Bradford Sue: Railways Bill — First Reading 
Bradford Sue: Railways Bill — First Reading 
[Volume:610;Page:7419] 
SUE BRADFORD (Green) 
: 
 The Green Party welcomes the bill that we have before us tonight. After the shocking record of Tranz Rail including a series of five worker deaths on the job within 7 months in 2000 we certainly support all moves to make the rail industry safer and its structures more accountable. This bill has been developed within the cooperative working relationship on transport that exists between the Green Party and the Government and it is on that basis that we wholeheartedly back its introduction. 
This bill marks a comprehensive attempt to introduce a sensible and an up to date system for rail safety in the wake of changes over the last two decades that mean the Government no longer owns operates and regulates the railways as it did in the past. Much as some of us would like to turn back the clock on Richard Prebble and his friends and their selling rather than saving of rail all of us have had alas to learn to live with the consequences of that. 
The overarching intent of this bill is to fix the problems raised by the ministerial inquiry into Tranz Rail which reported back in late 2000 and the 2002 Halliburton KBR infrastructure review. While the language of legislation like this can be quite technical and dry I would like us all to remember the number of rail workers and passengers who have been injured the workers who have died and all the human tragedies that lie behind the commissioning of the Wilson inquiry and the Halliburton KBR report which have led to this legislation. The bill draws together provisions of the Transport Services Licensing Act the Land Transport Act and the Railway Safety and Corridor Management Act. It imposes clear duties and gives the Land Transport Safety Authority clear powers to address safety issues. Those steps are long overdue. 
We are about to see a renaissance of rail in this country and it is appropriate at this time to put forward new safety legislation to replace the disjointed and outdated systems that exist at present. For too many years rail was left to moulder as it was seen as a dying industry or as just a commercial venture that was not really worth very much attention. We are delighted to be part of restoring the role of rail as a key part of a sustainable transport network for New Zealand. If rail is to carry much more freight and I hope a whole lot more passengers as well we need to have excellent safety systems. More trains and more staff mean less of a margin for error not more. There can be no compromising on safety as rail is rebuilt. 
During the select committee process we will be listening carefully to the submissions. We do have a few areas of particular concern with regard to the bill and the first of those—shared I know by the Rail and Maritime Transport Union and others—is over the way that the penalties provided for in the bill apply equally to rail workers and to employers. I will be looking at that very closely during the hearings on and consideration of this bill as I do not think front-line workers should ever be put in a position of carrying the can financially personally or in any other way for management or governance failures for which their employer bears real responsibility. 
On a second matter the Green Party is particularly mindful to ensure that heritage railway operators who by and large have a good safety record are not subject to undue costs. The Government has taken a positive approach to that issue and we are confident that there will be no problems. I believe that the solutions in this area are likely to be administrative as much as legislative and that the fears of some small operators will not actually eventuate. 
We have also been anxious to ensure that there is a seamless interaction between occupational safety and health systems and the rail safety system. It is important to both that there are no gaps between the two regimes. It is also critical that there is no needless duplication especially as that would impact heavily on the smaller operators. In addition many of the heritage operators use a mixture of paid staff and volunteers and it is important that all parties understand their obligations and are not subject to unnecessary bureaucracy. I understand that the Land Transport Safety Authority and the Department of Labour have already been discussing how the new systems will interface. Again many solutions will be administrative. 
On a final note I particularly want to draw the attention of civil libertarians and others to clause 73(2) which may otherwise be missed. The bill includes a relatively extensive regime of prohibitions and fines compared with the present regime. Almost all are necessary for safety. However we will be interested in the views of submitters on whether clause 73(2) goes too far when it comes to people’s mere presence on a station platform or to their crossing a rural railway line. We are sceptical as to whether such a broad range of penalties in addition to the existing powers of the Trespass Act is good lawmaking. 
This bill is really needed. I hope Parliament will work cooperatively to make it the best bill it can be. Those who suffered under the old system deserve nothing less.