Lees-Galloway Iain: Road User Charges Bill — In Committee 
Lees-Galloway Iain: Road User Charges Bill — In Committee 
[Volume:676;Page:21775] 
IAIN LEES-GALLOWAY (Labour—Palmerston North) 
: 
 It is a pleasure to speak on Part 3 of the Road User Charges Bill the topic of which is the assessment of unpaid road-user charges. It is absolutely right and correct that the Crown should have a method for assessing what it deems to be unpaid road-user charges. It is a belief on our side of the Chamber that everybody should get a fair go and a fair chance and that they should pay their fair share and the same goes for people and firms who are liable to pay road-user charges. 
We have to have a method for assessing those road-user charges. Part 3 also deals with the associated penalties for non-payment and the avenues through which those who are I suppose charged with non-payment can appeal their being assessed for unpaid road-user charges. 
It is excellent to see the Government putting through legislation that tries to tidy up the issue of unpaid road-user charges because before the last election there was a massive protest by trucking firms led by former National MP Tony Friedlander against the Labour Government. The Labour Government was trying to ensure that people who were liable for road-user charges did not try to game the system especially when the road-user charges were changed. The charges were changed without notice to ensure that no one shirked their responsibility for paying road-user charges. 
There was an outcry. In fact the truckers did exactly what Shane Jones suggested they did and they clogged up a number of our roads. I remember John Banks being in huge support of them. He was very excited about them expressing their right to protest and the right to free enterprise by clogging up the main streets of a number of our cities—and absolutely; I support anybody’s right to protest. That protest was about the method that was used to ensure that road-user charges were paid. 
I think it is right and proper that we ensure that unpaid road-user charges can be assessed as allowed for in Part 3. The provisions are not ones that Labour has any concerns with. There were some minor adjustments made at the select committee particularly on what information could be collected from electronic system providers. 
I know that some concern was expressed by some submitters that the power to collect information through an electronic system could be used to collect information that perhaps had less to do with road-user charges and more to do with some other aspects of safe driving. I know that for instance information on the distance travelled over a certain period of time could be collected and it was suggested that that might be used to determine whether vehicles had been speeding during that time. There was also concern about a number of other bits of information that could be collected. 
But this bill is about collecting information for the purposes of assessing what road-user charges are liable to be paid. That is specifically what it is about. To be honest I do not know why a trucking operator who was operating within all the laws they could be assessed on using that other information would be concerned about it being gathered. If they are operating in a lawful way and a safe manner on the road they will have nothing to fear from that information being collected. But I did note the concerns that were raised. 
The bill states: “any distance recorder information reported to the RUC collector by a vehicle inspector following an inspection of the RUC vehicle under section 58(1) or provided by an enforcement officer;”.