresolved areas, we have an enormous bill coming our way in the area called the three waters—i.e., how to enable local councils to try and work together. Unfortunately for them, I have more of a Singaporean approach, but, unfortunately, for me, that’s not my portfolio. So to get those councils to work together, aggregate their effort, and spread the costs over a larger number of ratepayers—that possibly could be something that in the future Ministers may want to refer to this body.

Secondly, the importance of rationalising the New Zealand port structure. I look forward, at the right time, to seeking some feedback from this body here, and indeed they may also try and crack that historical chestnut otherwise called relocating the naval presence out of Devonport to other parts of New Zealand, which I’m told by a former National Minister affectionately known in Whangarei as Banksie that it was something that he sought to do during the Bolger Government. The point I’m making is that this now gives Ministers an opportunity in the future to turn to a body of expertise that have some independence from the ebb and flow of the electoral process.

There will be some criticisms and, without any malice intended, I did take on board what the National member representing Feilding had to say. I hope he’s looking after Hato Pāora College, not that I went to that school; I went to Tipene. Unfortunately, the Anglican Church closed my school down and the Catholics are still keeping Hato Pāora open. But he is a doubting Thomas as to whether or not the content of this bill will actually enable an organisation to exert the level of influence that the other side of the House would like to see.

But the reality is these are contested ideas. Certain people want more privatisation. Certain people want more four-lane highways. Others want more public investment and public transportation infrastructure. Some like my good self want to see rail rehabilitated. Others want to see a rationalisation of the ports. Others want to see a relocation of defence. Others want to see more private capital in the delivery of social infrastructure—and the latter, that is not the policy or the ideological creed of this particular collection of parties. But I, as the infrastructure Minister, am a great enthusiast of blending the two traditions of public stewardship and also private capital. Whether or not we will always agree with this institution, well, as we say in Māori, “Mā te wā e titiro”—in time, we will see.

But we shouldn’t be fearful that if we ask bodies such as this and perhaps the Productivity Commission—I’ve never really bothered to read too many reports of the Productivity Commission. I stopped doing that when I passed honours philosophy. However, there are other bodies like that. This one, I think, will have a very practical bent to it when you consider the number of people that come from a finance background. Dr Bollard, a highly esteemed New Zealander—he is going to be the initial leader. We’ve appointed a CEO. Unfortunately for him at the moment, he’s wandering through the undergrowth, figuratively speaking, of creating an office and attracting staff.

So I would say to all members of the House, give the opportunity for the waewaes—the legs—and the ringaringas—the arms—to grow on this institution. But I’m respectful to the Hon Judith Collins and others, and indeed the member affectionately known as “Goldie”, who the paper described this morning as having achieved a sense of greatness as a consequence of asking me lots of questions over the stewardship of the Provincial Growth Fund. So to the extent that the National Party have elevated the Opposition spokesman on finance, I should claim some small responsibility for his new status. Thank you very much.

Well, thank you very much, Mr Speaker, and it’s my pleasure to speak in support of this New Zealand Infrastructure Commission/Te Waihanga Bill, one which members of parties across this House have supported because, fundamentally, it’s a reasonably sensible idea to set up an independent group to provide some input and insight into decision making around major infrastructure projects in New Zealand.

I had an early start this morning, going in to speak at the Mood of the Boardroom, and I’m bound to say at that particular function there was a high deal of frustration expressed at the lack of progress on infrastructure in this country. So this commission will help to a degree, to the extent to which it provides insights into how to go about assessing what’s going to be important, what’s going to be useful, what isn’t, and how you procure it. The suggestion that we made that has been picked up by the Government—and I’m pleased that they have—is that we should extend its information powers to local government. It was very odd that the bill was introduced in this space without being able to get into local government, where a big chunk of the infrastructure is actually done. So we tidied that up and it makes reasonable sense.

It’s interesting to hear the Minister for Infrastructure referring to the chief executive going about setting up his office already. We haven’t passed the bill, but anyway that’s how this Government works: they haven’t passed the legislation, but they’ve already appointed the board and the chief executive, and they’re working. So maybe it’s a bit of retrospective legislation that we’re passing in order to get the cart before the horse.

However, the main concern I have, of course, is that the extent to which this commission will be useful is the extent to which the future politicians can put some level of discipline around their decision making. So what we saw as a forerunner, which the Minister mentioned, is the Auckland Transport Alignment Project, whereby the council and the Government listed a series of projects that they saw as important for the Auckland region. But what happened when this Government came in is that they threw a bunch of them out and changed all the order around. So the third rail, which is an essential piece of infrastructure in Auckland to enable the commuter trains to keep running without having to stop every half an hour for a great freight train to go through—that doesn’t seem to be happening. Nothing’s happening. What’s happening with that, Minister? Nothing, and yet they’re spending hundreds and hundreds of millions on rail in funny places where it’s hard to understand. So the biggest rail project doesn’t seem to be happening.

Then, of course, we have the circumstance of the Government coming in, cancelling a whole lot of projects that were ready to go, and replacing them with a whole lot of projects that aren’t ready to go and won’t be for a long time. So we have a great infrastructure hole opening up over the next two or three years, which is of serious concern. Now this Government, of course, can’t even agree amongst itself about the slow tram down Dominion Road. We know New Zealand First don’t like it; Labour and the Greens love it.

So that inability to come up with decision making internally is not going to be helped by an infrastructure commission and, ultimately, it comes down to the political choices that are made. So if a Government comes in, like this one, and changes the Government policy statement on transport, removes any reference to reducing congestion, and it’s driven by two Ministers: the first, Julie Anne Genter, who will never yield to car fascists, and, secondly, the Minister of Transport himself, Phil Twyford, who thinks we’ve over-invested in roads—when you have got those sorts of highly ideological attitudes towards infrastructure investment, you’re always going to struggle to have to provide that long-term consistency over 30 years, which is indeed what the Minister is referring to, because you keep on chopping and changing on a regular basis.

So my only plea in supporting this bill—and wishing Mr Bollard and the rest of the team all success in coming up with some logic and some careful consideration about infrastructure priorities for this country in the next little while, and wishing them all the success—is I do wish to encourage members on the other side of the House to be a little bit more pragmatic about the decision making that they make and to actually listen to what the Infrastructure Commission says. On that basis, I commend this bill to the House.

During the Minister’s speech on this bill, we were given some snippets of his life story, and a little bit of back information. So given that we’ve had that kind of expansive approach to speaking, I wonder if you’ll indulge me for a little bit, Mr Speaker. I don’t intend to share my life story, but I do want to reflect on the extent to which, in actual fact, what we’re doing with this is we’re formalising gossip—“gossip” in the best sense of the word. Let’s talk a little bit about how people have worked out who’s going to do which projects, where, and at what time in this country. New Zealand is a small place; we all know each other. The leaders in business and in government, both local and central, know each other. They meet at the pub; they have a few beers and a bit of a yarn. In the case of the Hon David Carter, I suspect it’s in this stance [Leans on bench], talking about what’s going on at the pub—this is his habitual stance in the House. Other people—

💬 Rt Hon David Carter: Oh, we’re going to get a wellbeing lecture.

And always very relaxed and comfortable it looks too.

