James Meager is responding to Chris Hipkins’ comments about the Minister for the South Island role.
The Labour Leader called the position a “PR job”, saying there would be no need for Meager’s role if the Government was actually prioritising the South Island.
Hipkins says Meager's not doing anything because he has no budget or decision-making ability, and this is just a way of telling the South Island it hasn't been forgotten.
Meager has hit back, saying it speaks volumes that Hipkins thinks the only way to achieve something is having a big bureaucracy and budget.
He says it’s disappointing to hear that kind of comment, and he’d rather hear something more positive about the aspirations of the South Island, which is why he’s there.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:06):
You're listening to the Canterbury Mornings podcast with John McDonald
from News Talk ZB.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
To eleven so. In January this year, Prime Minister Christopher
Luxon decided to make James Meaga the very first Minister
for the South Island and the Minister for the South
Island is with a snow.
Speaker 3 (00:22):
Can I jameson Morning John to Fear.
Speaker 2 (00:24):
About an hour ago, I spoke with Chris Hopkins regular
catch up and I asked him about your role and
here's what he had to say.
Speaker 4 (00:34):
A lot of the projects that we had underway in
the South Island, the ones that the current government are
scaling back. I think that's why they need a Minister
for the South Island. But we were building did Eten Hospital,
Nelson Hospital, we did have roading projects in the Canterbury
region that have been cut back by this government. I'm
not surprised they feel they need to suddenly insute a
new voice of the South Island because clearly the South
Island isn't getting a look in their government.
Speaker 2 (00:54):
So it's a pr job.
Speaker 4 (00:56):
Oh, totally a pr job. I mean he's not actually
doing anything, he doesn't actually have any authority to do anything.
He doesn't have any budget, he doesn't have any decision
making ability. It's basically just a way of saying, oh,
South Island, we haven't gotten you yet, we're not doing
anything for you. But here have somebody who you can
look to and say, oh, that's up to soon.
Speaker 2 (01:11):
James Mago, what's your response to that?
Speaker 3 (01:13):
Well, I think it speaks volumes that Chris Sipkins thinks
the only way you can achieve something in this country
is by having a big bureaucracy and a massive budget
to spend money on achieving nothing. So it's disappointing to
hear those comments. I'd like to hear something more positive
about the aspirations of the south Old. I think that's
why I'm.
Speaker 2 (01:28):
Here, all right, I'll pick up on that. If you
thinking you've got a question for the minister, you can
get in touch oh way one hundred and eighty ten eighty,
or you can text us on ninety two ninety two,
just along those lines. And I'm not going to hold
back James, because if I do, people hold on you
got your coward when the minister walked in. But my
(01:49):
view is that your role it's a little bit like
chrisit happiens view is that it's nothing more than a
sop to the South Island. Why should I think otherwise, Well.
Speaker 3 (01:57):
I think you should look at what the role is
actually there for. We've got a big agenda in and
around growth. We want to get the economy grown because
that means higher and comes more jobs, better opportunities for people.
The South Island is going to play a big part,
hopefully a disproportionately big part of that. So I think
the Prime Minister has said we need a voice inside
government to make sure that we can leverage every bit
we can in the South Island. And if you've seen
(02:18):
what I've been doing over the past three or four
or five months, getting around the South Island as many
places as possible, figuring out where those big opportunities are
and feeding those through the ministers. You'll see that coming
in the next few months.
Speaker 2 (02:28):
See why do we need a minister though, because it
seems you don't have a ministry, You don't have staff.
You can go a couple of people working for you,
but you don't have a department. There is no Department
of the South Island. You don't have resources that you
can call on, so you're doing nothing more than waving
the flag.
Speaker 3 (02:46):
Well, we run a leanship and we've got a strong
minister who's an advocate for the South and so the
reality is that ministers can't be everywhere at all times,
and some of those ministers having clearly big portfolios. You
think of what Eric Stanford's doing in education, she's got
to have someone who can tell her what's happening on
the ground in the South Island and around education and
school property. You've got the Tourism minister who needs someone
(03:08):
to tell who were are the big issues in tourism,
whether that's cruise, whether that's access to the Milford Sound.
And I'm the kind of person that can do that
for them. I can do the work for them on
the ground, and I don't need a big bureaucracy. I
don't need a large office. I can get around and
do that myself. The taxpayer already pays me enough money
for me to do my job, and that's all I'll
go and do.
