Transport policy Q&A: Maurice Williamson

Maurice Williamson wants more roads. Picture / Dean Purcell

The Herald invited politicians to answer questions at a range of policy forums - today's focus is on transport, a major concern for many Herald readers, especially in Auckland.

Below are edited highlights of the 45-minute question and answer session with National spokesman Maurice Williamson.

The Government is doing well in funding transport changes, isn't it?

One of the issues for the current Government is they make announcements saying this is the most money ever spent on roads. But the figures show that historically we were running at the OECD average for road funding, at about 1.3 per cent [of GDP]. In 1985-6, we got a big tumble to under the 1 per cent line and it stayed there.

I was Minister for Transport from 1993-1999 and I managed to get it above the line by moving some of the petrol tax at that stage.

But it then dropped back under Labour as a percentage of GDP - and that is the standard international measure.

So what should be done?

In our view there's now a desperate need to build. Our arterial network is grossly unsatisfactory because most of the arteries don't join up.

It has always been planned for Auckland to have joined-up arterials - State Highway 20, eastern corridors and so on.

But our performance relative to some of the Australian roadbuilding makes blood-curdling reading. There is an Australian motorway connection - 40km long - which is going to start after one year of environmental consents and public consultations. It will start next year and it will be completed by 2008.

So we can ask, why haven't we done this here? Why have we not done the State Highway 20 Mt Roskill extension?

If you go to Transit's website, you'll see they announced they were going to do it in 2000. They then announced in the beginning of 2001 that it will occur in 2001. They put out a lovely brochure saying it will be completed by May 2005 and it still has not yet started. That's procrastination at its worst.

Would you be able to fund Labour's announcements, plus new roads, and have tax cuts?

One of the things the Government doesn't seem to think about is how you fund a lot of these projects - you don't need to pay cash. Most big businesses building plant and equipment borrow from the debt market and they only have to pay, say, 6 per cent as debt servicing for that year.

In the years I was Transport Minister, I never understood why we would only build roads on a pay-as-you-go basis from current revenues. Fonterra goes to the debt market and borrows hundreds of millions to build a new piece of plant and equipment and then uses a revenue stream over the years to pay that back.

Now John Key and I are still trying to get to grips with tackling how much this means, exactly how much this tax package would mean.

Under National, who's going to be borrowing to build the roads?

Big projects will be paid for out of the private sector, either fully or as a public-private partnership, but we will not hesitate to use Crown debt for some of the desperately needed infrastructure development.

So what specific roading projects?

I think the second Auckland harbour crossing - whether that is a tunnel or a bridge - is desperately needed within 20 years. That is more than likely to be a totally private sector project.

Three billion dollars is the sum that is talked about to build a second bridge. You're simply never going to take $3 billion as a lump out of the Crown's obligations, given we're spending only $1.5 billion total in the national land transport programme a year.

I would have thought things like Penlink [a roading project around Whangaparaoa] should at least be a PPP [public/private partnership] or that the private sector could choose to build it.

You may look to building the Mt Albert extension through to the Northwestern Motorway by way of a public/private partnership or by some debt funding.

Do you agree that some of the extra $500 million being spent for roads should be used to finance the western ring route?

I think Brash gave a commitment in May of last year that we would complete the State Highway 20 network completely within a 10-year time frame. It has to be done.

What about the eastern corridor?

I think that that has to happen as well. I could never find anyone to give me a realistic answer as to why that road is designated a local road.

In Pakuranga, the six-lane Pakuranga Highway carries more traffic than any other road in New Zealand, other than the motorways. Yet why is [it] a local road funded through Manukau City?

If we sort out the state highway issue then, what should be done on the eastern corridor?

The first thing you have to do is have a commitment to finishing the network. You only have bits completed. It doesn't join up here, you only have a bit of it but it doesn't go anywhere there.

A network is like arteries in your body. If your arteries didn't join up, you'd be dead. And these don't join up. It's laughable.

Outside Auckland, what about the state of State Highway 1?

The Waikato Expressway, we've already made that commitment.

The $750 million that's required to build that isn't currently in the land transport programme. You'll be building only parts of that expressway in the next decade. But it is too important to the economy not to. If we move $4.5 billion of extra funding over in the 10 years, Waikato normally gets about 12 per cent of the national land transport programme. But 12 per cent of that is $540 million. In 10 years that's not enough, that's the shortfall.

But we'll have enough money in the allocation of the petrol tax alone to cover the shortfall and that's why Brash was able to give the commitment.

Where does National see public transport fitting into the picture?

We think public transport is very important and it will become more important over the years as the gridlock makes it even more difficult to move around for the private motor vehicle. But for Auckland, there is the problem of the unbelievably convoluted trips that happen.

Only 11 per cent of the people work in the CBD in Auckland; in Wellington it's 45 per cent. Because it's such a small percentage and people go everywhere we think the only form of public transport that works and makes any sense in Auckland is buses.

Yes, we are going to commit to finishing the rail double-tracking and upgrading the stations, but every time I've looked at any other projects, like building new rail track and committing huge volumes of capital expenditure, the amount of patronage has never justified the spending.

There's a really good website [www.publicpurpose.com] where they have done an analysis of some of the rail projects in the United States and concluded that it would have been cheaper to give every commuter a seven series BMW than to build those things. They are so grossly economically inefficient.

Roading networks are vital, they are the prime focus of our transport policy. But that focuses on the private motor car and the buses, where there's flexibility.

So what would National do about the public transport system?

We said we would commit to completing the projects that are on the books - the double tracking and the upgrading of the stations and so on. We don't want to take away any of that stuff at this point, but we have said - and Brash said in his Timaru commerce speech - we will not move to any more capital expenditure development unless we are convinced that the economic benefits from that dramatically outweigh the costs. Because you can get really caught up in the euphoria of this public transport issue.

Would you raise the driver's licence age?

I already tried to do that. When I was the Minister of Transport, I brought a bill into Parliament and tried to do it and I lost.

Yes, I will. I think we are right out of kilter with the rest of the world. I don't know any other jurisdiction we like to compare ourselves with that is 15. Most of them are 17.

I'd go to 16 to start with. The reasoning for it at 15 was always from the rural sector that our kids leave school at 15 and they have got to get to work.

Now 16 is the school leaving age so their same argument will apply. Age 16 is a logical starting point. It's not the silver bullet to fixing our road carnage and the hoons. Nor is any other one step.

There has got to be a holistic series of a whole range of measures taken but one of them is lifting that driving age.