Duynhoven Harry: Public Transport Management Bill — In Committee Third Reading 
Duynhoven Harry: Public Transport Management Bill — In Committee Third Reading 
[Volume:650;Page:18789] 
Hon HARRY DUYNHOVEN (Minister for Transport Safety) 
: 
 It is a pleasure to rise to speak in this debate on the Public Transport Management Bill. I might perhaps be the last speaker I suspect but I say to the previous speaker David Bennett that in all the years I have been in this Parliament I have seen a number of interesting things in terms of transport legislation. The member can look to his colleague on the front bench the Hon Maurice Williamson who was wise enough—and it is rare that I pay this tribute to him—to have listened very carefully to the submissions made in a select committee some years ago on the issue of cockpit voice recorders. The Government put up legislation at the time that intended one particular aspect in regard to prosecutions and using that information. Following the hearing of strenuous submissions not from everybody but from some that said: “We think you’ve got this spectacularly wrong and you need to rethink.” Maurice was strong enough brave enough and wise enough to listen to those submissions and to go against what Cabinet had decided. The wisdom in that case was not with Cabinet; the wisdom was with the submitters. We face the same situation today and far from it being from one particular aspect several submitters supported option C. 
I find it quite unusual to be speaking against my friend and colleague Peter Brown from New Zealand First because he and I usually substantially agree on transport matters. But in this particular case I think New Zealand First has got it wrong. A number of submitters very strongly supported option C which was the decision of the select committee. And these supporters are not minnows. They include the Auckland Regional Transport Authority the Auckland Regional Council four Auckland territorial authorities Local Government New Zealand Auckland Sustainable Transport and three public transport operators—one of which includes Veolia Transport Auckland—which run all the suburban rail transport in Auckland. These folk were not about saying: “Hey look—our narrow commercial interests.”; they were saying: “For the greater good of the area.” which is precisely what the previous speaker was talking about. 
What a pity that the wisdom of Sir Dove-Myer Robinson many years ago was not actually more widely accepted. He proposed to greatly expand the public transport network not because of fuel costs at the time but because of the development of the city. Thank goodness an earlier person with a Dutch name in this Parliament—a guy called Julius Vogel—had the wisdom to go against popular sentiment at the time— 
Hon Judith Tizard 
: And commercial. 
Hon HARRY DUYNHOVEN 
: —and commercial sentiment and actually develop New Zealand by putting in place strong transport networks and this Government has done exactly the same. This Labour-led Government is committed to providing high-quality public transport systems throughout the country because we believe that improved public transport is not only vital to achieve our goal of sustainability but vital in the interests of our communities. This bill will improve the tools available to local authorities for providing public transport services to a set standard. 
As I mentioned in my speech in an earlier stage of this bill if members opposite would like to research a company called I think Carrington Bus Company—a short-lived public transport operator in the New Plymouth area—they will see that the tools in this bill are needed in terms of the countervailing powers of larger operators operating commercially but saying: “Here’s how we’ll commercially deal to this company. We’ll drop our fares on their routes to zero until they go broke.” And that is what happened. Two larger operators dropped their fares to zero to put a commercial operator out of business. The National Party is very fond of saying that it is the party that supports business understands business and knows about business but the unfair commercial practice that was operated in that instance caused a very good local company to go broke in a matter of weeks. Why? Because the other companies operating on those routes were able to cross-subsidise from their other operations subsidised by the local community. 
This Government far from what the previous speaker said has put a huge investment into public transport not just because of the oil prices—we began this long before oil prices rocketed up—but because we see congestion as a huge impediment to business in Auckland to the normal commercial operations of the city and want to encourage people particularly those in Auckland to use public transport as Wellingtonians have done for many years. Central government is putting funds—something in the order of $640 million in this current financial year—into mostly public transport. Some of that is the purchase price of new electric units. On top of that local government is putting around $270 million into public passenger transport. On top of all this is the electrification plan for Auckland suburban services. One would have to say that well over $1 billion of public money goes into commercial and contracted passenger services throughout the country. 
If we look at what is trying to be achieved in this bill and the reason for going to option C we see that anyone who analysed this thoroughly would see that the purpose is to give more tools to central and local government particularly to local authorities for providing public transport services to good standards to meet the demands of the community and to actually plan for prepare for and provide for the future. The bill will give regional councils greater powers over non-contracted—that is commercial—services in order to help regions get the best value for money and to achieve an integrated sustainable public transport network. 
The history of how commerce works is really worth looking at. If as the National Party believes the market will provide let me recommend a book called  
The Great American Streetcar Scandal 
 set in Los Angeles in the 1930s. It shows how commercial interests demolished what was to have been the best public transport system in the United States at the time. They absolutely demolished it. The streetcar system in Los Angeles was effective wide-ranging and provided transport for a huge number of people but it was demolished by commercial enterprise because the state of California did not have a bill like this to protect it against unfair commercial operation. I am a strong believer in providing a framework in which commerce can flourish and operate in a way that helps the beginning company but also protects the interests of the public. 
If members can find the people who own the Carrington Bus Company and explain this bill to them I guarantee when they see the provisions they will say they wish they had had this at the time. One of the members opposite said “What about the Commerce Commission?”. Well the Commerce Commission said: “If a bus company wants to reduce its fares to zero on a particular route then that is entirely fine.” That is what happened because the bus companies that Carrington set up in competition with were able to reduce their fares to zero on that one route in order to knock that fledging company for a six and put it out of business. 
I am pleased that this bill will enable local councils to set quality and performance standards for commercial public transport services—things such as emission standards or minimum periods of operation. These sorts of things are vital when one specifies public transport network conditions. The bill will also allow councils to require operators to integrate services fares and ticketing in order to serve the needs of the community. I think that integrated ticketing is a huge facet of this which we should not ignore. I have talked about it for a minimum of 15 years and I think it is absolutely vital to the success of public transport operations in major cities. Thank you.