Speaker 2 (03:24):
So you mentioned cruising there, what can you do for
the people of Akaroa, for example, who are really dreading
the next cruising season and having less ships coming through.
Speaker 3 (03:34):
Well, there's a lot that's happening in cruise or has
happened to cruise in the past few years. One of
the big issues is around biofiling. I've heard loud and
clear from the crew sector that that's presenting a large barrier.
Most of our big ports are seeing a downturn in
cruise over the next few years and that has a
big impact on local businesses. And I know there are
issues around Littleton and Akaroa over the past few years
(03:54):
about the impact that a lot of cruise ships have
on the area. But we're also going to see the
detrimental impact of fewer cruise ships. So it's about working
with Louise Upston and the Minister for Biosecurity on what
our biofailing standards are to we make sure that our
costs stay under control, so that cruise ships have some
certainty that when they get here they're not going to
have to lift their passenger fees just to cover those costs.
And how are we more welcoming to cruise. What can
(04:16):
we do to use that IVL to encourage them to
come here.
Speaker 2 (04:18):
It doesn't sound like you can do much in.
Speaker 3 (04:21):
Terms of increasing the cruise. I think we can do
a lot. I think we can invest in our port infrastructure.
We've seen a bit of that over in the West Coast,
and there'll be more to come in and around there.
We can look at what we're doing in our airport
infrastructure space and supporting our airlines. A lot of our
cruise passengers come to our country through our airport, so
if we've got good air connectivity to other countries and
through the regions, we can get more cruise passengers in there,
(04:42):
and we can actually start talking more positively about cruise
I mean, for about six years we labeled them as
the petri Dishes of the sea, and I'm sure that
had a very negative impact on people's willingness to come
here and to spend money on those cruise ships. So
I think we can do a lot in that space,
and there will be more coming from Louis all right.
Speaker 2 (04:57):
Some questions coming through. Someone wants to know whether you
had any input in the supercars coming to christ Church.
Speaker 3 (05:05):
I was aware of the prop I was coming through
through MB and.
Speaker 2 (05:09):
Did you advocate did you have anything to do with
getting them across the line?
Speaker 3 (05:11):
Those applications were in pretty much at the same time
I became the Minnesota So not for that particular project,
but I'm very happy that five point nine million dollars
will be coming to bring the supercars here. We saw
the big impact it had in Topor and it's going
to be a massive, massive benefit for not only the
people in around Christis but the wider South Island. People
love their car racing. I mean, I've got levels out
in Timrew, I've been to the thunder down under there.
(05:32):
I know what people think about car racing in the
south Old. So it's going to be a huge benefit.
But those are the kind of things are the exact
kind of things that I can help advocate for. The
major events, fund funding, regional infrastructure funding, school property, all
those things are things that I can have input into.
But I guess my challenge is there is a lot
that government does and I can try and dip my
toe into every single area and try to have my
(05:52):
say in everything, or I can focus on the big
priorities that Southold has really want me to.
Speaker 2 (05:56):
Focus all right, Well, Matt wants to know what your
stance is on commuter rail in Canterbury.
Speaker 3 (06:02):
Commuter rail or passenger rail. There's a difference between the two.
Speaker 2 (06:05):
Well, commuter rail will put it, well, what is the difference.
Speaker 3 (06:07):
Well, there's passenger rail. There's this idea that you could
run a passenger service between christ Chuch and Duneda, and
that's the old Southerner. And then there's commuter rail, which
is probably something you would look at more internal to
somewhere like christ Chutch.
Speaker 2 (06:18):
With this part, I think commuter is what he's asking.
Speaker 3 (06:20):
Yeah, but I think when you've got a city like
Christchutch which is growing as quickly as possible, and then
you've got towns like Rolston and Lincoln also growing well
as well, you have to look at all those options
to be able to get people around, and commuter rail
where it stacks up economically, will make sense. And the
government is willing to invest in rail. You've seen large
investments in metro rail for Aukland.
Speaker 2 (06:39):
Well, we have nothing for the Serve Island though.
Speaker 3 (06:40):
Not yet because we need to get our infrastructure in place.
Speaker 2 (06:43):
When you say not yet, what do you mean, Well.
