It’s Political

many challenges – many of them influenced by Government policy.

Apart from the many problems currently created by the COVID-19 pandemic, there’s the ongoing driver shortage, the worsening state of the nation’s roading network and looming emissions reduction legislation…

So, who among our political parties offers any salvation for the industry in these situations?

To have some insight into what politicians are thinking about issues impacting the road transport industry, NZ Truck & Driver has offered each of the major political parties the opportunity to voice their views on trucking matters each month.

This month the National and ACT parties offer their views on the industry. T&D

By Simeon Brown, National Party Spokesman for Transport and Public Service.

have a purpose of delivering world-class transport infrastructure to keep our country moving and to maintain our roads to a high standard. Families, businesses, and communities rely on our state highways and roads to stay connected and remain productive.

However, many Kiwis get the sense that transport investment is going nowhere under Labour and the money for road maintenance is not getting to where it is needed.

NZTA under Labour has cancelled so many important infrastructure projects. For example, there’s Mill Road, Christchurch to Ashburton, Whangarei to Port Marsden, and Cambridge to Piarere, just to name a few.

Meanwhile at NZTA headquarters, the number of staff has been growing, while the actual investment in transport infrastructure has been shrinking.

There are now 2,306 FTE staff at NZTA, compared with 1,368 when National left office, with the major increases being in back office roles rather than frontline services.

NZTA has doubled the number of its Managers, with 456 of them compared with 214 five years ago. Evidently, more managers doesn’t necessarily mean more work gets done. In fact, how many managers does it take to fix a pothole?

Also doubled is the number of Human Resources Staff with 118 HR Staff, which is up from 51 in 2018. I guess NZTA needs more HR staff to keep track of the 900 other staff they’ve hired…

There are now 485 Administrative Staff, up from 306 in 2018. With so many pen pushers, you would have thought things would run more smoothly at NZTA.

Perhaps most concerning, NZTA’s Communications Staff has tripled from 32 staff in 2018 to 97 this year. With millions spent advertising that the Road to Zero policy exists, rather than broadcasting an actual safety message, it should come as no surprise that NZTA is more concerned with drawing attention to itself and creating a brand image than actually getting things done.

While Labour has gone on a hiring spree, the outcomes delivered by the agency are getting worse.

Cancelled projects and the proliferation of potholes peppering our roads are just two examples. Key safety outcomes are not being delivered for the flagship Road to Zero policy, such as the fact that only half of the required three million breath tests were completed last year , despite alcohol and drugs contributing to 47 per cent of all deaths on our roads.

This is just another example of more bureaucracy, but worse outcomes under a Labour Government which doesn’t know how to deliver.

Maybe if NZTA was more focused on fixing potholes and building bridges rather than radically increasing the number of HR staff and spin doctors it hires, our roads might be in a much healthier state than they are now. T&D Simon Brown

By Simon Court, ACT Party spokesperson on transport

to get goods to and from our markets. The newly opened Hamilton section of the Waikato Expressway is a great example of a road that supports a thriving economy and healthy communities - safe, efficient and with a 110km/h speed environment.

Waka Kotahi claim that the expressway, now that the latest of seven stages is complete, will: • Reduce travel times between Auckland and Tirau by 35 minutes • Significantly reduce the number of fatal and serious injury crashes • Increase the highway’s capacity and passing opportunities • Reduce traffic congestion within smaller communities like Huntly,

Ngaruawahia and Cambridge • Reduce fuel costs and contribute to economic growth.

Yet, after Cambridge, this four lane highway reduces to two lanes, back to the 1990’s state highway network that is simply no longer fit for purpose.

Given the way Waka Kotahi rave about the benefits of the expressway, you would assume they have a plan to keep going, to extend the four-laning to Tirau and south.

Before any work can continue, land needs to be purchased and consents obtained. However, apart from updating the planning maps to show where a future four lane road would run, there is no work underway to extend the modern highway into the 1990’s danger zone.

Instead, according to information obtained by ACT, Waka Kotahi has spent $44.8 million over the past three years on reviewing speed limits with a view to lowering speeds on state highways across New Zealand.

Rather than look at opportunities to improve the efficiency of the road network, the Labour Government ‘s solution to safety concerns is slowing the movement of freight and people.

Waka Kotahi told ACT that they “conduct extensive stakeholder engagement, iwi and community consultation and engagement as well as implementing speed limit changes. The cost to-date for speed management plans, investigating speed limits, and making changes to limits is $44.8 million.”

I recently spoke to a police officer about the condition of the state highway network beyond the new expressway. He was concerned about repeated repairs to the same potholes, and how much time truckies are wasting while stopped at road works.

What he was most concerned about was the arbitrary and uncoordinated reduction in speeds on sections of State Highway One. He said it was difficult to justify handing out speeding fines when it is difficult for motorists and truckies to keep track of the posted speed limits.

Waka Kotahi have lowered speeds to as little as 60km/h in some areas, and long sections have been reduced from 100 km/h to 80km/h where there have been few, if any, accidents in recent years.

The police officer asked me - please find a way to upgrade the roads and return speed limits to what they used to be.

So why are speed limits being reduced instead of increasing like they have on the Expressway, to 110 km/h?

Building high quality road infrastructure is expensive, even more so as fuel and bitumen prices have soared because of the war in Ukraine. But that is no excuse to simply turn off the lights on major projects.

Taxpayers should not be the only source of infrastructure funding. Increasing the level of private sector funding will inject much-needed discipline into decision-making while allowing the Government to maintain prudent levels of public debt.

Between 2007 and 2017, more than NZ$300bn was raised by funds globally to invest in infrastructure. Most of that capital was raised from insurance companies, pension funds, and sovereign wealth funds (including our own New Zealand Super Fund) looking for long-term investments with reasonable returns.

ACT would harness the funding and expertise from the international investors and apply this to our roading network.

We would also use New Zealand’s independent Infrastructure Commission as the project manager, and take politicians out of the decision making loop.

This Government might be allergic to business, but ACT is not T&D

Simon Court