A blow for the regions

It’s official. This coalition government has confirmed that it plans to gut regional roading projects to pay for trams in Auckland, and to charge regional motorists more to do so.

In Northland, as in many other parts of the country, this announcement has been met with anger and disappointment. They have announced a massive cut of more than $5 billion out of the state highway construction programme over the next 10 years. That means roads that would have improved safety and security, created jobs, boosted regional economic growth and better-connected our regional farmers and producers to our major centres, will be axed.

This is an extraordinary blow for the regions, from a government that has claimed to stand behind them. Instead it is saying their needs are secondary, and ensuring that tourists can get from the Auckland CBD to the airport is more pressing.

That this government will continue the previous government’s commitment to road safety is to be applauded, but it is undermining that by axing the construction of New Zealand’s safest and busiest roads — RONS, the Roads of National Significance. In Northland the majority of stakeholders, along with all the mayors, have publicly stated the Northland motorway (RONS) is the single most important piece of infrastructure to drive our economic prosperity and growth. This coalition government thinks otherwise, and instead plans to halt all future construction of this vital link to the North, other than the first leg from Puhoi to Wellsford, which is currently under construction. This is short-sighted, and does not bode well for our future in Northland.

This coalition government refers to multi-modal transport, which is another way of saying we are going to take the money off the roading network and put it into rail. Rail in Northland is a dead duck. Rail needs bulk and distance to be viable, and Northland has neither.

You might question that. What about forestry? Well the forests are scattered all over Northland, and the logs have to leave the forests on trucks. The relatively short distance to the port means it’s uneconomic to offload the logs on to trains and then back off at the port, even if the rail went right there, which it doesn’t at the moment. The numbers have been crunched, and it simply doesn’t work.

The simple fact is, if rail in Northland was economically viable to the commercial sector they would be using it, and successive governments would have invested heavily in the system. The opposite has happened. The commercial sector transports everything by truck because it is more efficient and cost-effective.

The coalition government’s decision to radically change direction is short-sighted. It’s damaging to our economy and will set Northland’s future back dramatically. I urge all Northlanders to voice their concerns to the government and let them know that this is unacceptable.

For regular updates on political issues go to my Facebook page MattkingMP.

"The simple fact is, if rail in Northland was economically viable to the commercial sector they would be using it . . . "