In terms of finding out where something is happening or if there’s a bit of a project in the wind, the knowledge about it has been exchanged through these rather informal networks, which is exactly the function of gossip—of exchanging information—and on the whole, because we’re a small country, well, things have kind of muddled along and done reasonably well. Things have kind of gotten done. But we can do better, and that’s what this bill is about. It’s about taking that sharing of information, the networking, the understandings that people have—the knowledge that project A is happening down in Southland and project B is happening up in Northland, and that perhaps when project A comes to an end in Southland another one might be starting up the road in Otago. It’s taking that informal knowledge and actually making sure it is pulled into a consistent plan. It’s formalising it and it’s making it into something that we can use for strategic planning purposes, rather than just that back-door exchange of information.

So that is why I liken this to formalising gossip, and I think it’s a jolly good thing to do. I suspect Dr Alan Bollard will be a little astounded to learn that he’s presiding over a gossip network, but that is indeed what is actually happening.

If we look at the bill as it has come through the various stages, it has come through largely unchanged except for the addition of the local government information-gathering powers, so that the Infrastructure Commission can gather information from local government. Of course, that’s very important because local government is where a lot of the infrastructure work is done in this country. But the real nuts of it is sitting in this main function. It’s in clause 9 of the bill that “The main function of the Commission is to co-ordinate, develop, and promote an approach to infrastructure that encourages infrastructure, and services that result from the infrastructure, that improve the well-being of New Zealanders.” It’s about long-term planning and long-term thinking—and do we ever need it.

I think the previous speaker, Mr Paul Goldsmith, referred to the Auckland Transport Alignment Plan, or ATAP, in which there was quite a bit of work done trying to align the various projects in Auckland. Of course, they weren’t funded, so you can have all the planning you like if you don’t fund it, but the concept was good that we actually try to align the various bits of work that need to be done and create a long-term plan for them.

It serves two purposes. One is that it actually ensures that the planning is consistent over time—that the planning that is done for, let’s say, fibre networks for telecommunications is aligned with the planning that’s done for transport networks. That is important because you don’t want to be digging up some of the channels that have been built for fibre networks just to put in a new road and so on, but you actually need to align the things. So doing that alignment is actually a really important thing to do, and getting it just so that all the projects fit together nicely.

Of course, having a long-term plan for infrastructure is really important in terms of enabling the construction industry to thrive. So if a big project finishes, then if the firm that is doing it doesn’t have another project lined up, well, that results in job losses. Or, equally, if a firm gets going on a particular project but it cannot see projects two and three and four down the line, then the incentives are to take on short-term contract workers instead of providing long-term employment for people.

So this infrastructure planning serves the wellbeing of New Zealanders in all sorts of different ways, and when it’s done well it serves us very well indeed. I guess the examples that occur to me come to me from my own electorate, New Lynn, in Auckland, where we manage with all the Auckland traffic problems. Mostly, I manage by trying not to drive into the central city, because I’d far rather take the bus. But the traffic does get clogged up, and it is because we do not have sufficiently good public transport networks in place yet. So that indicates a real need for some long-term planning around our networks but also around who’s going to build them and so on.

But on the other hand, something in New Lynn has worked very, very well indeed and that is the New Lynn Transport Hub. It’s a major transport network hub, where the trains and the buses all come in to the same point so that people can catch a bus down to the train station, then the train station to town. It’s lined up around supermarkets and the like—around supermarkets and shopping centres. It’s lined up around intensified housing. It’s all quite carefully planned so that it all fits together. I’d like to pay tribute to my predecessor in my seat, the Hon David Cunliffe, who, with other people, was responsible for getting that project kicked off and under way. It’s a great project, and that’s the sort of thing that we will see coming to us through the planning that is done by the Infrastructure Commission.

So it will help us to get all the networks that we need to run a modern society in place, and to coordinate them altogether. It will help the construction industry to see where its next job is coming from, and where it can, again, engage in its own long-term planning as to how construction firms build their firms and plan for the long-term future. It will also help central government, obviously, but it will help us in terms of funding and of thinking how do we fund infrastructure. At present, we tend to do it a little bit on a project-by-project basis. It’s somewhat ad hoc, the planning around funding for infrastructure. One of the things that setting up a long-term plan for infrastructure will do for us is to then enable those of us who are in central government to think about how we fund that long-term plan and put long-term strategies in place for the funding around it as well.

So these are all the benefits that come to us from this Infrastructure Commission. As the Minister said, it’s getting under way at present. The board has been appointed, a chief executive has been appointed, and that person is starting to gather the resources that are needed in order to do the job. So, as with anything, it does take a while to get going, but I am hoping that we will see some pretty good stuff coming out of that Infrastructure Commission in the not too far distant future.

I suppose what I want to focus on there is I don’t think the Infrastructure Commission needs to be perfect right from the start. It will take a while for it to get up and running, but we can expect it to do a pretty good job, particularly with the resources that it can draw on from people like Dr Bollard but also the other people who’ve been appointed to the Infrastructure Commission and the people who will end up working for it.

It’s not a critical piece of our machinery of Government. This is the sort of thing that can be done without, but on the whole we will be better off for having it in place. It’s very similar to similar sorts of entities that operate in other countries around the world, in the various states of Australia and so on. So having an infrastructure commission, or something equivalent to it, is not a new or novel idea. It is just a jolly good idea, and it is great to see it being supported across the House.

💬 Dr Duncan Webb: Jolly good—rah, rah!

It is jolly good—rah, rah!

On that note, I want to finish just by thanking the members of the Finance and Expenditure Committee, who worked on the bill. It was a collegial process and one of those bills where we did try to nut out some of the problems and sort out what could be done better. It was interesting to listen to the members of the public who submitted to us, ranging from infrastructure firms themselves to individuals. They all had interesting points to make, and it was genuinely a collaborative process of working through this particular piece of legislation—long may that continue. So, with that, I commend this bill to the House.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. Shane Jones is many things, but he is not stupid. One of the smartest things he did was to pick up an excellent National Party policy to run with it and also to involve us in the process of getting the appointments made and actually briefing us properly. His colleagues in the Government could well use that sort of nous and understanding around how to get stuff done in Parliament and across-party.

Infrastructure is something that the National Party believes very fully in. I mean, if we look at the roll-out of ultra-fast broadband, the roads of national significance, the Waterview Tunnel, the electrification of Auckland’s commuter rail network, and the major upgrade of the national electricity grid, we have a very good track record in actually committing to and then delivering on infrastructure.

I am really pleased that we are able to continue to support this bill, but I am disappointed that my colleague Andrew Bayly’s Supplementary Order Paper was voted down by the Government in the committee stages of the House, because that would have given building and construction firms better protection from the excessive risk that they take when they are contracting with the Government.

The Government is a big client. It’s a very enticing client when it comes to the big size of projects. But, unfortunately, it can be a pretty bullying client too when it comes to the terms of trade and business. What we have seen are some of our previously successful businesses in the construction industry going to the wall, and one of the causes—that they say, anyway—are the terms of trade and business that they have with Government agencies. So I think that is a real opportunity lost, and I’m very sorry that that has happened.

However, looking to the positive, what we can say is that it’s good that the Government has worked out now that infrastructure is important, because, actually, it’s had a shambolic record to date. When they came into office, the Government cancelled 12 major shovel-ready roading projects up and down the country, to the huge amount of distress to local people—

💬 Dr Duncan Webb: Lots of shovels; no money!

