The Aratere grounding, the Air Force plane breakdown and Power Poles falling over, NZ’s Infrastructure is mass immigration broken and User Pays will make it worse.
NZ’s Economic success is built upon 3 pillars.
The first is stealing indigenous land and never paying it back, the second is an addiction to a deunionised low wage economy and the third is mass immigration to exploit those low wage workers.
Bernard Hickey is devastating in his appraisal of how under funded our social infrastructure is and how cheap mass immigration is to blame…
In my view, this is the culmination of 30 years of under-investment in health infrastructure to ensure Budget surpluses and low public debt, but with low income taxes and no wealth taxes. This coincied with a tipping point in the 30-50% pay gap between Australian and New Zealand health sector wages. Australia’s decision to announce on Anzac Day this year it would welcome any New Zealander as a first class citizen accelerated the exodus, along with significant upfront bonuses and relocation pay offers from Australia’s health system in the wake of covid.
…Bernard Hickey calls it the ‘Dark Heart of NZ’s Political Economy‘, and it’s the Real Estate Pimps protecting their golden goose while Governments simply import fake growth from exploiting migrant workers but not taxing the rich to pay for the infrastructure…
The failure of yet another pre-fabricated house builder1 and a legal threat2 against our biggest council to force more greenfields development are two more signs, if we needed them, that our economy and society are now just a residential land market with bits tacked on.
…National’s solution to this massive underfunding is borrowed tax cuts alongside privatisation and user pays…
Chris Bishop cites private sector spending for infrastructure funding and user-pays
The Infrastructure Minister wants more private sector financing, such as public-private partnerships (PPPs), to pay for major projects.
In a speech to Local Government New Zealand on Thursday night, Chris Bishopsaid he wanted Government grant funding to become a last resort for councils.
“My speech talks about some of the things we’ve been talking about as a Government for six months, and we’ve actually campaigned on – so making greater use of tolls, public private partnerships, things like value capture as well,” he told Morning Report on Friday.
…
…this mutation of a road policy that National have trotted out slashes public transport infrastructure and is a naked attempt to push poor people off the roads!
This is user pays privatisation of our Roads, exactly as TDB warned you!
Bernard Hickey is once again scathing…
Simeon Brown’s road-taxing bait-and-switch
Govt unveils unmentioned $50m rego fee hike & fuel tax hike from 2027 to raise $650m and help build 15 new motorways; Funding for cycling, biking & walking slashed; Climate impact unmentioned
…he’s right!
Simeon only mentions Climate Change twice throughout his 43 page ‘plan’.
NZ is one of the few countries that sold our public transport systems and the nonsense underfunding of our public transport system sees entire rail closures because it’s too hot…
Thousands affected as dozens of Auckland trains cancelled due to hot weather
…this heat that shuts down underfunded Rail networks is also eroding the ground with huge rainfall…
Discovery of 3m cavity closes part of state highway in Tauranga
Barely a year after the devastation of Cyclone Gabrielle, we are seeing what catastrophic climate change looks like in real time as roads develop mass erosion caused by extreme rain dumps caused by climate change.
We don’t have the adaptation capacity because we refuse to tax the polluters more.
You appreciate things are only going to get worse from here on in right?
Despite the climate denial from the Right in NZ, it is real and it is here now.
The $14billion dollar damage of Cyclone Gabrielle and our inability to rebuild highlights how little resilience we have in our underfunded system…
National’s response to all these threats to our infrastructure is privatisation and user pays.
When the Boomer King Wayne Brown is struck dumb by the Government destroying the hopes of public transport infrastructure in our groaning gridlocked city, you know shit just got real.
I kept asking questions to candidates about roading privatisation during the election debate series because the obviousness of where National’s roading platform led to seemed an important issue, but it never caught a wider focus.
Now we not only get the privatisation, but we get the pain of user pays inequality.
It’s all stick, no carrot.
What the petrol tax did was generate revenue from as wide a group as possible to fund infrastructure, National have dumped that in favour of privatisation of roads with tolling and congestion taxes that will burn the poor with no expansion in public transport infrastructure to provide alternatives.
Remember our subsidisation of public transport was supposed to be an emission reducing tactic as well, so by dumping them will not only make gridlock more likely, it will produce more emissions that are feeding the climate change extremes we are watching burn our country this Summer.
So we open the taps on immigration and exploitation…
Migration still at record levels but signs of slowdown
…and rather than build the infrastructure for that level of migration, we simply impose user pays as the solution???
Whatever decision is cooked up will be for the benefit of a Right wing donor somewhere.
We are in the age of consequences now and we will choke on our denial.
Look at these numbers…
…road crashes were 4% of GDP!!!!
Our roads should not be privatised and they should not by made user pays. Roads should be seen as a common good with huge state investment focused on climate change adaptation, better engineered for safety and vast upgrades for public transport.
Nothing National have planned here will solve anything in the short term, medium term or long term.
Indeed all they are doing by rising speed limits is playing to peoples impatience caused by the underfunded infrastructure.
This is simply about pushing poor people off roads and hoping no one notices while the rest of the infrastructure topples over.
There are solutions to all of this, tax the rich to gain the revenue source to pay for this in the first place, far higher tourism levies, universally enrol all migrant workers into a Union and place enormous state subsidies into total electrification of NZ.
“Nothing National have planned here will solve anything in the short term, medium term or long term.”
National haven’t planned anything. Much like the Aratere, they are an empty vessel. Labour had it right when they secured the contract for new ships. Then along came Willis and waisted tax payers money by axing the contract and suggesting we build Toyota corolla versions as they are cheaper. Well in this world of consumables the one thing we know is that cheap is not best. The other thing we know is that National government cost us all in the long run(except their donors and the top 1 %, landlords etc)
And Simeon Brown is simply awful, a man child.
