Peters Winston: Land Transport Management Amendment Bill — In Committee 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Peters Winston: Land Transport Management Amendment Bill — In Committee 
[Sitting date: 01 July 2008. Volume:648;Page:17076. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS (Leader—NZ First) 
: 
 There are some nights and days in Parliament when one is just utterly and totally amazed. That a National Party spokesperson would get to her feet and raise the issue of New Zealand railways is as I said today a case of her having either the utmost gall or total amnesia. There was an outfit according to Booz Allen Hamilton that sold a $100 million profit-going company in 1993 not for $400 million as was claimed but for $328 million. 
Dr Wayne Mapp 
: She wasn’t here then. 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: Not being here is no excuse; to show total ignorance is the problem with National members. Too many of them were here. They are still on the front bench and they have learnt nothing. The reality of the whole thing is that they said: “We are doing this because we cannot afford $200 million of capital to develop infrastructure and Wisconsin Central Transportation and our friends Fay Richwhite can.” So did those companies invest $200 million? No. Did they recapitalise and take a $9-plus shareholdership down to 28c? Yes they did. And why have they been in court in the last 12 months? It is because they robbed the public blind. They are the very same people who are lining up behind the National Party as I speak today—and they all know it. So for the last speaker to get to her feet and talk about the railways repurchase is beyond anything in my wildest dreams that I would contemplate would happen here this evening. 
Parts of this bill are very good and parts are not. First I believe we should not act until we have international fuel stabilisation. Secondly I believe there is a windfall occasioned by GST that could mean we could pay this money across; we could actually hypothecate it to use a term that came out of some bureaucracy. But let me tell members this: we cannot sell that to the public—hypothecation. 
Hon Maurice Williamson 
: It is the same thing—you can’t sell it— 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: Oh yes we can. My mayor wrote to me as he would have written to all National Party MPs—although of course he does not have one now that “Bob the Quitter” has gone; if it is not for Bob and for Bob’s advantage Bob is not interested. The mayor wrote to me and asked me whether I would back this legislation because on the whole he substantially believes it would be good. Mind you I believe that he also thinks our ideas are more sound. 
Dr Wayne Mapp 
: Simon is out there knocking on doors. 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: Well if I were him I would knock on doors with my head because frankly no one can silk-purse a sow’s ear. National at the last election robbed the people of Tauranga blind by bringing in somebody who spent all his time complaining about the local council and trying to get deals done for himself. Robbing the ratepayers blind by getting a white elephant and selling it to ratepayers is what the National Party calls “socialising your losses”—passing them on to ratepayers. That is why Bob has gone and bought two farms just north of Tauranga for $24 million. 
Christopher Finlayson 
: Who won in 2005? 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: I will tell the member who won. He should look at the Electoral Act. Nobody will get away with that sort of cheating again. Oh no—they are laughing nervously now. 
Christopher Finlayson 
: Who got the electoral petition? 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: I will tell the member who won the electoral petition—the man who got the law changed. He won the petition in the end did he not? Just because one can find three judges who against all the record say one thing—but let me tell that eminent lawyer at the far end over there— 
The CHAIRPERSON (H V Ross Robertson) 
: The member knows he is ranging too far. 
Rt Hon WINSTON PETERS 
: I know but I just want to say one thing. Those members will not be able to get up in this election and use mates’ rates of one-tenth of real and actual costs and get away with it—sorry but we are on to it. 
I come back to my point about hypothecation. It should have gone from the GST windfall straight across to the national roading account—transparent fee-equivalent no commission taken off on the way through—and we would have been happy with that. 
There is one other thing I want to say to Mr Williamson who mentioned the issue of public-private partnerships. If someone cannot get a project going in 35 years and make a profit then I would be very fascinated to know what that project is because if the project is being run on a profit—whether it is the Millennium Wheel the Tauranga Harbour Bridge or anything like that—and if the developer has the utility for the public at heart then it should be able to be done in 35 years. But the member is not talking about that of course.