—but also to the construction industry. Dr Webb may find that very funny, but, having met with the civil contractors at the time of the East-West Link road cancellation by the Hon Phil Twyford, it was really evident that contractors were concerned that they had put in enormous amounts of effort of staffing and commitment and had given up other projects to get themselves ready for this project that they had every reason to believe was happening. A change of Government came in, infrastructure was suddenly out the window—didn’t want to hear anything about the East-West Link. It was all going to be about light rail up Dominion Road, going to Māngere—not sure, because it’s certainly not to the airport. What they saw was that having put huge effort into it, they were suddenly left high and dry. That is the sort of thing that should not be happening.

One of the things I would like to see is for Governments—successive Governments—to respect some of the decisions where contracts have been signed or, certainly, where people have been advised that contracts will be continuing. It is important that we don’t have little hissy fits when it’s not our projects that are happening. We have made it very clear that the light rail up Dominion Road is something we think is a complete waste of money, time, and everything else, and I’ve noticed that the Government that was all very excited about having that happening in this term of Government now seems to have a date that’s sometime after the America’s Cup, and possibly never, because they’re not quite sure where in Māngere it’s going to end up—certainly not at the airport. So the whole thing is just an absolute farce.

So good on Shane Jones for trying to take some sort of control and putting some form of structure around it. It must be a total delight—not really—for him to have to deal with the Hon Phil Twyford on this issue, on transport. I do feel that the Hon Shane Jones has got an almost impossible job: to deal with people who don’t like infrastructure, except if its 19th century, and who are not committed to the fact that, actually, most of New Zealand has to get around places on roads.

One of the things that I think is really important is also to understand that infrastructure, obviously, has commitments around electricity, around water, around roading, and around broadband, obviously—around all the things that help to make our lives 21st century rather than 19th century. So it is really important that we take a considered and serious approach to this and not get all too party political when it’s not our particular pet project.

So good on Shane Jones for doing that. We’re happy to support that. But, as I said, real opportunity lost in this Parliament in not supporting Andrew Bayly’s Supplementary Order Paper, because one of the big messages we’re hearing in the building construction area is that businesses are finding dealing with Government agencies is just getting really hard, and we can’t have our construction companies, businesses—some 50 or 60 years old—going broke because the terms of trade of dealing with Government agencies are just too tough. I think we just need to be a little bit smarter about this and understand that we can promise all we like in Parliament and when we’re in Government on what we’re going to deliver on infrastructure, but we need the people to actually do the work, as well as the money. People actually have to be able to do it, and those people need to have businesses that are viable.

So I just think it’s a good start, but it’s a bit too late. I’m happy to support it and hope that when we are back in Government in the, hopefully, not too distant future, it will be something that we will find useful and I think the public will find useful as well. Thank you, Mr Speaker.

Kia ora. Thank you, Mr Speaker. This is a great step forward for New Zealand. We, indeed, have languished with a lack of planning around infrastructure and projects that have been driven, not by a thoughtful, careful, systematic approach, but by the kind of pork-barrel politics that can go on around six-lane highways to Ashburton and so on. Whereas what this does is it says we need to think carefully both about priorities, about what is really in the best interests of all New Zealanders, and also about pipelines and funding.

The Hon Judith Collins was right that we do need to think carefully about the health of our construction industry, in many ways. One of those ways—one of the critical ways—that this is doing is trying to even out some of those bumps so that there aren’t big spikes where prices go up and we pay too much for the services and then, three years later, when a project comes to the end, people are on the unemployment benefit and businesses aren’t being used to their full capacity because of that kind of planning. So we want to be able to project well into the future—using this bill—what the work will be, so that businesses and other institutions as well can plan around that. That’s at the centre of what this bill does.

It is important to note that this kind of planning will also enable us to ensure our training institutions are up to scratch as well, because we know that that is, essentially, part of the infrastructure of New Zealand: the quality of our people and their ability to do these very skilled tasks, whether it be engineering or whether it be, actually, simply laying that road or building that building as well.

So this bill does a number of things, and one of the main things, of course—the first task for the commission—will be information gathering, and that’s at the heart of this bill, which is to say we need to know what is going on. One of the things that occurred in the Finance and Expenditure Committee was that that information-gathering power was extended into local bodies, because we know, in fact, that probably the majority, but certainly a huge amount, of infrastructure works that is undertaken is undertaken by local bodies, whether it be three waters or whether it be building public libraries or any other public facility. So that ability to cast the net pretty wide and understand what’s going on, what the needs are, what the capacity of industry is, is really important as well.

You know, I was interested to hear the Hon Judith Collins reciting her Government’s achievements, but we know that there’s a huge shortfall in New Zealand—that’s why this Government announced in Budget 2018, in fact, that it would invest $42 billion over the next five years. That’s the kind of money which simply hadn’t been invested, and there’s a massive deficit in our infrastructure, but we’re going to catch that up.

It is interesting to note as well that the bill defines infrastructure very broadly. Quite often, when we talk about infrastructure we leap to transport, because those projects are large and visible. However, we’ve got to recognise that things like the rural broadband project that this Government is rolling out is also part of important infrastructure and that the Dunedin Hospital is a massive project—I think it’s $800 million; I may be wrong there—that’s going to absorb a huge amount of infrastructure resource in the South Island. The huge school building project that this Government is embarking upon, and again, that’s going to take a lot of building resources, a lot of planning, a lot of architecture, a lot of engineering—that’s infrastructure, as well as those fantastic rail projects that I know my friend Mr Ball will be very happy with, the road projects, and, of course, things like ports and so on. So it’s all infrastructure. In fact, right down to the kind of tourism infrastructure that we’re going to be using the tourism levy on—things like upgrading toilets and tourist facilities on our main tourist routes—it’s all part of the infrastructure that this bill is aimed at delivering in a careful manner, in a planned manner, and, if I may say, in a manner which will get both the best business model for the construction industry and the best price for all of those people that are embarking on it. The “terms of trade” was the phrase used by the Hon Judith Collins. It is important we get those right, and part of that is making sure that we do give full, fair warning of when these projects are coming so that we don’t have to pay a premium for ramping up and ramping down in a most inefficient manner. So that’s great news.

This kind of infrastructure really contributes to our wellbeing in New Zealand, both in the provision of great infrastructure, which means we can lead better lives, but also things like reducing our carbon output, so that we have things like great rail links and better inner-city networks and so on.

Of course, one of the other really important parts of this bill is prioritising, because it’s all very nice to look at a centre where some voter support is needed and put a link of some kind in or a bridge that is not really used or doesn’t actually have a great business case. What we really want to see is that if we’ve got, you know, $8 billion to spend on infrastructure over the next short while, it’s used in the way it gives the best return—not necessarily the best financial return, but the best return in that way we now need to look at what a return on investment is: the way in which it improves the lives of all New Zealanders, whether it be by putting them into work more effectively, by business operating more effectively, or even just leading better, healthier lives, better-connected lives, lives where we understand each other better. The safety work that’s going on on our roads is a really good example of that, where we might not get somewhere quicker but we’re going to get there alive. We’re going to drive that road toll down. That’s a great piece of infrastructure. That’s the kind of planning that we can prioritise by looking carefully at both the science side of it, the numbers, but also looking at the human side of it—what’s the best spend.