Welcome to New Zimbabwe
The renter class (property speculators, bankers and financiers) have taken control of our country. Their solution is extraction, extraction, extraction. What to do?
Our stupid Finance Minister going on about a Toyota Corolla solution for a ferry crossing after they prattle on about a thriving economy. They are so ridiculously small minded in their approach, they are an embarrassment. The last government were useless at execution, whereas this government excels at going backwards. Pathetic.
As Farrar said on X, Bluebridge has managed a fleet of eight different ferries since 1992. They managed to replace and renew them successfully before they break down, and have done it without costing taxpayers a cent”. Time to sell off the Interislander perhaps.
“But political commentator Liam Hehir says it’s going to be difficult for the Government to avoid the link between the grounding and its jettisoning of the $1.45b iRex project to acquire new Interislander ferries.
The Aratere grounding is “another damning episode” where NZ “had big aspirations and ambitions” to do things but eventually failed to see them through, he said.”
“Just saying,” tweeted former prime minister Helen Clark, “didn’t someone cancel the order for badly needed new NZ inter-island ferries?”
Michael Wood, a transport minister under the last Labour government, says it’s been known for a long time the ferries are at the end of their useful lifespans.
“What today’s events throw into relief is that the decision to stop those ferries being built isn’t one that results in a quick replacement – we’re looking at years and years before we have the security of new vessels.”
Time to vote out this outrageous cut at all cost government perhaps.
Problem with the iRex project was the original budget was for ferries AND infrastructure. A useless board at Kiwirail bough ferries too large to fit in the turning circle that is the Piction Basin and spent the WHOLE budget on ferries leaving no infastructure to load and unload them.
Willis canceled the cost overrun that would have seen the original budget blow out by 100%.
Kiwirail still has the $1.5B original budget less the cost of the ferry cancellations. You simply cannor have a SOE board not spending to their (yes they could do the whole ferry/infrastructure for $1.5B) allocated budget. Why even budget if you are out by 100%?
The chairman has rightfully fallen on his sword and as such should be a warning to ALL SOE’s, spend to your budget.
Trouble is once again you put money ahead of lives. We were lucky this time, next time may end in lives lost, then Willis’s decision would amount to a court hearing.
In this day and age how many operations run to budget?
New ships don’t break down? New ships don’t sink? Must be in a AI generated alternative universe. Titanic did not fare well.
So if we allow government project to over run their budget why bother having the PMC set budgets? National is right to clear out the PMC in that case. What is the point to having bean counters if you can shell out beans willy nilly.
Why would Willis face a court hearing when the new ferries were not for delivery till 2026 and the new infrastructure to handle the ferries not even approved via the RMA process? Infrastructure build would take 8 to 10 years (if we take the construction speed we have for infrastructure building currently) as it passed through consent, tendering and built processes.
The new ferries would sit tied up to the docks for at least a minimum off 8 to 10 years. So dumb was the choice on ferry size that they would need to turn around in the channel and back up 14K to Picton. Picton basin is to small to turn around that size ferry. Mind you they could dredge and widen the basin but get that through the RMA process? Must some snail that needs protecting?
National at least are trying the fast track infrastructure builds but even than you are still looking at least three year consent process followed by a five year build.
Waterview tunnel was on time and under budget. Can be done.
waterveiw was done by labour thats why.Ask sir micheal Cullen
But every one of Bluebridge’s ferries have always been garbage. Choosing to take Bluebridge when it costs basically the same would be like delibrately booking an Interislander trip on a broken ferry.
How many trains fit on Bluebridge? I don’t deny that the Interislander could be managed better although I suspect that political issues are probably the biggest barrier to its success.
We need a report regarding the freight, vehicles, and passengers transported by each company to enable a fair decision on their respective worth.
Maritime Union National Secretary Carl Findlay says if the steering had failed during bad weather, or when the ship was in Cook Strait, the outcome could have been disastrous.
He says the Government made a massive error cancelling the iRex project, with the Aratere’s grounding threatening not just the transport network but also the safety and wellbeing of crew and passengers.
“If this incident does not shake the Government out of its complacency about the need for investment in new vessels and infrastructure, what will it take?”
Bring back Dharleen tana–she’ll fix it in an instant!!
Or Sam Uffindell. The ship needs some panelbeating.
Judith Collin may get some favour’s through her husband’s Oravida Chinese contacts for cheap ship parts, its not to far out of her way.
NZ is a soft touch on migrant exploitation, and the exploiters know it. What is exposed is most likely the tip of the iceberg.
Exploiters know in the unlikely case they get caught it will likely result in a fine.
There should be more labour inspectors, seizure of assets, jail time, (not home detention) and deportation of new NZ residents exploiting people from their native country.
The Swiss don’t piss around no matter how rich the exploiters are as per this article. This is the message we should be sending:
https://www.theguardian.com/world/article/2024/jun/21/british-billionaire-hindujas-sentenced-to-jail-in-swiss-exploitation-case
NACT First are just the worst.
We’re now going to get far less capable ships, no rail capability, no improved port infrastructure for more money with a fucking long time to wait exposing the public to risk by forcing them to use the current decrepit antiques. All because National and Nicola Willis needed to dig out 3 billion dollars out of the budget to gift to the fucking landlords. They’re a mean spirited shambles of a government totally focused on looking after their own.
Ultimately NZ get the government they deserve so here you go NZ, enjoy your miserly sugar rush while our countries infrastructure continues to rot.
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