Brown Peter: Customs and Excise (Motor Spirits) Amendment Bill — First Reading 
Brown Peter: Customs and Excise (Motor Spirits) Amendment Bill — First Reading 
[Volume:621;Page:16614] 
PETER BROWN (Deputy Leader—NZ First) 
: 
 I do agree with the statement by the Hon Mark Gosche that during the 9 years of a National Government little was done on roading. But we are not going to support this bill; it is an absolute load of garbage. In 1991 or 1992 I went to the Rt Hon Winston Peters—perhaps in some ways as that is how I ended up here I wish I had not—and told him I was a consultant for port reform. 
Brian Connell 
: He was in the National Party wasn’t he? 
PETER BROWN 
: He was in the National Party at that time yes. I told him that once we got port reform and this country was working 7 days a week 24/7 the trucking on our roads would be enormous and the roads would not keep up with it. In 1993 I went to see the Rt Hon Winston Peters who had by then formed New Zealand First at a public meeting. He put on his usual charm as I walked out and asked me to write him a transport policy. I did not dream for one minute that I would be here now trying to put it into place. 
I have to tell the honourable members over there that the only thing they have got right about this is that we need to put some money into roading. I agree with Dr the Hon Lockwood Smith that the way we fund roads in this country—and this is what I told Winston way back in 1991—on a “pay as you go” system is absolutely ludicrous. People have listened to the Greens far too often in recent times. I am totally ignoring them right now. I am not going to take a blind bit of notice of the member on my left. Basically this country needs more roads fast. Lockwood Smith referred to the fact that they are intergenerational. I think he said 20 years; I hope the roading we build in this country will last a lot longer than 20 years. 
Dr the Hon Lockwood Smith 
: They don’t; they fall apart. 
PETER BROWN 
: They do not last because of construction problems. We should be borrowing the money to finance these roads within the existing funding stream particularly if the excise tax on petrol that goes into the Crown account is transferred across. That was started when we were in coalition Government—2.1c per litre of petrol went across to the roading account. That was a New Zealand First initiative which would have continued had we stayed on the Government benches. 
With that money we should be borrowing to build these roads and building them fast. We have been absolutely dumb in this country. When we had massive unemployment we should have been building roads. A few years ago in the 1930s a chap called Francis Chichester came out and said there was a Depression in this country so we should grow logs. And look at the benefits of that to this country right now. We planted timber and it has had huge benefits. 
When we had unemployment problems in the late 1980s and 1990s we should have been building roads. [ 
Interruption 
] I tell Mr Cunliffe not to take this lightly. Many people have died because of our failure to build roads and because of our inadequate roading. They will continue to die until we build adequate roading and the way to do that is to borrow money. 
United Future is a party with fortitude to some very limited degree. In the last few days its members have been pushing for tax relief here there and everywhere. They have not won one cent of tax relief yet they will support this bill to increase tax on petrol. Does that make sense? It does not make sense to me but I am just a simple sailor. United Future members have been going around the country bragging that we need a 5.6c a litre increase on petrol when we have a huge amount of money in the consolidated account. 
The tax take in June this year is close to 40 percent greater than it was in June 1999. Now we are talking about slugging the motorist for another 5.6c per litre of petrol. It is an absolute disgrace. On top of that—and it is only 10 seconds away—we know that the Government is going to put in tolls here there and everywhere including on the second bridge in Tauranga. United Future members are actually bragging about this. They are bragging that the motorist should be slugged for another 5.6c a litre and that we should be paying road tolls. 
I say to the honourable members in the Government that for God’s sake they should get their wits about them and read the Allen report. It is a very significant report. It tells us what can be done and the advantages on a dollar basis with an investment in roading in this country. It is very very significant. On a dollar-invested basis the returns in Tauranga would be huge. It states that on a loan repayment at 8 percent there is a $6.50 return on a dollar invested. That is the way to go. There would not be one business in this country that would fund its expansion of business—and that is basically what we are talking about by expanding the road infrastructure—there would not be one company or any business people worth their salt who would want to pay as they go. 
 They would be saying “Let’s use the dollars we get in revenue to borrow and advance this business.”—be it capital staff or whatever. That is what we should be doing with roading in this country. We should be taking a more businesslike approach and saying that we need this amount of roading in this time frame and we will have to borrow on this basis and pay it back from revenue earned. I listened to the argument that we will get better consumption per litre of petrol and therefore that the revenue will go down. That is quite some way away. Even with the energy-efficient cars that were outside Parliament this afternoon there will still be some revenue from petrol that will be a return. There are also road-user charges. The other thing about this bill is that it does not target the road-user charges that trucks pay. It is only the average motorist in the light diesel vehicle who will pay increased road-user charges. This bill represents nothing more than a rip-off for the motorist. This is an approach by the Government to say that motorists are an easy target and it will take them for all it can. 
Hon David Cunliffe 
: Auckland needs it. The country needs it. 
PETER BROWN 
: There is no argument that Auckland needs roading. Members will not get any argument from me. But I tell Mr Cunliffe that the way of funding it—and he must have some idea of finance as he is the Associate Minister of Finance although I guess that does not give him any particular qualification— 
Hon David Cunliffe 
: No free lunch. 
PETER BROWN 
: He is exactly right. There is no free lunch and he should not be putting his free lunches on to the working people that he supposedly represents here. You come in here on the backs of average working people— 
The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (H V Ross Robertson) 
: No I do not do that Mr Brown. 
PETER BROWN 
: The member wants to question what I am saying. 
The ASSISTANT SPEAKER (H V Ross Robertson) 
: You are bringing me into the debate. 
PETER BROWN 
: I beg your pardon. I realise that you would not do that in any way. 
I will answer the member’s concerns. If the Government wants to be fair then it should accept that roading costs are paid for people who use the roads now and for people who will use the roads tomorrow and the day after. That is a fair way of funding the whole thing. Until we get a political party sitting in the Treasury benches that takes a businesslike approach to roading the Government will have to slug the motorists or whoever it can. I tell the Government that we will be there. This is the biggest issue that I think this country faces in the next few months in terms of finances. It will be a political issue. The people who think that they can keep slugging the motorist—the average person who just goes down the road—for more dollars or cents per litre of petrol and then add road tolls will find that they will come a gutser. We will be back after the next election and we will be insisting that this tax is removed. It is not fair it is not warranted and we will remove it. I can categorically tell the House now that it will be removed. I say to the poodles now in the United Future seats that they can vote for it because we will not have to worry after the next election. They will not be here and we will be taking it off.