6. Question No. 6—InfrastructureCARL BATES (National—Whanganui) to the Minister for InfrastructureQuestion No. 6—Infrastructure6. CARL BATES (National—Whanganui) to the Minister for Infrastructure: What announcements has he made about the Quarterly Investment Report?Hon CHRIS BISHOP (Minister for Infrastructure): This morning I announced that the Government is going to release quarterly investment reports which outline information on large Government investments throughout their life. This is part of our plan to get the books back in order drive better performance from agencies and also give New Zealanders the openness and transparency they deserve about their investments. The aim is to change the culture inside the public sector after years of opaque inefficient and wasteful spending. The quality of information about these investments is unacceptable and taxpayers deserve better.Carl Bates: What are the highlights of the quarterly investment report ending March 2024?Hon CHRIS BISHOP: The quarterly investment report shows there is a significant amount of investment across the pipeline. There are 137 investments in planning with an estimated value of $93.7 billion and 171 investments in delivery with a combined approved budget of $79.4 billion. These investments are bringing needed infrastructure and other services to New Zealand but the report also paints a grim picture about the state of the investment system. We have inherited a system that cares a lot about paying consultants to write business cases and not enough about delivering and looking after the investments that we already have and that we need. So we are resetting expectations to drive high-quality information shorter and more fit for purpose business cases improved asset management better monitoring oversight and enforcement from both the Treasury and also Ministers.Carl Bates: What else is the Minister doing to reset expectations to drive fiscal sustainability?Hon CHRIS BISHOP: The Minister of Finance and I have written to our colleagues setting out our expectation for robust investment discipline and improved reporting. We know that the state of the investment system is unacceptable and we take our responsibility to uphold fiscal discipline seriously. We will be monitoring agencies and chief executives to ensure that they are driving improvements in long-term planning business cases asset management and reporting. We are also closely monitoring the progress of large projects to keep them on track and on budget doing away with a previous recipe for delivery which includes taking the cost of projects and doubling it before serving it to the public and expecting them to support it.Carl Bates: Are there any further actions the Minister is taking to improve investment decision-making?Hon CHRIS BISHOP: Yes there is a lot of work to be done to fix our investment and infrastructure system. As a further measure we are also reviewing Treasury's Better Business Cases and Gateway frameworks to ensure we're getting rid of what I call the fluff and nonsense" and selecting projects that New Zealanders need and that we are confident represent value for money and can be delivered on time and on budget. That work is ongoing and it is going to take some time to get our investment system back on track but we are committed to doing so.Hon Peeni Henare: Buy some ferries.SPEAKER: We come now to question No. 7—Hon Chris Bishop: That's precisely a demonstration of the problem.SPEAKER: Well when the demonstration is over we'll carry on with question time."