So the Infrastructure Commission will be—and we need to recognise that it’s not a kind of democratic body; it’s an expert panel. To that panel will be appointed people who have special knowledge and expertise in the various areas of infrastructure and planning, and they will be able to deliver to Government, quite independently, their views. That will be on a rolling basis, so we’d expect those reports to be published every five years and to be able to inform the Government of where the need really is in terms of all of that infrastructure upon which New Zealand, the economy, and its people depend. Of course, the Minister responsible will be able to take that and respond to it. It will be a public document, so it can be subject to the careful scrutiny that members of this House and the wider public subject it to.

It is an absolutely fantastic piece of legislation, and it’s great to see—you know, I don’t deny that this was an idea that had its genesis in the National Party. It’s one of those ideas which should have cross-party support because it’s simply common sense. Of course, we’ve got around to doing it, which is something that really is worth taking note of.

The information-gathering powers in the bill, though, are important, and I must say this was what came under most scrutiny at select committee, because we’re always a bit worried about a Government entity that can pry, and we’re rightly cautious about that, because privacy and commercial sensitivity is an important thing. So we looked carefully at those provisions, but I think the committee was satisfied both that the powers were appropriate in their extent—that the ability to get information from third parties, from local government, from other parts of Government, was appropriate—and that there were appropriate safeguards. Of course, information that’s commercially sensitive and confidential cannot be used for anything else, cannot be further disseminated, and those protections are there in the bill—very important protections they are.

This bill really is a leap forward, and what it means is that huge sum of money that this Government’s going to spend, and I suspect there’ll be more to come in future Budgets—that $42 billion will be carefully spent. It will be spent in a way which gets best value and improves all of New Zealanders’ lives better. I commend this bill to the House.

It is a great pleasure for me to rise and take a brief call and to say that I’m finally on my feet supporting a piece of Government legislation, because this does have the support of the National Party. Listening to the member who has just resumed his seat, Dr Duncan Webb—he, of course, claimed credit for a huge amount of the infrastructure spend done by the previous National Government. We invested significantly in broadband, to the benefit of most New Zealanders. The area that he attempted to claim credit for was, of course, the Rural Broadband Initiative, which was one that was championed by the National Party, with its interest, of course, in rural New Zealand. It has been a success, and that’s acknowledged by Duncan Webb, but I just want to point out that it wasn’t an initiative by the current Labour Government.

We will support this legislation because of the figures released from the last day or so after the botched census of last year—2018—that the population of New Zealand is roaring towards 5 million people. Clearly, there has to be investment in infrastructure, be that roads—and I know that there’s a philosophical divide between the Green Party and the Labour and New Zealand First Party about the necessity for roads. I drive a car. I don’t consider myself for one minute a car fascist like the Hon Julie Anne Genter does.

We need to invest in roads. We need to invest more in broadband. We need to invest in things like hospitals and schools. Again, Dr Duncan Webb championed the spend by the current Labour - New Zealand First - Green Government on the Dunedin Hospital of $800 million. Well, it hasn’t started yet. Not a sod has been turned to build the Dunedin Hospital. Compare that with Dr Duncan Webb’s own electorate, where, of course, there was the Christchurch Hospital rebuild, substantially completed, of $600 million - plus done under the National Government.

So there is a need for the Infrastructure Commission. I hope it will take some of the politics out.

Of all the investment in security and infrastructure, the one that certainly worries me is the current determination by members of this Government to spend money on rail. I was talking to my good colleague here Ian McKelvie, who reminded me of the success of the Wairoa rail line, recently opened on 14 June by the Government. It was predicted to have six trains a week on the line. It’s had one—it’s had a train there on the opening day. It hasn’t had another train on that line since opening day. So I do think that by establishing the Infrastructure Commission, we may see some more sensible and rational decision-making. It does depend on the Minister putting the right people on the commission, and, to date, he’s shown an ability to do that.

As I conclude my brief remarks, I also just want to make sure that in the future there’s no political interference by the Minister for Infrastructure. I do note the legislation has the ability for him to comment on the draft report that is tabled from the commission and for the commission then to take note of the comments of a Minister. The Minister can also direct at any time the commission to do a particular report into infrastructure. So it’s that political interference which risks undermining the good work being done by the establishment of the commission.

I commend the bill to the House. It is a step in the right direction.

Kia ora , Mr Speaker. Ngā mihi nui ki a koutou. Kia ora. I rise on behalf of the Green Party and I’m proud to support the New Zealand Infrastructure Commission/Te Waihanga Bill.

You know, infrastructure is the foundation of a prosperous country. It affects everything in our society. The choices we make in this House or in the Beehive affect the decisions that Kiwis can make in the real world. It affects the type of schools or hospitals that their kids or family members go to, how expensive their electricity is, whether their children can safely cycle to school or whether there is a fast train to take instead of avoiding congested streets, or whether your water infrastructure is a hundred years old and creaking and leaking. The decisions we make affect the decisions people can make, and that’s why making sure that the foundation is strong, is joined up, is coordinated, and takes a long-term approach is really important. That’s exactly what this legislation is doing tonight, and I’m proud to be supporting it at the third reading.

Now, I’ve heard different members criticise the Green Party for taking an anti-road approach. I want to set the record straight, because what the Green Party stands for is a balanced transport system. What we saw under the previous Government was billions borrowed on just seven “roads of National Party significance”, which had many of the negative benefit-cost ratios, which meant that the National Party was quite happy to put it on the national credit card and actually lose the country money. Every dollar spent was actually returning negative. It was costing the country money. It was absolutely foolish and it was simply because of ideology.

Now, what the Green Party has never said is we’re against all roads. What we want to see is a balanced transport network. There are some roads we need to invest in, particularly when it comes to road safety, because instead of spending on these uneconomic mega-projects, we could have actually saved lives faster by investing in road safety. So what we want to see is balanced transport spending and safe transport infrastructure, and I’m not going to have a bar of these ideological arguments we’re seeing from the National Party.

What this legislation does is establish the New Zealand Infrastructure Commission. It’s going be an autonomous Crown entity. The new body is going to be tasked with coordinating, developing, and promoting infrastructure strategies to improve the wellbeing of New Zealanders. Now, here’s a crucial word—“wellbeing”—and this is a word that people are hearing on the world stage. I’m incredibly proud to see my Prime Minister on the world stage talking about this concept, because wellbeing is critical. For too long, you know, the wellbeing of the corporate mates of the National Party has been the main interest of previous Governments. What we need to have is the wellbeing of New Zealanders, and this legislation enshrines it.

I guess there are three main roles I want to pick up on. The first is advisory, because it’s going to do the 10-year capital infrastructure plan and then the 30-year strategy, which is going to be refreshed every five years. For too long, we’ve treated infrastructure as a short-term problem. I note Professor Jonathan Boston recently published a report criticising the three-year parliamentary term and the perverse impact that’s actually had on short-term decision-making in New Zealand. I see this as a small step in the direction of encouraging long-term decisions.

We’re a small country. You know, we’re a country of only, what, 4.7 million, according to the latest census. We aren’t the richest country in the world. We can’t afford to waste our resources. We can’t afford to waste it with duplication, with not integrating these projects together. We need to think smarter as a small country, particularly in troubling economic times, so that we use every dollar valuably, so that we get as much out of it, and actually so that we do get those outcomes for New Zealanders and our environment for wellbeing. So that’s really important—getting this helicopter view over the infrastructure spend. Look, the Government’s going to be spending $42 billion over the next five years on capital spend for infrastructure. It’s important we get it right, and having this coordinated, long-term strategic function of the commission is particularly valuable.

