Palmerston North Voted To Keep Assets
Before the election last year many commentators and politicians, myself included, painted the vote as a referendum on asset sales. In a bid to get people looking at the policies rather than just the personalities, we implored the voting public to vote for parties whose policies reflected their own views on state asset sales.
Given that, it could be read that New Zealand voted for asset sales when it elected a National-led government. Certainly the word ‘mandate’ has been thrown around quite a lot since election day. National gained 48% of the vote, it has formed a government and has the confidence of Parliament. Surely that constitutes a ‘mandate’ to sell off our assets?
Not exactly. The referendum on asset sales threw up an interesting result: 60 MPs clearly in favour of selling assets, 60 MPs clearly opposed to selling them and 1 MP, Peter Dunne, whose position on asset sales seems to depend on the direction of the prevailing wind at the time he is asked where he stands.
For now, Peter Dunne says he will support the Government’s programme to sell off the Government’s top performing assets. Those that produce the greatest rate of return for taxpayers are the first on the block.
So just how enthusiastic are New Zealanders about asset sales? Unsurprisingly, not very. Polls regularly show around 75% of us are in favour of holding on to our power companies and majority share of Air New Zealand. Here in Palmerston North, we overwhelmingly displayed our desire to keep our assets at the ballot box. 53.5% of us voted for parties that favour retention and just 45.2% of us voted for parties that favour selling them off.
So should we resign ourselves to the National-led Government inevitably acting against our wishes? Not on your life! Democracy doesn’t just happen once every three years. Expressing our views and being listened to by our government is more than just a right. It is a privilege that we must make the most of at every opportunity.
Opposition politicians, and those who supported us, must accept election results and allow the government to govern while stating our opposition where we disagree and building the case for our alternative view.
However, where it is obvious that the government is not only working against the best interests of the nation but also the will of the people, we all must fight with every resource and every ounce of energy we can muster.
Printed in The Tribune on Wednesday, January 18.
Gorge Clean-up Challenge
As I have said previously, the actual job of cleaning up the Manawatu Gorge and gettting the road re-opened is a massive one and the fact that is taking such a long time is nobody’s fault. This photo, supplied by the NZTA, shows why.
You can see at the top where the ‘benching’ work (a bit like terracing) has got to so far. There is an awful lot of dangerous, expensive work ahead. We can expect the shocking Saddle Road to be overloaded for quite a while yet.
Brownlee Tells Us How Important The Gorge Is
Before Parliament adjourned last year I put a handful of questions to new Transport Minster Gerry Brownlee. They weren’t terribly challenging, just getting an idea of what information the Government had gathered on the Manawatu Gorge and what solutions they might be looking at.
It wouldn’t have taken much effort to pull together some standard answers. But apparently even that was too much effort for Gerry. This is what I got back:
Question: What is the expected total cost of work to re-open the Manawatu Gorge road?
Portfolio: Transport
Minister: Hon Gerry Brownlee
Date Lodged:21/12/2011
Answer Text: I am unable to provide a response at this time and undertake to provide the member with a final response at a later date
Attachment: None
Date Received:16/01/2012
__________
Question: What reports or briefings, if any, has he received estimating the cost of proposed options for improving road access between Palmerston North and Napier?
Portfolio: Transport
Minister: Hon Gerry Brownlee
Date Lodged:21/12/2011
Answer Text: I am unable to provide a response at this time and undertake to provide the member with a final response at a later date
Attachment: None
Date Received:16/01/2012
__________
Question: What options, if any, is he considering for improving road access between Palmerston North and Napier?
Portfolio: Transport
Minister: Hon Gerry Brownlee
Date Lodged:21/12/2011
Answer Text: I am unable to provide a response at this time and undertake to provide the member with a final response at a later date
Attachment: None
Date Received:16/01/2012
And so it went on for these questions too:
What is the total annual cost of work to clear slips and other causes of closure to the Manawatu Gorge road for each year since 1996?
What is the total cost to date of work to re-open the Manawatu Gorge road since August 18 2011?
What reports, if any, has he received regarding closure of the Manawatu Gorge road since August 18 2011? When does he expect the Manawatu Gorge road to be re-opened?
So while the closure of the Gorge is costing our region money and endangering our safety, the Government hasn’t even got the energy to answer a few simple questions. Obviously my faith in Gerry was misguided.
Fix The Gorge – But Then What?
145 days after the latest closure of the Manawatu Gorge commenced, any signs that our primary road link to Hawkes Bay, Wairarapa and, most importantly, the Port of Napier will reopen are still well over the horizon. With the summer holiday upon us, many more unlucky travellers have now experienced the frustration of being stuck behind a heavy vehicle not at all suited to the undulating twists of the Saddle Road. For those who travel the route daily, the journey’s additional complications have become far more onerous than a pesky inconvenience. It’s costing money and endangering travellers’ safety.
No one can fault the clean-up operation. That it is taking so long is not the fault of the NZ Transport Authority, the Government or the contractors working on the cliff-face. In fact, we should all acknowledge the skill and bravery of those workers who are tackling what is a colossal engineering challenge that cannot be rushed. We will be in their debt when the work is done.
But once it is done and the road re-opened, how long will it be before another slip closes it again? We can’t answer that question but we know that closures are inevitable. Some will be small, others will be large and there is nothing to say that even more substantial slips than the ones that caused the current closure will not occur. That is the nature of the Gorge’s geology and geography.
Constant closure would not be tolerated on roads – dare I say it – further North. There are strong economic and safety arguments in favour of building better transport links to the East of Palmerston North and doing so is long overdue.
Will this just be another opportunity to overlook the provinces or will the Government make a serious assessment of the options available and act decisively in favour of our region?
Printed in the Manawatu Guardian 12.01.2012
Good News For The Gorge?
The new cabinet has been announced and Gerry Brownlee is the Minister of Transport.
This gives me some hope that a solution to the Manawatu Gorge problem may get greater priority than it did under Steven Joyce.
Although Gerry is still an ‘urban’ MP, he’s not from Auckland and that’s a good start. Further, Gerry’s experience as the Minister for the Canterbury Earthquake Recovery should have shown him the value of working across levels of governance and across party lines to get positive outcomes.
I have heard mixed reviews about Gerry’s performance after the earthquakes but I have heard enough that is positive to believe there might a chance he will work collaboratively to get the result our region needs.
