Foster AndyANDY FOSTER (NZ First): My turn. I'm pleased again to support this bill. Look I'm going to start off by responding to a couple of comments that were made by the Hon Julie Anne Genter. She said that transport shouldn't be a political football. I would agree with her because I would say that the more things that we can get long-term consensus on in the community and across the political divide the better especially on things like transport which often you're putting in transport infrastructure and it will be there for 100 200 300 years and will have an effect across that long period of time. The reality is though we are having a vigorous debate about this.I'm just going to pick up on some of the issues which have been raised just to show that I've been listening to what the Opposition has been saying. The Hon Deborah Russell talked about any council being able to apply for a fuel tax and of course that is going to go under this legislation. However my recollection was that Jacinda Ardern as Prime Minister actually ruled out any more regional fuel taxes and she did indeed do that. I've got a quote from a news article here: Jacinda Ardern has ruled out any more regional fuel taxes under her leadership" I accept that she's obviously not the leader anymore but it was clear and emphatic ruling that out. "I can give [a] guarantee to this House and consumers [that] there will be no other regional fuel taxes while I'm Prime Minister." She also said—which was interesting because of this concept of saying "Well actually there could be other parts of the country which would like to have a regional fuel tax." She also said "Well some regions are desperate for investment" said Ms Ardern "but we've ruled it out."—but we've ruled it out.So these other parts of the country which were going to benefit from the thing which had gone in in Auckland—and I can remember because I was mayor at the time and actually my predecessor also came and asked the Hon Phil Twyford who I see over here and he's nodding. He said "Well on the basis of that ruling out"—I presume that's what it was—"no Wellington you cannot have a regional fuel tax either." In fact what I wanted was to say "I would like you to at least say 'Can we get the congestion price legislation under way.' "—nodding over there again. The answer was no. But after you got through the 2020 election the answer was "Yeah well maybe maybe maybe." So we felt like we were making some progress.But I think the reality was that from our perspective there was value in getting the right mechanism there. I accept that the congestion pricing is going to take a fair bit of time to get to but that is the right mechanism because it changes people's behaviour as well. It is not simply a blunt tool which affects everybody. We've heard that issue about being regressive. The reality is that many people are going to need to use their car. Auckland's issue is not just about the transport system; it's about its form. It's such a big city that to get around it for many people the car is the only option. Public transport is not going to be viable for many many people to use and so the car is going to be necessary. For those people what this is is regressive and it affects them significantly and that's why we're pleased to stand to repeal this.We also heard that there's going to be a whole lot of projects which will now be cancelled. They won't be cancelled; Auckland can still put them up into the National Land Transport Programme and if they are good projects they will get through that process. Now sometimes we over-embellish things in this House but the reality is we're talking about something like—Grant McCallum: Really?ANDY FOSTER: Really? Yes sometimes things get over-embellished. But we're talking here about $130 million - odd a year. The National Land Transport Fund from fuel taxes etc. $4.5 billion a year. Auckland would usually get roughly a third of that—$1.5 billion a year. So we're talking about 8 percent or so of the money which would be effectively going to Auckland. So yes it will have an impact; the issue is: how much impact.Then of course the issue is: does that put that little bit of extra pressure on saying that you've got to get better-quality projects? And look we've heard about $500000 speed humps and pedestrian crossings. That's not great. We've heard about the cost of putting those sort of things in and we've got to have a look at that the cost of all the health and safety issues around those. But if we can try and make sure that we get better-quality investment I think that that will be a very very good thing.We've also heard some accusations about this Government whacking up the fuel tax. What we haven't heard from the other side of the House is that it's three years before any of that happens at all. We also haven't heard the recognition that—in fact I think it was both under a National- and a Labour-led Government that 4c a litre regularly went on the petrol tax. So in fact if you said 4c a litre over six years you'd be 24c a litre anyway so there's probably not a lot between the two sides there.We've also heard an accusation about giving with one hand and taking away with the other about registration rising. I don't think that the cost of registering a vehicle has gone up since 1994—Tom Rutherford: Before I was born.ANDY FOSTER: Before Tom was born. What I would say to people right around the Chamber is that so often a price is set and it's not adjusted—Hon Member: Oh one-off.ANDY FOSTER: —yeah these one-off prices—and Labour-led Governments are equally guilty of that. I know that because having been in local government we would regularly come to Government and say "Hey you haven't allowed this price to go up for 20 30 years. It's now completely out of whack. Can you do that?" We should never be put in that position. We should never be imposing that. A little bit of trust between central government and other people will go a very very long way.So I think those are most of the things that I wish to say other than to say a really really important thing: putting cycleways in putting busways and public transport improvements in can benefit motorists but we have to get the balance right and so often we are not taking motorists with us—we are not taking motorists with us. In fact some of those projects have a significant negative impact on motorists. I look around the city that I live in and I know that people have not been taken on that journey at all and that they see a real negative impact on people who want to get about and do their business and they just happen to want to be able to use a car and they are not happy with that. I am delighted to commend this bill to the House."