The second role is around supporting those infrastructure projects. Now, it comes to the best practice. It’s going to advise on issues such as procurement.

The third area is, as the previous member mentioned, the ability for the Minister to request a report being given. Now, the Rt Hon David Carter was trying to infer that this is somehow political interference. I think this is simply smart pragmatic governance. It makes sense for your Minister for Infrastructure to be able to request a report on a specific area. Again, we’re a small country at the bottom of the world. We can’t afford to wait for things to just appear out of the air. Actually, if there are emerging technologies or changing global patterns—Kiwis are demanding different types of getting around our cities, for example—it makes sense that the Minister can proactively instruct and get a report drafted.

We want to make sure that our decision makers have the best advice at their fingertips, and I guess this is an important point to reiterate. This is simply an advisory commission. It’s still going to be the Government and the Ministers of the day making the actual decisions. You’re still going to see that accountability. But it’s important they do get the best access to information, and this is where I’d like to acknowledge the select committee. I didn’t have the privilege to serve on it, but I understand the major change in the select committee phase was giving the commission the powers to get information from local government.

Now, given that local government is responsible for waste water and for much of our transport spend—huge infrastructure capital spend projections—it’s important that the Infrastructure Commission is able to get information from local government. There’s provisions to make sure it’s not overly onerous and that commercial sensitivity is still protected consistent with the Local Government Official Information and Meetings Act.

I really want to acknowledge the Finance and Expenditure Committee. They’ve improved the legislation and that’s I think what the ambition of all select committees should be, no matter what party you’re in. So I’d like to thank those members and everyone who submitted.

One clause, in particular, I’d really like to highlight in this third reading is clause 11, which relates to “Infrastructure needs and priorities for infrastructure”. Now, I’ve already talked about clause 11(a), which deals with the wellbeing of New Zealanders, but I really want to stress clause 11(b)(iii), and I’ll read it because it’s only a short sentence: “matters relating to the mitigation of the effects of climate change (including through reducing emissions of greenhouse gases) and adapting to the effects of climate change;”—critically important. Right now, world leaders are meeting at United Nations. We’ve seen Greta Thunberg’s very emotional, very powerful challenge to politicians that future generations are watching us and that the world’s eyes are actually asking for action and not just words on the world stage when it comes to climate change.

Here’s yet another example where this Government is acting on our generation’s nuclear-free moment. It’s not just words, of course. You got the zero carbon bill, the 100 percent renewables target, the courageous and right decision to transition away from polluting fossil fuels, the doubling in spending for public transport, the 100 percent increase in walking and cycling funding—I could rattle off an even longer list of actions where it comes to climate change—and here is yet another one in the legislation this Government is passing setting the 10- and 30-year infrastructure strategic overviews.

Climate change is front and centre of this legislation, and it’s important, right? Because that $42 billion save that the Government is going be spending over the next five years, if we located it all next to the coast—sea-level rise is locked in. It’s already baked in. The question for us is: how much are we prepared to see emissions increase to lose how much of our coastal regions, not only in New Zealand but around the world? So it makes sense to make sure that where our infrastructure is located takes into account climate change. Sea-level rise is an important part of adapting to a climate-changing world. I’m really glad to see this in the legislation.

But I think critically important is also the sentence regarding “(including through reducing emissions of greenhouse gases)”, because I’d like to acknowledge the National Party. In the time of the great financial crisis, they did actually increase spending in infrastructure. Look, the ultra-fast broadband and Rural Broadband Initiative tranche one was a success story, particularly compared to Australia. In times of economic crisis, it’s good to spend money on infrastructure, but the problem was it wasn’t all good infrastructure. They actually ploughed $237 million—I’ve got the figure exactly in my head—on fossil fuel subsidies. They were investing in last century’s infrastructure, for the infrastructure actually risking our planetary survival and risking our coastal regions.

So it’s important that we don’t invest in infrastructure that’s simply going to make climate change worse. It’s actually not going to produce the economic returns we want, it’s not going to produce the society we want, and it’s definitely not contributing to the wellbeing of New Zealand or future generations.

So when it comes to, say, electricity infrastructure, we shouldn’t be investing in new power stations based on fracked gas, which we actually know the leaked emissions put it more on par with coal. We should be investing in modern, smart infrastructure for the clean-energy economy, and, of course, this is where the majority of international capital is going: investing in clean energy, not fossil fuels. This is where, I think, the commission’s going to provide such a leadership role, because for the billions of investment we already have in our electricity grid, we can actually deliver cheaper, cleaner, smarter energy for Kiwis.

Actually, tonight I’m hosting an event with the Green Building Council as they launch their sustainable road map. The panel topic is on peak electricity, and by tackling peak, we can actually save money for Kiwi consumers. We can actually reduce carbon emissions. But, most importantly, we can do it smart, because in this small country of ours, we should be investing massively in the infrastructure we need for a sustainable, prosperous economy, whilst not forgetting natural infrastructure as well. Kia ora koutou.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. Very hard to argue against a lot of what’s been said in the course of the discussion on this bill tonight, as we, basically, across the House, support the intent of it.

But I do want to go back to a couple of issues that have been raised, and it relates back to something the Minister for Infrastructure said earlier, and the fact that I have had some cynicism about how this might operate. That’s been confirmed for me in the last few minutes, because this is all about the wellbeing of New Zealanders and it’s going to make things better for everybody, and then, in the next breath, we say that this thing is, basically, an advisory committee, and the advice doesn’t need to be taken. There’ll be some challenges around that, and that’s really the reason for, I guess, my cynicism around whether it will actually work or not when it’s put to the test, because a lot of work will go into achieving what we achieve with this.

The previous speaker, Gareth Hughes, spoke about the rural broadband stuff. Well, that, of course, didn’t help a lot of us watch the All Blacks on Saturday night. I don’t know whether you could blame the rural broadband or not, but, certainly, there was no reception where I live, which isn’t very far from the main road. Of course, rugby will be the loser of that and no one else, because, as we always used to say in the car business, if you let a person go down to the next door car sales yard, they’ll buy one off them, and they’ll never come back, and it’s just like the rugby: if you can’t watch the rugby and you watch the soccer, then you’ll go to the soccer, and that’s it.

But that’s the sort of importance of this New Zealand Infrastructure Commission/Te Waihanga Bill and the opportunity that it has, in my view, to put a steadier on what goes on in New Zealand, and I think we do need that. Interestingly, I’ve been involved in local government for a bit of my life, and the Local Government Act 2002 went a long way towards trying to steady up the change that happened in local government. It didn’t entirely achieve it, but it did stabilise what went on, and change for the sake of change often costs a lot of money. That’s one of the designs this bill has set out to, I guess, not eliminate so much as to moderate, because you do need to have in a democracy the opportunity for new Governments to come along and change the way they want to do things.

But you don’t want to be disruptive, and I’ve had the opportunity in the last few weeks to drive around most of New Zealand, as you do when you live in the Rangitīkei—you can’t go any other way. But when you drive through Levin, you strike two sets of traffic lights at the end of what will be a pretty useful piece of infrastructure, despite the criticism of the roads of national significance. Then, this week, I happened to have to drive from Auckland to the middle of Northland, and you can’t fly into that part of the world that easily either. Again, that’s an infrastructure challenge. But I got to, I think it was a place called Warkworth, and I struck three sets of traffic lights on—

💬 Dr Duncan Webb: I’ve heard of that.