Speaker 3 (06:44):
We're always looking at where we can make investments to
make sure we get the best economic growth story. So
you've got to look at the places that are producing
the most growth, and it is Canterbury. It is. You
look at the four fastest growing regions that asp survey, Canabury,
tesmen Otago South and they are the places where people
want to bring their business, they want to move. So
as a government, we're going to make sure we're making
good investments to get the best being for our buck
because it is a limited pot of money and there
(07:05):
are infrastructure marns all over the place.
Speaker 2 (07:07):
So if the rail Minister or the Prime Minister said
to you, James, what do you reckon commuter rail for
the greater Christricch area, what would you say?
Speaker 3 (07:13):
I'd say to them, Look, does it stack up economically?
What's the governments would you want it? Would you say,
I'd love it for commuter rail as a concept. Absolutely,
anything that helps people get around our cities and our towns,
I'm absolutely supportive of. What we need to be considerate
of is what is the cost of government, what's the
cost of ratepayers, what's the benefit to the private individual
who benefits from that commuter service, and what's the wider
(07:33):
public benefit and where's the mix there, because there's always
going to be a trade off between what the user
pays for that service and what the public pay for
the general public good. And you know, there are tough
decisions that we need to make in all these spaces
where government makes investments. So what we need to do
as a government and as a minister for the south
Old who needs to advocate for south Old projects, I've
got to be cautious as well. If I'm advocating for
(07:54):
specific projects in and around christ Rich what does that
mean for the availability of transport funding down in central Otarga?
What does that mean for fixing up the roads on
State Highway six along the west coast, which had.
Speaker 2 (08:05):
Shows that you've almost got an impossible job.
Speaker 3 (08:07):
It's almost an impossible job, almost, but nothing's impossible, John,
if you put your mind to.
Speaker 2 (08:11):
It, how do you know that you will have been
a success in the role?
Speaker 3 (08:14):
I think there's a few things that I want to
see happen over the next eighteen months to show some
success in this role, that the key priorities are following
on from what nicol Willis wants, grow our GDP, increase
our exports, improve our public services and improve our transport infrastructure.
Speaker 2 (08:28):
It's the same for everyone that's.
Speaker 3 (08:30):
Across the country, but specifically for the south On. I
want to see us disproportionately outperform the rest of the
countries so that we play more of a part because actually,
at the moment our population is about twenty three to
twenty four percent of the country. We sit just under
that in terms of our GDP produced now, depending on
the measure you look at now, I think we can
do better in that space, and so I'm trying to
figure out, and I have done that over the past
(08:51):
few months, where are the biggest places, biggest projects that
I can influence and I can have as say over so,
is that something like the data grid project down in
south and is it something like the transport options in
and around Queenstown, whether that's a new gondola. Is it
investing in our roading network on the west coast to
make sure that we have tourism operators have confidence that
they're going to be able to do a loop around
the South Island because as much as we love you know,
(09:13):
coming and depicted in heading down to Vicargo, I think
tourists want to do a looper in the South Old
not just up and down state Higo one. I've driven
that highway enough times to know that it's a beautiful
drive one way, and it's a beautiful drive both ways.
But if you're a tourist, you probably want to see
it once, you want to see some other things.
Speaker 2 (09:26):
It's a lot of stuff to achieve before the next election,
it is.
Speaker 3 (09:29):
And if I can make some progress in some spaces,
I will be happy, But there's always more to do that.
You're never going to achieve everything in the world. You're
never going to please everyone. But if I can work
hard and I can make a difference in the south on,
I think they would have achieved something.
Speaker 2 (09:41):
Jee It's been a touch from in Vcargo James and
he wants to know whether you can please get the
Southerner service restored and going all the way back to
all the way down to in Vicago.
Speaker 3 (09:51):
Yeah, well, it's an interesting prospect. There was a report
done a couple of years ago by MB. They spent
about fifty grand on this report, and what did ended
up coming out was saying that if the way you
make it work is if you run a passenger service
once a day between christ Church and Denial christ Stitch
in Vicago at one hundred percent occupancy at one hundred
dollars a ticket, and then you pay it off in
(10:12):
eight years, that's a challenge, right. It means it's going
to be incredibly expensive and you're going to have to
rely on consistent high patronage to make that work. That's
probably why it hasn't happened so far and probably why
it won't get off the ground. But look, if there's
you know, if people again can make the numbers stack up,
and the government's open and willing to put a little
bit of public transport money into it, it's something you
can look at it. At the moment, one hundred dollars
(10:32):
a ticket and one hundred percent occupancy not paying its
face for about ten years, it's unlikely to happen, especially
when we've got relatively good connections between in the Cargo
and christ Church and our roading network.
