Logie JanJAN LOGIE (Green): Thank you Madam Chair. I rise to take a call on the Appropriation (2016/17 Confirmation and Validation) Bill in the economic development and infrastructure sector debate. Specifically I want to talk about the annual review of KiwiRail which was one of the more extraordinary—actually I'd have to be honest and say the most extraordinary—annual reviews I have ever been a part of. We were given a very clear message from the chief executive and the chair of KiwiRail that fits with a pattern that we've been hearing more and more in the media of persistent under-investment and deferral of maintenance which is a significant risk to us as a country.I've just heard from the previous speaker Parmjeet Parmar that the reviews she heard were a reflection universally of the good work of the previous National Government. Well let me tell that speaker that this review did no such thing. We were told quite clearly I think by the chair of KiwiRail that they had told the Crown how much investment was needed to be able to meet the minimum requirements for health and safety within KiwiRail and they were funded at $38 million below the minimum requirement for health and safety and $87 million short of the requirement for a resilient network. I do want this House to take a minute to think about that in light of the storms that we have been having over the recent months—$87 million less than was required for a resilient network.I was unaware of how rundown and how old the infrastructure that KiwiRail are working with actually is. Most of the locomotives in the South Island were built before 1975. There are 11 locomotives in the South Island that are older than I am and that's not that young. We have piles on bridges that were built in the 1870s which these locomotives are running over carrying our freight and our people and our tourists visiting this country over bridges held up by piles from the 1870s.The previous Government decided that they'd defer the maintenance on that and reduce the funding that KiwiRail needed—that they didn't need the money that they actually said they needed. We heard from KiwiRail that this is making it really difficult for them to compete commercially. They've had to cut passenger lines because they are no longer safe. They've had to be running some trains which I assume were freight trains but could have been passenger trains down to 10 kilometres an hour to be able to be assured of the safety of that service over the land. This clearly is not viable in the long term. It's not viable in the current situation and it's certainly not viable in the longer term.I do just want too to put this in the context of the value of rail and that there was an independent report done last year that showed that there were $1.5 billion a year of indirect benefits that attribute to rail as opposed to other forms of transport—that result from reduced congestion fewer emissions safer roads fewer fatalities and savings from road maintenance for taxpayers. All of these things accrue from a functioning healthy rail system and one that we could have been gathering the benefits from but we have not been able to because the previous Government made funding decisions to focus on the glossy headlines and they privileged getting a surplus over ensuring our essential services were available to us as a population. So I am very pleased to be on this side of the House to see a turnaround in that kind of thinking and a return to true investment in the pillars that uphold our society.