Oh, have you heard of it? It’s somewhere up there. Three sets of traffic lights on the main road, and there will be a brand new road of national significance completed there in a year or two, but I don’t know whether it’s going to quite dodge the traffic lights.

Anyway, I think the importance of this bill can’t be overlooked, and I do think it is an opportunity, provided the advice from this Infrastructure Commission is treated by those elected to govern New Zealand with the respect that it probably should deserve, and I think, as the Minister said, the people appointed to it are extremely capable. So I hope it stabilises change and gives some certainty to all of those who provide infrastructure in New Zealand, whether it’s broadband, whether it’s defence force issues, or whether it’s roads or rail, for that matter. I hope that it stabilises and gets us set on a path where there’s a pathway that contractors and people who are involved in those industries have a rational way forward.

So I’ll say no more. But I think it is a good bill, and I look forward to it having its desired effect in due course, despite my cynicism. Thank you.

This is a split call. I call Tamati Coffey—five minutes.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. Very pleased to be squeezing in my call before the dinner break, actually, so I thank the previous speaker, Ian McKelvie, for his timeliness and punctuality. Look, the New Zealand Infrastructure Commission is a good thing, and I want to start by thanking the Minister for Infrastructure, the Hon Shane Jones, for bringing it to the House. It could’ve been done in a long time period before—say, nine years—but it wasn’t. The fact is that it was done in our term, under this Government, and, actually, it has been, therefore, supported by the other side of the House as well. So kudos to the Hon Shane Jones for that.

I was pleased to hear from colleagues, actually, that were at the Building Nations conference on 21 August, where the board were named, the chief executive was named as well, and also the chair of the board was appointed too. As previous speakers have spoken, it’s a very, very qualified board. Dr Alan Bollard, being the chairperson, has a PhD in economics and a Doctor of Laws from Auckland University, as well as having had many senior positions within government. Jon Grayson, the deputy secretary commercial and financial at Treasury, is responsible for Treasury’s debt management, and has also held many senior exec roles within the public and the private sector as well. So there you have it: the chairperson, the chief executive, and just a quick mention to the other members of the board, David Cochrane, Raveen Jaduram, Sarah Sinclair, Stephen Selwood, and Sue Tindal.

This is a good piece of legislation because quality infrastructure is absolutely essential for the economic progress and the social wellbeing of all of New Zealand. The commission is going to be that independent body which is going to provide good, expert advice to the Minister and to Government. There will be a strategic plan set down, and for that reason, that report will be finished in good time. Successive Governments have actually relied too heavily on short-term projects. The cynic in me may say that it’s been according to electoral cycles that decisions have been made. So this hopes to set that trajectory a lot bigger, a lot wider, and a lot more into the future, and that’s why it’s going to be such a good commission that’s providing good information to us as a Government to be able to make good decisions with.

Budget 2018 said that it would invest $42 billion in net capital spending over the five years up to 2022, but of course we need to do more when it comes to that. The sector actually got together and told us, as a committee, what exactly it was that they wanted. So this isn’t just something that we’ve come up with. They came through in the various submissions to the Finance and Expenditure Committee. They identified four key areas. One was a lack of integrated investment decisions within and across central government and local government. They said that there was a lack of visibility, a lack of pipeline, and a lack of scale. They also said that their overriding focus was on building new assets, rather than the outcomes that we’re trying to achieve, and the ability to be able to deliver on them, and, obviously, the biggest criticism, which is that central government and local government coordination was severely lacking.

So we made a couple of changes in that process. The bill that we first were looking over—the first draft of the bill—isn’t the same as the one that it is now. There’s been a few amendments to that—namely, the information-gathering powers. We’re making sure that we protect individuals’ privacy in the collection of data for infrastructure projects but also making sure that local government are along with the ride as well and we are being able to collect information from local government, who are big local players in the infrastructure game. So these are all measures that came through in the submissions. The Minister has responded accordingly, and, as a result, I commend the bill to the House.

Sitting suspended from 6 p.m. to 7.30 p.m.

Thank you, Mr Speaker. It’s great to be able to speak on this bill, the New Zealand Infrastructure Commission Bill. We’ve heard a number of speeches from the Government members saying how great this is and how this shows a real commitment to infrastructure and saying that there’ll be long-term planning and New Zealanders can be secure in knowing that there will be that planning and that those that are in the business of building roads and rail and other infrastructure can know they’ll have security of contracts, and all those wonderful things that we’ve heard from the Government. But there is one thing that is missing from all their speeches, and that is to say the fundamental premise of this legislation is that it does not guarantee anything.

There is no guarantee at all that projects will be committed to by a future Government. All it says is that there will be an infrastructure commission that will detail and determine future projects. It doesn’t say anything about how those projects then will be committed to by future Governments of a different ilk—[Mr Speaker holds up the bill]—and that is the heart of the problem in this bill, Mr Speaker. It is that it does not mention that. The problem with this bill is that we’re being told it is great for New Zealand infrastructure going forward, but the great failure of this legislation is to bind any future Government.

So what will happen is what we have seen in the current infrastructure in New Zealand, where the current Government has come in and destroyed the great roading network that was being built through New Zealand. They have taken apart those projects—and I see Mr McAnulty is laughing away, and the Minister of Transport there. I just want to acknowledge the road from Cambridge to Piarere that was approved by the New Zealand Transport Agency (NZTA) board before the last election—

💬 SPEAKER: Order! Order!

—approved by the NZTA board—

💬 SPEAKER: Order! The member will resume his seat. I do want to draw the member’s attention to Speakers’ rulings 121/4-7, which indicate that the third reading is a summing up. He may make passing reference to other matters, but I’ve yet to hear him refer to the bill as it emerged from the committee stage.

Oh, I think I made it very clear that this is a bill which sets out plans for infrastructure going forward, and that’s what the bill is about. It sets up a planning process. But that planning process isn’t binding to any future Government—

💬 SPEAKER: The member was good for a line. Let’s get on with what is in it.

—and that is the nature of the bill. That’s the whole point of Parliament and democracy—it’s so that people watching can find out what’s going on. If they are constrained in their democratic ability to hear what’s going on, just to make it sound like—

💬 SPEAKER: Order! Order!

—what the Government wants to hear—

💬 SPEAKER: Order! The member—

—that’s not—

💬 SPEAKER: I—no, not quite. I think I’m slightly lucky that the member’s mike went off when I stood up, because I think what he said might have been grossly out of order. I’m going to remind the member, for the last time, that he must speak on the bill as it has emerged from the committee, and not base his speech on what’s not in the bill, because that is out of order.

Well, thank you, Mr Speaker, but is that a new ruling?

💬 SPEAKER: Right. I think I stood up right at the beginning and referred the member to Speakers’ rulings 121/4-7. I think it’s probably a bit hard for the member to make a speech and read that at the same time, so I’m going to give him a last chance to be consistent with the Speakers’ rulings, which date back to 1961 and 1962. It was Speaker Algie, who has a very good reputation, and who dealt with those—the Speaker in the first term of the Holyoake Government.

Thank you, Mr Speaker, and just like the great reputation you hold as well—I appreciate that.

This bill is based on the New South Wales approach, so they’ve basically copied and pasted the New South Wales legislation—

💬 Marja Lubeck: 45 seconds—make it count.

—as their Infrastructure Commission for here. Did you say something over there?