Speaker 2 (10:43):
So it sounds to me you've softened Steve up for
a know there.
Speaker 3 (10:46):
Well, it's a no, it is certainly not at the moment.
We just think the numbers don't work, and I'm happy
to point Steve to that report. I just think one
hundred dollars a ticket for one way between Christrichen and
v Cargo is not realistic when you can jump in
the car and do that trip in six and a
half seven hours and you get through.
Speaker 2 (11:00):
Someone's been in touch obviously from Queenstown so does admitist
to have any plan to fix the disaster that is
Queen's Own's traffic issues. It seems that the National government
has opened the floodgates to allow every man and his
dog to reside in Queenstown without any long term plan
to make the area more user friendly.
Speaker 3 (11:15):
I'm in Queenstown from the ninth through to about the eleventh,
and I'm meaning a few interesting people. They're one of
which is proposing this idea of a commuter gondola. Now,
when I first heard that proposal, it struck me to
be something similar to, you know, the monorail scene off
the Simpsons, where they're trying to sell this fantastic, you know,
hypothetical solution to people's transport issues. But then I looked
(11:36):
into it more and more and it actually seems like
it could be a bit of a goer, particularly that
the proposers don't want a lot of government investment into it.
The challenge in Queenstown is, if you.
Speaker 2 (11:45):
Have it's not the only reason you say it's to
go because.
Speaker 3 (11:48):
It's hugely It can be hugely successful if you don't
need to draw on government resource for it, If the
private sector can get out and solve our transport problems
without government needing to put a huge amount of investment
into it means we can put those limited resources elsewhere
where perhaps the private sector aren't able to step up.
So putting that aside, Queen's Son's got a unique situation
because it is geographically constrained about how you get people
(12:10):
into the town. And of course all the growth is
happening out Frankton Way, so you've got to think about, well,
what is the solution to get people in and out
of the CBD. But then where do we want to
focus the future growth in Queenstown And that's where the
Council has a big role playing that.
Speaker 2 (12:22):
We'll come back to those questions you're talking about Queenstown before.
In response to the question about the transport mess in Queenstown,
what's your position on the idea of an airport at Terrace.
Speaker 3 (12:35):
It's an interesting propose. I know Kros Airport we're looking
at a while ago and it's been put on ice. Look,
we're pretty agnostic as to where that kind of infrastructure
grows or goes again. You know, it's an investment for
the Christiach Airport themselves to make. If they can make
it work. There are challenges around Queens Steam.
Speaker 2 (12:53):
You're feeling very diplomatic there.
Speaker 3 (12:55):
Well, I've got to be a little bit cautious to
because the government has an ownership share in Christiach Airport,
So I don't want to be saying things or directing
people in a certain way. But look, my job in
this role and my Associate Transport role, is to encourage
regional connectivity. If there are projects that would improve that
and are realistic and could get off the ground, then
they could be supported. But at the same time, Queenstown
Airport continues to grow. It's not quite at capacity. It
(13:18):
has some constraints in terms of how it can get
planes in and out in terms of flight noise levels,
and of course you've got one agree report as a
possibility for expansion as well, so there are options there. Again,
if an ensity like christ at Sheport thinks it can
get it up and running and make it work economically,
then it's worth I don't think government should get in
the way of that, whether or not government tips money
(13:38):
into it.
Speaker 2 (13:39):
Which would you be in favor of being fast tracked?
Speaker 3 (13:43):
I'd be happy for it to go on a fast
rek schedule. If consenting in regulation was getting in the
way of making it happen. If there's a way that
we can make it more affordable. The fast Trak process,
of course, maintains those existing controls, but just brings everything
into one place at once, and it seems like it
would be ideal for a large project like that. But
my understanding at the moment is that there's not really
much that it's been sort of put on hold as
(14:03):
other options are pursued, So I'm not sure if it's
a realistic optunity for fast Trek right now.
