Phil
Smith, Editor: The House
Analysis
– The centrepiece of Parliament’s week was a
two-hour-long special debate on the recently released National
Infrastructure Plan.
The
Plan is a worthy and fascinating read. The debate had a
different tone to many, with general agreement that New
Zealand needs to do better on infrastructure.
“They
have made a compelling case for change,” Chris Bishop said,
introducing the Infrastructure Commission’s work. “We face
significant challenges as a country: ageing stock, a backlog
of maintenance and renewals, an ageing population, and
increased exposure to natural hazard events.”
MPs all
agreed that infrastructure planning is too important to be
tinged with politics. MPs attempted to reflect this
sentiment in the amiable debate, lauding others’
observations, even across the most bitterly fractious party
divides.
Credit and blame
From the start,
despite genuine effort, the debate failed to avoid politics.
Minister for Infrastructure Chris Bishop lauded his own
government for commissioning the Infrastructure Plan. Labour
speakers focused on their former colleague Grant Robertson’s
role in forming the Infrastructure Commission and
commissioning a strategy.
Advertisement – scroll to continue reading
The jealous guarding of
credit is likely more automatic than deliberately political.
It demonstrates one of the political bidi-bidis in the sock
of bipartisan endeavour – other obvious contenders are blame
and parochialism.
It would be an odd politician who
highlighted his opponent’s success and his own failings.
Each party came up with different examples of bad political
decisions. For example National’s Katie Nimon pointed to the
stop-start work on the Hawke’s Bay Expressway, while
Labour’s Tangi Utikere pointed to the Interislander ferry
(iRex) project.
But the sniping was comparatively
minimal and MPs were even buoyed by the general positivity.
National’s Nancy Lu said she was impressed by the
opposition’s “willingness to work together for the long term
betterment of our country”. Out of context that may sound
absurd, but it illustrates that MPs tend to presume the
automatic rejection of any proposition by those across the
political divide.
All parties agreed that politics is
detrimental to infrastructure decision-making, and that
things need to change. Labour’s spokesperson on
Infrastructure and Public Investment is Kieran McAnulty, who
called for the Infrastructure Commission to have a stronger
role.
“If all Crown infrastructure went through the
independent assurance process that the Infrastructure
Commission has set up, then we will go a long way to
avoiding the cancellation of projects that we have seen in
the past.
“It is about confidence and about certainty.
And one way to assure that is if we get the settings right,
then it doesn’t actually matter what is going to happen at
an election, because they know that infrastructure projects
have been properly assessed, and nothing has been promised
without an ability to pay for it.”
Pork barrels and
parochialism
Megan Woods, who has opted to be a list
candidate in the next election, also observed a political
tendency that, ironically, she will soon be freed
from.
“Even in this debate, where I think we’ve had
some very thoughtful contributions, we can’t have missed
some of the … pork barrel politics that has underwritten
infrastructure for too long in this country – that thinking
being a good politician is talking about the ‘wins’ in your
local patch.”
Typically, National has more electorate
MPs, and in this debate they frequently lauded
infrastructure projects underway on their own patches. Among
them, Grant McCallum (MP for Northland) defended the
imminent Northland Expressway, which had attracted strong
criticism during the debate: “Is that investment a wise
investment? Well, for the people of Northland, it is. And
it’s because we’re making up for generations of a lack of
investment.”
Green MP Julie Anne Genter had earlier
noted the difficult cost-benefit choices involved, arguing
that the possible cost of the Northland project was
equivalent to seven new Dunedin Hospitals. McCallum wasn’t
alone though. ACT’s Simon Court had earlier decried the
state of the highway in Northland, while New Zealand First’s
Andy Foster touted the project’s economic
benefits.
The only MP who loudly decried a new road on
their own patch was Green Wellington Central MP Tamatha
Paul, who said of Wellington’s new double tunnel project:
“if you want to save money for the people of New Zealand,
don’t do that project”.
Glum
projections
Despite the calls for a bipartisan
approach, Labour’s MP Ayesha Verrall sounded pretty glum
about the projected health needs in the report, as well as
the impact of politics on their delivery. (The plan notes we
are likely to need 4900 additional hospital beds by 2043, to
add to the current 12,000.)
“New Zealanders want
roads, they want hospitals, they want schools, they want an
electricity grid that works, and yet, it’s too tempting for
us to lean into the politics around infrastructure that is
detrimental to us achieving those outcomes.
“I am so
grateful for the thoughtful contributions that I’ve heard
today that suggest something else might be possible. I don’t
underestimate the challenge of maintaining this posture from
here, though. How easy is it going to be, in the next seven
months, to promise a road, to oppose a road, to try and make
political hay out of cancelling or promoting an
infrastructure project?”
Some MPs appeared to doubt
they can be collectively trusted to sufficiently eschew
politics to plan infrastructure effectively, but none were
suggesting that infrastructure should be entirely removed
from their oversight and control.
The Infrastructure
Plan is an attempt to instil strategic thinking in
government planning. It is not the project ‘to do’ list that
its title might imply.
It is a fascinating read though,
full of revealing details of the sorts of things that should
guide investment decisions. For example, in education,
projections suggest an increase in school-aged Māori, while
Pākehā school-aged populations decline (possibly meaning
an increased demand for Māori immersion schools); while a
shifting population distribution has led to 11 percent of
schools (224 schools) being less than 50 percent
utilised.
The Infrastructure Plan looks forward 30
years. A few MPs referred to climate change and referenced
‘resilience’, but no one raised the potentially politically
unpalatable impacts of three decades of accelerating weather
events and coastal inundation. No one raised whether, for
example, some of our significant coastal infrastructure will
become physically or financially impossible to retain, and
the implications of that on local populations.
The
Infrastructure Plan can be found
here.
The Hansard record of the debate can be found
here.
* RNZ’s The House,
with insights into Parliament, legislation and issues, is
made with funding from Parliament’s Office of the
Clerk.
New Zealand’s public broadcaster, providing comprehensive NZ news and current affairs, specialist audio features and documentaries.
Radio New Zealand is a Crown entity established under the Radio New Zealand Act 1995. Radio New Zealand News are vital elements in our programming, providing impartial news and information to New Zealanders every day. Radio New Zealand (RNZ) provides listeners with exciting and independent radio programmes in accordance with the Radio New Zealand Charter.
