Don Brash: RMA is biggest obstacle

Don Brash. Photo / Herald on Sunday

Opinion

Act views top-class infrastructure as being a cornerstone of future economic growth. If New Zealand is to prosper we need great transport and power networks and great allocation of our water resources.

Of particular importance is rebuilding Christchurch's infrastructure and relieving the transport bottlenecks in Auckland and Wellington. Act strongly supports investment in infrastructure whenever and wherever a comprehensive cost-benefit-analysis stacks up.

We realise that such developments will be expensive. Serious consideration must be given to economic pricing for road usage. Act supports phasing out petrol tax and road user charges, where possible, in favour of congestion charges and tolls. Such changes will not always be popular but when the alternative is decades of gridlock, politicians should have the courage to do what is right.

Act fully supports the National Infrastructure Three Year Action Plan goal to encourage demand management and pricing in infrastructure sectors.

Private sector investment in road construction, both through direct ownership and through public private partnerships with central and local government should be encouraged.

All new infrastructure projects should be subject to rigorous cost-benefit-analysis. The Labour Government's disastrous buy-back of KiwiRail is a prime example of what happens when such an analysis is not carried out.

The Government has committed to partial sale of some state assets if given the mandate after the November election. Act welcomes this and believes the scope should be extended to Government-owned infrastructure projects such as KiwiRail.

We are also aware that there will be a need to further expand our electricity lines network over the coming years. We support such upgrades.

The biggest obstacle to infrastructure development is the Resource Management Act.

We support the provisions in the Resource Management Act that provide for expedited consent processes for projects of national significance. However, we are concerned that the amendments introduced by the Government in this regard do not go far enough insofar as they still allow objectors who are not directly and tangibly affected by projects to raise objections. The RMA should be reformed so that only those whose property rights are directly and tangibly affected by a project can raise an objection.

Act is concerned that New Zealand's water resources are not being used optimally and that our water infrastructure leaves much to be desired. Tradable water markets have created exceptional efficiency gains in Australia and should be given serious consideration in New Zealand.