Speaker 2 (14:07):
I think it's got zero social license. I think that'd
be a problem with it.
Speaker 3 (14:10):
It could be an issue. I know there's a lot
of local opposition to it, and I know there were
some concerns raised by the christ Uch Council all the
councilors as well in terms of whether or not it
was drawing attention away from christ Church. But all these
complicating issues going to it. Underlying all that is it
is a region where people want to get to if
we can improve the connectivity to it. It's in particularly
from places like christ Chuch into Central Otago. I come
(14:33):
from Timuru. If I fire to travel to Queenstown, it's
driving the only way I can get there is to
drive because there aren't flights in and out of there.
I think if we can improve our connectivity to places
like that make it cheaper for people to travel, that
must be a.
Speaker 2 (14:43):
Good thing, all right, I guess, so says, get your
mate Chippy back on after listening to this genius minister.
Speaker 3 (14:50):
Well, I'm happy for Chippy to come on. He's probably
very busy man as well. I know it. Being in
opposition is like, but I'm a bit a chat to about,
you know, his lack of investment and and attention to
the South Oland and when he's going to put his
South Island spokesperson.
Speaker 2 (15:02):
Up right, I want to see what you if you
can answer this question because I've got no idea what
they held this person's on about. Could the government look
into funding it's on the aviation theme. Could the government
look into funding Coat one one one instrument landing system
it tries to ach airport. This person says this upgrade
would enable planes to land safely in forg significantly reducing
(15:23):
flight disruptions and by improving the airport's resilience and reliability.
Aukland Airport's got this. The Cat one one one you'll
be all over the Cat one one one Minister look.
Speaker 3 (15:36):
Not familiar with that specific three letter acronym. But in
terms of I think this is around being able to
have instrument only landings at places like Christiatch Airport. That's
the kind of infrastructure I think government can look at
when it looks at supporting airport infrastructure. We had an
issue this morning where we had a minister's plane circle
around a few times and head back home actually when
he's coming down to make an announcement around building consent authorities.
(15:59):
And that's a challenge because places like christich and Timuru
are subject to heavyweather Hamilton as well, where the conditions
more than often than and I am asking Civil Aviation
to make sure that we look at whether it all
have our rules and any airways and the like of
that are fit for purpose, whether or not we can
invest in new technologies to allow airplanes to land more frequently,
more regularly, reduce the delays and reduce the cancelations. Actually, interestingly,
(16:22):
we're going to be putting out data for the first
time this week which will show the performance of airlines
to our regions. In the past, we've only done it
for jets and for the main centers. But we're going
to be able to tell whether or not your town
is being served well by the airlines and what the
cancelation rates are, and all of that will put pressure
on airlines to perform and make sure we improve that connectivity.
But the idea of investing in those instruments sounds like
a reasonable one.
Speaker 2 (16:42):
All right, So what we do now about that.
Speaker 3 (16:44):
I'll go away and make sure there's enough money in
the kiddy to invest in that. I can talk to
christ at Shairport about whether that's something that they are
interested in, and I can talk to other ministers who
have access to infrastructure funding about whether or not that's
the kind of project that they'll be interesting and helping
me support. So I guess that's the part that's a
great example of my role. You bring me on the show.
You've got a caller who has an interesting idea that
(17:05):
hasn't been raised with me directly. I can then go
and work with my officials, plus advocate to ministers who
have accessment for structure funding and see if we can
work together to help fund that centrally.
Speaker 2 (17:14):
It sounds like with respect. So there's a lot of
talking in the job, not a lot of making stuff
will making things happen.
Speaker 3 (17:22):
There is as minimal talking as possible before we get
the stuff to happen. So the unfortunate reality which is
I'm finding in this job so far, is that there
is a lot of talking upfront, but there is a
significant amount of action happening. So for something like airport
infrastructure investment you've seen a little bit over on the
West Coast, You're going to see announcements made in their
future around some of our regional infrastructure around water. We
(17:44):
did an announcement a couple of weeks ago around rail.
So there are things happening. One of the problems is
that I think as a country is we've got stuck
in this regulatory molasses as people have described it, that
there is a lot of consultation and a lot of
decision making and a lot of you know, consultation on
the consultation, and not a lot of things actually happening.
