Smith Nick: Road Traffic Reduction Bill — Second Reading 
Smith Nick: Road Traffic Reduction Bill — Second Reading 
[Volume:615;Page:11151] 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH (National—Nelson) 
: 
 We can have all the weasel words we like but the fact is that the problem is getting worse. The congestion year-by-year gets worse and worse and no amount of waffle from that member can fix it. But I want to come to the issue of the Road Traffic Reduction Bill. One could have taken this bill straight out of Karl Marx’s book—because it is a bit like this: if only we had a bill to reduce traffic reduction it would reduce. The Minister for the Environment would have us believe that if we had a “Flatulence Reduction Bill” that would reduce flatulence; that if we had an “Obesity Reduction Bill” that would reduce obesity and that if we had a “Crime Reduction Bill” that would reduce crime. The notion we have from the movers and from the Labour Party is that if only Parliament would pass a bill stating that everybody will be good then it will happen! It is a bizarre approach—that somehow if we pass a bill that says there will be traffic reduction everybody will get out of their cars and life will be nirvana. Well I have news for members: it does not work that way. One actually has to have a bit more intellectual grunt and a bit more substance to one’s policy than shoving through the Parliament of New Zealand bills of that sort. 
The whole concept behind this bill is centralised planning. It is as though each morning everybody gets up and says: “What’s the Government said I have to drive today? Has the Government told me I have to get on my bike today? Has the Government said I have to drive a car today?” It is as though there is no free choice. The reality is that whether people take a bike walk or drive that decision is an individual decision made by every independent New Zealander. One can drive all the wiffly-waffly bills through Parliament one likes— 
Hon Marian Hobbs 
: Nobody told me I couldn’t drive my car today. 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH 
: I say to that Minister for the Environment—a Minister who has wanted to pass all sorts of waffly legislation of this sort—that by passing some sort of strategy and some target such as a target for waste reduction— 
Hon Member 
: What happened? 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH 
: The Minister has passed a target bill for waste reduction. Waste keeps going up but we have a wonderful target and somehow we are all meant to feel a lot better! Well we do not and we actually need some policies that have some substance. What would make a positive difference? The sort of thing that would make a positive difference rather than the squealing and whingeing from the Minister for the Environment is to do something about the Resource Management Act and fix it so that we can get on and do some things. 
Hon Marian Hobbs 
: What about the environment? 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH 
: Let me give an example to the screeching Minister from the other side. The excellent member from the Coromandel is in the House. She would know that every day every week and every year vast numbers of people wait at the Kopu Bridge. She has been diligently working to try to have that bridge replaced. Now let me tell members what happened with the legislation that the Minister for the Environment is responsible for. They had to do some drilling to determine the design of the bridge. 
Jill Pettis 
: Don’t shout! 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH 
: I have to shout I tell Ms Pettis because the whingeing women on her side of the House keep interjecting. Let me come back to the issue and that is that they had to drill into the bed of the river at the bridge to determine— 
Jill Pettis 
: I raise a point of order Mr Speaker. I take objection to that misogynistic statement. 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH 
: Speaking to the point of order I point out that for the whole time I have been speaking I have had to put up with constant screaming from Mrs Hobbs and Jill Pettis. If they do not like being called whingeing women they should shut up. 
The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Hon Clem Simich) 
: No we will not have members being referred to by those terms. The member will withdraw that please. 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH 
: I withdraw. Let me come to the substance because that Minister opposite is responsible. As I was saying all they wanted to do was drill two 3-inch diameter holes at the Kopu Bridge to do the foundation. Because of that Minister’s policy they had to get consent from the local iwi and they said under this Government’s policies that it was offensive to drill those holes to build the bridge and they did not even do the investigation. It took 2 years and cost $200000 to get consent to drill two holes. I say to members opposite that we will continue to have traffic congestion like my colleague Sandra Goudie has to put up with at the Kopu Bridge while the foolish Minister for the Environment continues to block sensible reform of the Resource Management Act. Reform of the Act is needed so we can build some of the roads we need. 
I come now to the great plans and the great strategies that the Government has for road building. In particular I want to challenge the Government about its 10-year roading plan. Last year Government members went up and down New Zealand consulting New Zealanders on Transfund’s 10-year plan. They spent 8 months consulting on it and in August last year the Minister with great fanfare said: “Here’s the 10-year plan for building roads around New Zealand.” Do members know how long the 10-year plan lasted? Not 6 months. Within 6 months the Government had binned its 10-year plan and had walked away from the decisions within it. That is how far we are away from getting any sensible decision-making in this crucial area. 
Then there is the key issue of Auckland roads—and everybody accepts we have a problem. The problem for the Government is that it is $4 billion short on solving the problem. We have heard absolutely no answer from the Government as to how it will fix it. All the key groups accept that the congestion in Auckland under Labour has got worse and under its policy it will continue to get worse. 
I also turn to the provisions in the bill for more planning. The provisions that the Minister has picked up out of this bill and put into law involve even more bureaucracy. In fact we had roading plans for roads that were already to be built but as a consequence of this legislation we had to have more bureaucracy and more navel-gazing rather than getting on with the job and building those necessary projects. We are miles away from having any sensible approach to roading. 
I want to set out very clearly what National says should be done. The first thing is that we must reform the Resource Management Act. The select committee has been advised that it now takes 7 years to get a consent for a new road—that is absolute nonsense. It is unacceptable and it must be fixed. It rests at the desk of Marian Hobbs that that legislation has not been reformed. She has rejected the sensible proposals that National had introduced into the House to address those very issues. The second thing we must do as my colleague Maurice Williamson pointed out is look at congestion pricing. That is a sensible model. It is a model that provides for getting the pricing signals right. Where we differ from the Green Party and the Labour Party is that if we are going to get sensible transport decisions we have to get the pricing right. We have to get the market signals correct so that when people are making choices as to whether they use public transport rail bicycle walking or cars those true costs are reflected. 
As has been so amply illustrated in other parts of the world congestion pricing is the way forward. The problem for Labour is that in the late 1990s as National developed the intellectual policy work to bring in congestion pricing Labour members opposite decried it. They shouted it down. They would not understand it they do not understand what is required for it and until they grapple with that issue the transport problems in our major centres will continue to get worse. The third thing that must be accepted by this Parliament is the extra capital investment that is required for roads. I was amused I almost fell out of my seat laughing when I heard Lynne Pillay say that the Government has budgeted to spend more on roads. The problem is that the Government has not spent. Do members know that Transfund is sitting on a $240 million surplus? People are sitting in congested traffic all over New Zealand while Transfund is sitting on $240 million. 
Jill Pettis 
: We’ve got a plan. 
Hon Dr NICK SMITH 
: How I ask the rowdy Jill Pettis does it help the road users of New Zealand to have their petrol taxes put up not once but twice and to have vast sums of money sitting in the capital funds when it should be getting spent on the roading works this nation requires?