From the House: Our economic recovery is under way

Stuart Nash. Photo / File

We promised action on jobs and infrastructure projects to lift the economic recovery. For Hawke's Bay and Tairawhiti the time has arrived. Get those shovels in the ground!

In my last column in this paper a fortnight ago I said announcements were due soon on the shovel-ready projects from the special Covid Response and Recovery Fund set aside in last month's Budget.

The East Coast and Hawke's Bay are big winners from the first round of decisions. What this means is jobs, jobs, and more jobs. It also means local businesses have more certainty about the health of our regional economies.

We are kick-starting the economy. New infrastructure projects in transport, sports or arts and cultural facilities, housing and the environment will boost our recovery from Covid-19 and support more than 20,000 jobs.

Hawke's Bay will get $130 million worth of projects, and the East Coast has $106m of new infrastructure spending to look forward to. The first two big projects are confirmed.

Hawke's Bay's new inland port gets around $20m. It's a phenomenal sum. The inland port is on a 12 hectare site between Napier and Hastings, with direct road and rail connections to the port of Napier. This investment will help with our growing primary sector exports, especially horticulture and forestry.

I have talked to the local mayors about our regional projects, and discussed the inland port proposal with port CEO Todd Dawson and regional councillor and old friend Rick Barker.

We already have a very efficient port at Napier but the inland port takes the economy to the next level. It signals fantastic growth in both volume and profitability.

We are experiencing a boom in horticulture, viticulture, and forestry on the East Coast of the North Island. A staggering one million new apple trees are going into the ground each year in Hawke's Bay.

We've already announced $12m for the new Food Innovation Hub to look at innovative ways to grow and market our primary products, like food, beverages and agri-tech.

The inland port will future-proof our region.

Meanwhile up the road, the Poverty Bay Rugby Football Union are no longer the poor cousins.

The Rugby Park grandstand in Gisborne is currently unsafe. It's earthquake prone and the roof is stuffed too, including hazardous asbestos. We will spend $8m to demolish and start from scratch. The new grandstand will be a fantastic facility for non-rugby events too. What a great asset it will be.

We went hard and we went early with our health response to the Covid pandemic.
That means we are now one of the most open economies in the world and we can expect the economic recovery to be quicker than most other countries.

This package will provide Kiwis with confidence that the Government is backing them in this challenging economic environment by creating new jobs and opportunities in communities around the country.

The region can have confidence that our economic recovery is under way.

Stuart Nash is the MP for Napier and Minister of Police