IRIMA reform will help that. Ministers making decisions quickly will
(18:06):
help that. In my aviation role, I'm trying to turn
around certification and permission for new airlines and co sharing
agreements as quickly as possible so that we can get
that stuff happening. So I'm certainly trying my best.
Speaker 2 (18:17):
James, you said in your maiden speech when you first
entered Parliament, you talked about your upbringing and your father
leaving school when he was fifteen and working at the
freezing works for forty years, and your mother holding down
multiple jobs while she raised you and your two siblings
on her own. How would last week's budget have helped
people like your parents.
Speaker 3 (18:39):
I think if you look at what the budget did
in around health and education, they are accessing services when
I was growing up in the same way that EVENUW
Zelander did right, So if you can invest in equality education.
I also mentioned in my maiden speech and in comments
following that that I think the only reason I was
ever successful was that my mum drove us into a
good education, having a good primary school. So making sure
(19:00):
that young people like me growing up had access to
quality primary school education is key. You're going to see
a lot of that from are Stanford, and I know
there's some announcements around local property upgrades later on today
in christ Church, which is going to be absolutely fantastic
for the region. So I think when you're looking at
that way that would be an important help. I think
the motivation for people to take control of their own
(19:21):
lives and to be better managers and better disciplines in
their own lives. My mum was a fantastic role model
growing up. I mean, we all relied on the social
welfare net that we all support and will continue to
support and put money into that.
Speaker 2 (19:35):
If you or one of your siblings have been out
of work when you were eighteen or nineteen, could she
have afforded to support you financially, Because that's what your
government is expecting of people now for.
Speaker 3 (19:49):
Those families who are in the position to do so.
So that's the nuance there as well. This isn't about
saying that you're all on your own. It's about saying
that we're families have the ability to support eighteen and
nineteen year olds, they should do so. The first responsibility
for looking after you and looking after your family should
fall on you. When you are unable to do that,
the second responsibility falls on your neighborhood and your community
(20:10):
and therefore the wider state. So in those situations where
you had a beneficiary household and a nineteen year old
that was also out of work, I think it's unlikely
that the responsibility then falls on someone who is also
on a benefit right. So that's the detail that's been
worked out through the policy that was announced by Ministerruption
over the election. But the fundamental core principle maintains if
(20:34):
my mum got to a point where she was in
a position to support me and my siblings, I would
have the expectation that we would rely on ourselves to
get ourselves into work before calling on support from other
parts of the country.
Speaker 2 (20:47):
You talked in your speech about what sounded like some
pretty dire times in your family life. How bad did
it get?
Speaker 3 (20:56):
Look, I think relative to some of the things that
other people went through growing up, probably not bad. But
I think it's all individual, it's all circumstantial and on
the whole, I had a pretty good life growing up.
I can't complain about anything I need.
Speaker 2 (21:09):
Do you think then that I'm not suggesting that you
over egged it or overcooked it or whatever, But do
you think maybe some of the media reports overcooked how
bad things were for you growing up?
Speaker 3 (21:19):
I think I was cautious to make sure that I
was trying to explain who I was and where I
came from. With the reality that, Yeah, I grew up
in an environment that was tough, and from my perspective,
it was a tough upbringing. But I was very clear
that I never went without I never went to school
without shoes on my feet, I never went to school
without a full belly, without books in my school bag.
So we had what was I thought at the time,
(21:41):
and I think is pretty typical, a typical upbringing from
a part of the country that comes from a poor
part of the community. Now, there are obviously people in
far tougher circumstances than I am, and I think that's
why it's important that we have that wealthy in it
and that safety net for those people. But I don't
think Look, I think people can take from that speech
what they took from it. I don't think overall that
people catastrophized.
Speaker 2 (22:02):
And know all right back to the questions, what is
the plan for State Highway one from christ Church to Dunedin.
Speaker 3 (22:10):
So the plan for State home from christ Church to Deneeds.
So the first part of that is that we in
the ndta's National Land Transport or that the Government policy
statement on land Transporters. There's all sorts of acronyms. There
is a port to port part of that, so little
import to timmer report looking at the resiliency and the
reliability of the road between those two ports, and it's
(22:31):
an export focused strategy, right like we want to make
sure that we've got goods on the road and on
our rail getting out to our ports and life overseas.
So the first part is looking at whether or not
it is viable to four lane parts of that highway.