💬 Kieran McAnulty: He’s trying to fill time now. Get on with it.

No, no, no, there’s no need to fill time. No need to fill time because we’re going to have a look at this bill, Mr McAnulty, and look at what infrastructure is in New Zealand.

It is a bill which the New Zealand National Party had intended to bring to this House at some stage as well, but we would have done it in a much more—

Order! The member has finished his time.

Tēnā koe e Te Māngai o Te Whare. It is my pleasure to stand and take a call on this bill tonight and talk specifically to the bill as it has emerged from the select committee. I hope that I can do that justice, because I actually was a member of the Finance and Expenditure Committee, which heard the submissions on the New Zealand Infrastructure Commission/Te Waihanga Bill.

But, first, I want to acknowledge the Minister for Infrastructure, Shane Jones, who was responsible for introducing this legislation; the officials who worked on it; and also too the other members of my select committee, from both sides of the House, actually. We did work constructively, in the main, to make this the best possible legislation that it could be. Unfortunately, at the end, there was a bit of disagreement, particularly around Supplementary Order Paper 362, which was introduced at the last minute, which we could not support. But we received about 41 submissions on this bill and we heard from 15 submitters, and, overwhelmingly, they were in support of what is proposed in the bill.

We did recommend some changes to the bill, and I want to talk specifically about those. They are now presented as amendments to this for the third reading. Specifically, I want to talk about the changes in terms of local government.

My history prior to coming into Parliament was as a councillor for the Far North District Council, and one of the things that alarmed me when I first became elected to the Far North District Council was the state of disarray that we were in in terms of understanding what our infrastructure was that we actually had and what the current and future needs were, how much deferred maintenance there had been, and how ad hoc the planning had been. It was later in 2015 that an amendment was made to the Local Government Act 2002 that required councils to actually develop a 30-year infrastructure plan and strategy along with their long-term plans, which are done every three years. That was a really good step in terms of addressing the issue that we were facing as local government at the time, but what this New Zealand Infrastructure Commission/Te Waihanga Bill also recognises is that this is a problem not just at the local government level but for central government and across New Zealand.

The problem is that we don’t have a comprehensive understanding of our current infrastructure and our future needs for infrastructure. So this bill addresses that problem in terms of establishing an independent infrastructure commission, which will be completely autonomous to the Crown.

I heard David Bennett, the speaker before me, say that there is nothing in this bill that is going to require the Crown to do anything in particular with regard to the strategy that they will be required to develop, but I actually differ. If you read the bill, you will see in there that within the first two years of establishing the Infrastructure Commission, they are going to be required to produce their first report, and that within 180 days, the Minister is going to have to provide a response to that strategy, which will be open for all of the public to see. It is this type of thing that will ensure that Governments are held to account.

So here is an independent commission that is being established and that is made up of experts in this field, who are going to do that projection for us and who are going to produce that report within two years, and then every five years thereafter. That is going to show the public of New Zealand what the infrastructure needs are for this country and Governments at that time—that will be ours when the first one comes out, I hope, and then the next one and then the next one. But it is going to be more than an election cycle. It’s going to take the politics out of this, and it’s going to give something to New Zealanders that they can hold any Government accountable to.

Now, in our Budget, we’ve announced $42 billion to be invested in infrastructure and capital spending over the next five years, out to 2022. What this bill aims to do is ensure that we coordinate, develop, and promote an approach to infrastructure and the services that result from that infrastructure that will improve the wellbeing for New Zealanders. I just want to take this opportunity to say that originally in the proposed legislation, when it came to the information-gathering powers, it did not include local government. But we received a number of submissions, particularly from the New Zealand Society of Local Government Managers and also from Local Government New Zealand and several councils, but, in particular, Tasman District Council and Whanganui District Council, who all recommended that we broaden the ability of the commission to obtain information from local authorities so that it isn’t reliant only upon the publicly available information but that it can gather more information to help produce the best infrastructure plan for this country, both at the central government level and local government level.

Now, there were some concerns from submitters that this inclusion of local authorities in the information-gathering powers of the commission could have a burden for local authorities—some who are not particularly well off, who have small ratepayer bases with low average incomes—and so their concern was in trying to strike a balance between getting the information that would be useful to the commission and not overly burdening our councils with additional costs.

So the proposed legislation, which we have in front of us, aims to address that balance by saying that in terms of any information that is publicly available, the commission can access that themselves at their own expense, and that the councils cannot restrict the information that they give to the commission if it is available under the Local Government Official Information and Meetings Act (LGOIMA), for example. But if it is not information that would be otherwise available—under the LGOIMA in councils’ case and the Official Information Act in Government departments’ case—and it is particularly sensitive in terms of commercial sensitivity, then it can be withheld.

If it’s going to require significant research to give the information to the commission, then they can be excluded from the provision within the Act, but they are encouraged to have a conversation with the commission about that before determining that they won’t comply with that part of the Act. So I believe that we are striking the balance and meeting the requests of those councils and other submitters who said that it should include local government but not overly burden our councils with additional expense.

Just to wrap it up, I want to talk about information that came out today and show how, in context, this is practically applicable. Today, it was noted in the newspaper that Northland’s population is the fastest-growing in New Zealand, according to the latest census. I don’t find that hard to believe, because it’s such a beautiful part of the country. But we have experienced 27,000 more people coming to Northland between 2013 and 2018. Now, the numbers speculated were much lower than that, and that’s put some pressure on our infrastructure planning. I particularly wanted to talk about the Far North District Council, because we had a decrease of 110—a declining population—in 2006 to 2013.

The general manager for strategic planning said that growing population was a complex issue to tackle. It is hoped that the New Zealand Infrastructure Commission/Te Waihanga Bill is going to help us in terms of projecting for the current and future needs of communities like the Far North, where there is now an increase in demand for goods and services, boosting spending and employment within the district—which we welcome—but the challenge is providing affordable infrastructure for a growing population across a large district with more than 40 towns and villages. That remains our greatest challenge—

💬 SPEAKER: Order! Back to the bill.

—and so it is hoped—yep. That is exactly the type of situation that this bill envisages that this independent commission is going to be able to assist New Zealand and our communities. Kia ora.

Look, I’m very pleased to take a call on this New Zealand Infrastructure Commission/Te Waihanga Bill. I hope that in the time that I will have available, I will be able to build a credible speech, particularly on the third reading.

So, look, I’m very pleased that National is supporting this. A little bit like other bills that we’ve supported, it’s because National had, in effect, started the legislation of this nature and is actually conceptually in support of an infrastructure commission. We see the value in it. It’s easy for statements like that, of course, to be made in Parliament, but I’m fortunate to be able to build my case, the infrastructure of this argument if you will, by pointing out—[Interruption] Yes, that’s my best work for tonight, I’m afraid. The key is, of course, that National has been very keen on infrastructure. One only needs to think of the roads of national significance, completing Waterview—these are infrastructure projects which we have been proud of and which, of course, you build on in order to move into the likes of a commission of which this bill is structuring things.

It’s an attempt by the Government to set up a strategy. It’s trying to empower the commission to engage New Zealanders, for them to understand what projects they want. I think that’s actually an important part of it. I note we actually have Jessica McKnight, the Youth MP for Maungakiekie, in appearance up there tonight. They would know, and I’m sure they’d be the first who would want to talk—I hope it’s not presumptuous, Denise Lee—to this new commission, to demand that the East-West Link get completed in Auckland.

