Williamson Maurice: Local Government (Auckland) Amendment Bill — Second Reading Instruction to Committee In Committee 
Williamson Maurice: Local Government (Auckland) Amendment Bill — Second Reading Instruction to Committee In Committee 
[Volume:618;Page:14032] 
Hon MAURICE WILLIAMSON (National—Pakuranga) 
: 
 Part 3 is a reasonably specific part. It occupies only about half of one page and half of another and in many places it is just to do with revocations of and amendments to some quite detailed legislation such as the Transport Services Licensing Act. 
I think the most important clause in this part is clause 37 “Amendments to Land Transport Management Act 2003” which states: “The Land Transport Management Act 2003 is amended in the manner indicated in Schedule 5.” I think the debate on this legislation the whole way through has been about whether it will achieve the focus and the expectations of Auckland—that is whether it will solve our transport gridlock. Everybody in Auckland is looking towards Parliament. 
Actually Aucklanders were looking towards Parliament in respect of the Land Transport Management Bill; they were desperate to see a bill that would see the bulldozer engines start and start now and desperate to see a whole lot of infrastructure rolling out. The amount of infrastructure that has been rolling out in the last 5 years under this Labour Government is less than what rolled out under the National Government and those figures were tabled in the House today. I will clarify that for the United Future member so that he is clear. When we were in power National was funding the Albany to Puhoi realignment a massive extension of the northern motorway the Mangere motorway the eastern access to the airport a whole lot of work around “Spaghetti Junction” and so on. Massive projects were going on. But every year that this Government has been in power it has spent fewer dollars in real terms than we did in our last year. 
Then it brought in the Land Transport Management Act which this clause makes some amendments to. We thought that legislation would be about getting some more roads; we were convinced of it. Sadly the Land Transport Management Act when it was passed became known around Auckland and Auckland local authorities as the legislation a Government passes when it is trying to stop any new roads from being built. What a tragedy it is that we are here tonight with another bill! One would have hoped that it would be a capitulation; that it would say that the Government really got it wrong first time round and this Local Government (Auckland) Amendment Bill will amend the Land Transport Management Act to give it the clout it needs to see the bulldozers start. 
One would have hoped that it would rev up the elements in that legislation about the private sector’s involvement because despite all the rhetoric from the Government how many private sector roading projects have there been in Auckland so far? Zero—a big fat zero. My next question is how many private sector roading projects look likely to occur in the next couple of years. The answer—and I have talked to most of the major players in the private sector roading area—is a big fat zero. Why would we get involved they say with the Land Transport Management Act being as restrictive and regressive as it is? [ 
Interruption 
] Rod Donald has just confirmed exactly what everyone knows. Helen Clark and many other Ministers in this Government have said to a number of people in Auckland local government that they were really wrong to have rolled over and let the Greens have so much say in the Land Transport Management Act. Helen Clark regrets it. She says it was a sop to the Greens and so is this bill. I pointed out earlier that in all the press releases that came out from the Ministers—and they all looked brilliant with their red colour—roads did not get a mention. 
So the Government is amending the Land Transport Management Act and I thought we would now see some amendments that would actually ensure that some roads were built. But the amendments in schedule 5 which are driven by clause 37 in Part 3 make no improvement to the Land Transport Management Act. If anything they are a retrograde step. 
What was clearly needed was some work on the Resource Management Act. Why did we not see some clauses in the Local Government (Auckland) Amendment Bill that freed up the resource consent process? The Committee needs to know that Transit told the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee at the end of last year that it now takes considerably longer to get consent for a major project than it does to build it. I have done some checking with comparable jurisdictions like New South Wales Victoria and so on and in none of those cases did they even have a clue what I was talking about. This bill does not do it.