Have we got enough passing lanes on? There? Are our
bridges reliable and resilient? And then looking further south, what
is the connection between the likes of Timmery down to Dunedin.
How do we integrate rail along the way there? You
(22:53):
saw the announcement with the rail hub down in Moscow
getting freight off trucks and onto rail to get into
the ports.
Speaker 2 (23:00):
Did you know about that before it was announced by
Called to Stuart.
Speaker 3 (23:05):
I wasn't aware of Call to Stuart one, No, But
I was aware of the Moscule freight hub and I
was at the announcement with Shane Jones, but I hadn't
been privy to Courter Stewart's proposal.
Speaker 2 (23:14):
It was a bit weird, wasn't it.
Speaker 3 (23:16):
Their timing? Yeah, well, I suspect they probably knew that
there was progress being made on the Port Taro Dines
Transport one and they wanted to put their proposal on
their idea out of there and look, if they think
they can get that working. And I know Carter Stewart
have a reputation of being able to produce things and
make things work down the South, then good on them too,
and now at Rolston as well. That the governments can
(23:36):
only act on the proposals it receives. And if Quarters
can get these across the line and get it working,
and you can have one in Moscow as well, there's
no reason why you can't have them both working in harmony.
Speaker 2 (23:46):
Milton and Moscule pretty close together though well testing the
South Island Minister on the geography.
Speaker 3 (23:52):
Here, they're close if you were traveling from Moscule to
Milton and you wanted to spend what set of forty
forty five minute drive, But it's not so close when
you're trying to get freight from say Milton all the
way into Port Charmers. So that's probably one of the
challenges with Quarters model compared to Moscules model. But again
we're willing to work with and partner with private sector
(24:13):
organizations that want to drive that economic growth story. And
so if quarters have a proposal, if Dines and import
Otarger have a proposal, if there's proposals for freight hubs
up in mid canabya Rolson, we'll look at them and
we'll make sure we invest in what makes sense. That
The challenge, I guess is you're probably not going to
end up with an inland port or an inland freight
hub at every single town along the way. So you've
(24:35):
got to make sure that at some point we're sensible.
We have that balance between making sure it's market lead,
but we also have the government leading and doing a
little bit of planning so that we have a New
Zealand wide.
Speaker 2 (24:43):
Approach to this. All right, got to get through the
questions coming through from people. Someone what about I'll share
the message. I'm not saying I know exactly what they're
on about. I say, what about biofouling for commercial shipping?
If you intend to grow exports out of this country,
focus needs to be on the ships that carry them
and making it easier for them to come here.
Speaker 3 (25:01):
So biofoiling is this idea that when ships come in,
if there is detritu, sore mollusks or some sort of
credit attached to the bottom of the ship. Our biosecurity
rules have wrapped up over the past five six years
to the point where if they are not clean, they
get turned around. Now we don't have very good biofol
and cleaning facilities in New Zealand, and particularly for our
crews and the riskers is that they won't come here
(25:23):
because they're risk being turned around.
Speaker 2 (25:25):
So what are you going to do about it?
Speaker 3 (25:26):
So we are looking at whether or not we can
relax some of the regulations around that to bring them
back to where they were, in line with maybe what
they do in Australia and other comparable jurisdictions. We're looking
at whether or not we could allow places like Ports
of Auckland to have their own cleaning facilities on site
there so that ships can come in and be cleaned
in a quarantine maintain space. And we're also looking at
(25:46):
whether or not there are ways to support proposals such
as the dry dock up in fargad A, which could
potentially be another opportunity for those vessels to come in
and be cleaned. I guess the idea is giving certainty
to those offshore operators that when they send their vessels
down to New Zealand, they're not going to get turned
around because they've got a limpet stuck to the front
of the ship.
Speaker 2 (26:05):
Wayne's got a question. Claying Order is sitting on millions
of dollars of undeveloped land in christ Church, costing the
government hundreds of dollars in rates. What can you do
to expedite building or building more much needed social housing
and christ Church.
Speaker 3 (26:18):
There's been a big review of Coying Order and it's
still underway. The challenge with Coying Order is your texture
or your call is correct. They are a massive property
owner and they have done a job in building some houses,
but we think that the private sector, in the community sector,
can do a lot more and you've seen that in
and around places like Christish Arralston in particular. So there
(26:38):
is a shift towards procuring housing through community housing providers
and giving them access to the income related rent subsidences.