Look, it’s a fundamentally important commission, but there are two caveats and concerns that this side of the House has around where this bill is landing in its third reading, and that’s its two deficiencies. First and foremost, we don’t think this has enough teeth. We think it’s still malleable to ideology, if you will. I think both sides of the House—I would’ve hoped—would’ve agreed that actually setting up an infrastructure commission should’ve been done in a way to keep it away from the whims of political cycles. The other is the disappointment that through the committee of the whole House stage and now at the third reading, a Supplementary Order Paper (SOP) in the name of Andrew Bayly was defeated. This, in effect—

💬 Stuart Smith: Outrageous.

—was about—it is outrageous, actually. It was an attempt to try and shore up—for want of a better word—those groups, those organisations, those businesses who work in the infrastructure sector.

The way things are structured at the moment—and it was unfortunate, because the commission could’ve been empowered to look into it—is to try and share that risk. If those on the other side, particularly in Government, are talking to those working in infrastructure, to those who will be affected by this commission and its intentions, they will say that too much risk of Government procurement is put on to them and, subsequently, on to subcontractors, and we already know from recent weeks the tragedy that that entails. I’m disappointed that that SOP did not progress, but the bill is sufficiently in line with what National had already intended and supported, and so at this third reading I’m very happy to commend the bill to the House.

Well, I too am pleased to make a contribution in this third reading debate to the New Zealand Infrastructure Commission/Te Waihanga Bill. It is, in our view, a great opportunity for New Zealand to lift its game when it comes to planning, investment, and construction of infrastructure.

It’s important, I think, for two reasons. The first is that we spend a lot of our national wealth on infrastructure—a lot. In transport alone, we’re spending $4.5 billion a year. Most of that is capital spend on transport infrastructure every year. Think about what we do in relation to the building of our social infrastructure. It is a massive part of our annual spend.

The second reason that this is important and that it deserves serious attention is that, done well, infrastructure can make a really significant difference to our economy and our prosperity. The example I want to give to substantiate that is what we’ve seen over the last 15 years with the break-up of the Telecom monopoly and the roll-out of ultra-fast broadband. Those two moves together are responsible for the growth of one of our most successful and fast-growing industries. So the the digital economy in New Zealand is really a direct result of, in this case, a very high-quality infrastructure decision.

It was mentioned earlier that this bill is based on the New South Wales model, and to a large extent it is. Shane Jones and others of us spent a lot of time with the Australian infrastructure bodies—the arm’s length state level and federal infrastructure commissions—that inspired the work that went into this bill. It’s really about lifting the standard of debate and of policy making on infrastructure, and it’s really important, in summing up on this third reading, to note that the New Zealand Infrastructure Commission/Te Waihanga is fundamentally an advisory body. It’s not a police officer that can march into Government departments and Crown entities, take over projects, rewrite their policies, and do their job for them. That’s fundamentally why the Supplementary Order Paper that the previous member was speaking about was not supported, because it wasn’t in keeping with the essential advisory nature of the commission.

The brief of the commission, really, is to develop broad public agreement on long-term infrastructure strategy. I think it’s good on all sides of this House that we recognise the value that that could add. I think of some of the debates on infrastructure that we’ve had over the last 20 years in New Zealand that would have benefited from a seriously good, tooled-up, arm’s-length commission with good policy and analytical capability—the barren debates about public-private partnerships (PPPs), for example, where one side of politics and the infrastructure industry are ceaselessly promoting PPPs as if they were some kind of free pot of money that would enable projects to be built, when, in fact, the bigger issues are around the quality of the infrastructure delivery and the ultimate lifetime cost to Government and citizens. We’ve finally, I think, reached a stage where PPPs are no longer being touted around as some kind of panacea. There’s such a track record in Australia, the UK, and elsewhere over the last 20 years of them coming to grief.

On our side of the House, certainly, we are very open to private financing initiatives, but not out of some kind of religious zeal, and not to accommodate the commercial imperative of the private sector infrastructure providers. But when they can actually deliver high-quality projects, when they can deliver on the complex challenges that some projects pose, and if they can deliver value for money, then we’re open to them. I think that if we’d had a commission like this we could have advanced that debate much more productively over the last few years.

One of the things that this bill offers and the commission will offer, I think, is a more productive engagement between public and private. Often the Government takes a more conservative approach to these things, but it is firmly focused on the public good. This bill sets up a board which deliberately sets out to bring experienced private sector people on to the board, so it’s the possibility of a really good marriage of public and private. The private sector is often more innovative and often sharper about assessing risk but, of course, always looking for business, looking for more work. Many of the infrastructure providers in the infrastructure industry—there’s some great creative talent in our own infrastructure industry, but they never saw a PPP that they didn’t like, or a private financing arrangement. So I think if we can marry those two impulses in a much more constructive way, we will actually elevate infrastructure thinking in this country.

So the other part of the commission’s brief is about direct support for projects. Now we know that our system of Government in New Zealand is highly devolved and delegated so sometimes quite small Government agencies or departments can find themselves undertaking some very large infrastructure projects. They don’t necessarily have the capability in-house to do that, and there’s the potential here for the commission to be called in to provide that capability on behalf of Government departments or Crown entities to take on large-scale infrastructure projects. I think that will be a really big advantage.

There’s no question that the whole idea of a pipeline of infrastructure projects is essential, and I think everybody in the House would agree with that. We have to give certainty to the market. We have to allow people to plan to build capability and build confidence in the infrastructure market. So that part of the commission’s brief is really, really important.

One of the really helpful things that the Finance and Expenditure Committee did was look at extending the information-gathering powers in the bill to local government, and that was extremely helpful, because we know that some of the trickiest, most challenging, infrastructure issues that we’re facing today involve both central government and local government. My colleague Nanaia Mahuta will attest to just how challenging it is to think through how we can transition our way in the next few years to a sustainable solution to the problem of three waters. The Havelock North contamination episode demonstrated once and for all that local government lacks, in many cases, the balance sheet and the capability, in the case of some smaller councils, to properly manage our three waters infrastructure. When people get poisoned by water contamination—contamination of the water table—that is a particularly graphic reminder of this. So Minister Mahuta is working closely with the entire local government sector to find a way through that. It’s going to require some different approaches.

I think that the commission, if it were up and running today, would be well placed to assist the Minister and the Department of Internal Affairs in thinking through the creative new approaches, different ways to use the balance sheets that already exist within local government, to find new institutional ways to build that capability so that every community in New Zealand and every citizen can expect that they will have access to safe, clean drinking water, that our environment will be protected, and that storm water and waste-water systems will be up to the challenges put to them by our towns and cities and to the challenges posed by climate change.

The other example I think of around local government is that we’re struggling right now as a country to invest in the infrastructure that’s needed to support the growth of our towns and cities. It’s not just transport; it’s three waters and the rest. Our existing policy settings, the National Land Transport Programme, and the way that councils traditionally have been responsible for providing the infrastructure to support urban expansion—whether it’s greenfields or brownfields—is really struggling in our high-growth centres. We have to find new ways of funding, financing, and planning that infrastructure, and I believe that that is exactly the kind of challenge that the commission can assist us with.

Another example is the need to build the infrastructure to support decarbonised energy generation and things like public transport and a freight vehicle fleet that is based on hydrogen or electricity and all the infrastructure that’s needed to support that.

Bill read a third time.