Locals key to delivering Northland's infrastructure projects - Infrastructure NZ CEO

Four-laning SH1 south of Whangārei will help ease congestion, but local labour and materials are key to delivering the project, and other infrastructure planned for the region, INZ CEO Pail Blair says

More Northland apprentices and materials should be a key part of bringing the North's new $1 billion government infrastructure spend to life, according to Infrastructure New Zealand.

"It's about the whole of life value of the work - not just the economic but social, cultural and environmental too," said Paul Blair, the chief executive of INZ.

Tenderers for the new Northland roading, rail, hospital, schools work and more should be required to support the region through taking on Northland-based apprentices and sourcing materials locally.

Large-scale and complex procurement work was involved in bringing the funded work to life.

Tendering should not be based on choosing the quickest, cheapest operator.

"We need partnership rather than out-and-out competition," Blair said.

Partnership was critical for the success of the newly announced projects.

"All of the key interests need to be around the table," Blair said.

He said the Government's new infrastructure spend was "fantastic" news for Northland. It recognised ongoing historic levels of underinvestment.

But the way the spend was brought to life was crucial.

The next critical step was the make sure the projects involved were well executed.

Paul Blair, Infrastructure New Zealand CEO, is in Whangārei today for the organisation's board meeting.

Blair said the Government and construction industry's April 2019 Construction Sector Accord should be used as the framework for procurement to bring the projects to life through partnership with iwi, councils and the private sector in alignment with the principles.

"All the key industry operators need to get around the table. Everybody needs to be clear on the risks involved and allocate these fairly."

The $69.2 million infrastructure spend on the Whangārei to Port Marsden road was an excellent investment, along with other major areas of government investment into the region, Blair said.

"The road's highly congested. It's about as congested as the road from Auckland to Warkworth and it hasn't got a great road-safety record."

Northland's new infrastructure spend will be front and centre in Whangārei today when INZ holds its first regionally based board meeting in the city. Meetings are also being held with local leaders from government, private sector and community infrastructure interests.

Key new potential infrastructure sites - including the possible New Zealand Navy base at Port Whangārei - will be among those visited in a locally based infrastructure roadshow.

A range of high-powered local infrastructure leaders involved in current, newly announced and potential future new regional infrastructure will participate.

The Northland venue was selected for the INZ board visit due to the region's spotlight as a growth area. This position has been further strengthened with last week's announcements of about $1b of government infrastructure spend into the region.