Falloon AndrewANDREW FALLOON (National—Rangitata): Thank you very much Mr Speaker. It's a pleasure to take a call this afternoon on the Land Transport (Rail) Legislation Bill but before I come to the legislation I do just want to acknowledge the situation down in South Canterbury at the moment. Members will be aware we had a significant flood event around the Rangitata River just over 10 days ago and unfortunately it knocked out both the road bridge and also the rail network for quite some time. Contractors down there did a fantastic job getting both bridges open fairly quickly but unfortunately the main trunk line down there is still closed. But it's a real pleasure to be able to report to the House that they've done a fantastic job down there. I understand they're having to replace about 200 or 300 metres of rail line and they are aiming to have that open by Thursday which if they did would be an absolutely monumental effort.I do want to cover off a couple of points that we do have in this Land Transport (Rail) Legislation Bill though and at its heart it's making it even easier for KiwiRail to access the National Land Transport Fund. I have real concerns about that particularly for an electorate like mine. And we've heard from Ms Chlöe Swarbrick who obviously has an interest in all things Auckland. But I have a concern because this is already a Government that has taken $5 billion out of the State highway network to put into rail projects particularly in Auckland and also cycle projects in Auckland. They've done that and what it's meant is that there's a real lack of money now available for the New Zealand Transport Agency (NZTA) to put into the State highway network.That's certainly true in my part of the world where had National been re-elected we would have built a four-lane highway between Ashburton and Christchurch or more specifically Ashburton and Rolleston because the Rolleston to Christchurch part is nearly complete. But because the Government's taken so much money out of the State highway network we now have a situation where NZTA are having to come up with this cut-price scheme which is to put a median barrier down the existing road. That's really just due to the fact that they've taken so much money out of the State highway network to put into rail instead.So I have real concerns that this bill is going to make it even easier for money to come out of money that should be going on roads to make those roads safer. I mentioned Ashburton to Christchurch and there's a very good reason for that. It's now the second most dangerous stretch of highway in the country for fatalities and serious injuries. So if we're taking more money out of the roading network to put into rail all it's going to mean is that roads around the country including mine in Canterbury are less safe because legislation like this passes and more money ends up going into rail.It's also had another effect which is we've had an announcement recently from the Government which is to borrow $19 billion because they're now in projected deficit having to borrow $19 billion. I think around $12 billion of that is going to go into infrastructure and $6.8 billion of that is going to go into the road and rail networks. We still don't know by the way what the breakdown of that's going to be about how much of that $6.8 billion is actually going into roads but I have this fear that when you look across the other side you look at New Zealand First on the one hand the Greens on the other and Labour in the middle there's probably only one thing that they actually agree on and that's rail.I'm not opposed to rail. I think rail can work in certain circumstances but I have a fear that you've got a Minister over there who's sitting opposite who said that we have over-invested in roads and motorways for decades. You've got an Associate Minister in Julie Anne Genter who refers to motorists as car fascists". What's the likelihood that we're going to see much of that $6.8 billion actually going into new roading infrastructure rather than into rail?So all this bill does is it makes it even easier for rail to raid more money from the roading network. The Government opposite have already announced they're going to be putting more money into rail. All it means unfortunately is that roads in my part of the world in Canterbury are going to be less safe because all we're doing is investing more and more into Auckland and into Wellington. Thank you."