Brown SimeonSIMEON BROWN (National—Pakuranga): Well thank you for the opportunity to take a call on this debate regarding the Transport and Infrastructure Committee's inquiry into congestion charging. And I think the Government was thinking this would be a great debate to have on a Thursday afternoon but actually quite frankly it's a bit embarrassing for the Government who have been in office for five years and have actually done nothing when it comes to congestion charging despite the fact that when we left office in 2016 we launched the congestion question. We had the first report come back; the next report came back in 2018. This Government then said We will put it into the emissions reduction plan." They've consulted on the emissions reduction plan which has recommended congestion charging. They then shuffled it off to the Transport and Infrastructure Committee said "Oh can you do some work as well?" and they said "Yep congestion charging is a good idea." And then they said "Well let's have a debate about it in Parliament." Here we are having a debate about it in Parliament but we still don't know where the legislation is at. We've heard about the ambition from the chair of the Transport and Infrastructure Committee. He's ambitious. That's great. Fantastic. He's got ambition. We heard from the previous speaker Deborah Russell who said there's no particular barriers to bringing in congestion charging. Well the only barrier is the Government—that's the only barrier. Because actually this House is in agreement but we can't make progress and I think that's an indictment on this Labour Government sitting across the other side.So as I said the National Party supports a congestion charge. We know the benefits that this will have on our networks—the increased productivity that our infrastructure spokesperson Chris Bishop was talking about earlier. Congestion costs Aucklanders $1.3 billion every single year. So there is not just a cost of putting this in there is an opportunity cost every single day that this has not been put in place and that this Government continues to sit around and not actually make progress on this. But also they talk a lot about how there needs to be better alternatives. Well in five years public transport in Auckland has gone backwards. I note the Mayor of Auckland has put out a statement today where he has made it clear that this is something which is a significant issue if we're going to put in place congestion charging because they've just cancelled a thousand bus services a day because this Government won't let bus drivers into the country to keep our public transport running reliably. A thousand bus services every single day have been cancelled. We've got our rail network having a surprise rebuild over the next two years which is going to mean our rail network is being brought to a halt. So Aucklanders just do not have confidence in this Government when it comes to transport and infrastructure in New Zealand. All they hear about it is a cycle bridge; $51 million blown up in smoke—$51 million. I know Shanan Halbert would love to have had a cycle bridge across the bridge—he campaigned on it at the last election but it got cancelled on him. Well that's his chances of having a second term gone up in smoke. But the point here is that this Government talks a big game: $29.2 billion on light rail which has gone absolutely nowhere under this Government. So there's just literally no progress happening on all of these issues and they're embarrassed because they actually haven't made progress on transport in Auckland. So we support this because it's going to work. We support this because it works overseas. We support this because it's going to increase productivity. But I do just want to rebut a couple of the points being made by other members of the House which say "Well if we have congestion charging we don't need to invest in new roads and we don't need to invest in new infrastructure." Well the reality is Auckland is having a growing population and yes congestion charging will play a role in managing demand meaning in many instances that more people will be able to use the roads because we'll be actually managing that demand better because it will be operating more efficiently. I know the Greens don't like the idea of more people actually using roads but congestion charging will allow for more capacity and more ability to use those roads as we spread demand and as we give people alternative choices. But with a growing population there is still a need for more infrastructure and to meet that demand to give people the choices and the ability to get around and that is critically important and something which needs to be put into this debate. There are of course questions around equity; there are questions around where that money should go. It's very clear from the report: there needs to be a clear link from people who pay the congestion charge to the benefit in terms of where that money is being invested. That is something that we are very keen to see where that goes. Of course we should be also removing the regional fuel tax because all it's been is more charges for Aucklanders and no delivery and New Zealanders are sick and tired of the lack of delivery by this Government."