They have capital to build on those places. The great
thing about that is that they then have the ability
to put live in tendency managers and support services around that.
They're generally run by people like Salvation Army and Vision
West up up in Auckland. So that's where we think
(26:58):
the real strength lies. We've also got a bit to
do in and around our planning, in our rm A
reform in our consenting space too. This morning I was
out at Rolston to announce the help announce the country's
very first building or private building Consent authority. That's the
idea that if you are a private developer or a
home builder, you get to choose whether you get your
consent done by the council or done by this private company.
(27:19):
And they have promised sort of things like ten day
consent in turners and same day inspections and lower cost
and faster bill times and all that kind of stuff.
So that's where we need to get in that space,
and coin Or does play part of that.
Speaker 2 (27:30):
Georgie wants to know what you can do about getting
decent hospitals in the South Island. She mentions Dunedin specifically,
but also we have issues here with our emergency department
unable to come up with demand and in fact it
was reported in the New Zealand Herald this week that
the four hundred patients a day the most of any
hospital in the country.
Speaker 3 (27:49):
Yeah, and I think a couple of years ago, I
remember those situations where Pegasus was short of staff and
so couldn't open.
Speaker 2 (27:55):
It's just last year service, last y.
Speaker 3 (27:56):
Yeah, So there's a number of things we can do
in that space. On the hospital side of things, everyone's
aware of the investment down in Deneen one point eight
eight billion dollars. I think there was the announcement in
the budget of the rebuild of Nelson Hospital then. But
locally here in christ Church, I think the best way
to take pressure off christ Church Hospital is to invest
in those wider primary health care services, so training more GPS,
(28:18):
getting more GP access, get just on that.
Speaker 2 (28:20):
What's happened, What's happened with the other the third medical school, It.
Speaker 3 (28:24):
Is still in progress. Decisions are still being made. I
think the business case is being developed for that one.
So that's the idea for people who are unaware of
a graduate medical school up in Whitecoat. It's something that
we campaigned on and part of the Coalition agreement is
to look into that with ACT. In the meantime, while
that is progressing and hopefully progressing through to completion, where
we are increasing the number of doctors being trained in
(28:45):
our existing med schools A Tago and Auckland by one
hundred per year. That will help in the long run.
But you know it takes about six years undergraduate, six
years residency plus your specialty, so you're looking at twelve
to fifteen years to produce a GP. We're going to
need access to more GPS sooner than that to relieve
the pressure. So we've done things like improving the ability
(29:06):
for GPS to be trained those who have come from
overseas and increasing the amount of stuff that GPS can
actually do some minor.
Speaker 2 (29:13):
Day surgeries as well. All Right, so you say that
when you're at university you were loudmouthed, obnoxious and opinionated.
Why do you talk about yourself like that.
Speaker 3 (29:23):
I like to reflect on that part of my life
as being a real growth period. Eight to overuse the
growth metaphor, But when I went to university and when
I was eighteen, when I went to university, I did
a lot of my growing up there. It's where I
was away from home for the first time in my life.
I had a lot more responsibility on my own shoulders.
And like I think many people, I think it'd be
(29:43):
hard pressed to find people who are at Universe who
aren't loudmouthed, obnoxious and opinionated. But in particular, I think
I had to do a lot of growing up, and
so I wanted to reflect on that period, especially walking
into politics and to a place where you have to
be a lot more nuanced and a lot more reason
in your views.
Speaker 2 (29:59):
Does you not want to be another Sam Muffin Dell.
Speaker 3 (30:02):
No, I don't think that was the case. It was
was certainly on my mind at the time of selection,
because had just gone through his issues and I was
the very first candidate to be selected after that. And
yet there was always a chance that people drew those
parallels between what happened to what Sam did in high
school and maybe some of my opinionated behavior at university.
Speaker 2 (30:20):
When you say opinionated behavior at university, what are you
talking about?
Speaker 3 (30:24):
While I was on the student executive there for a while,
and I ruffled a few feathers when I was at
my hall of residence, I got kicked out of my
whole residence in my second year basically around in appropriate
behavior with alcohol and getting into arguments and things like that.
And I think I was trying to reflect on that
and make the point that I'm pretty transparent about me
(30:46):
and my background, and I wanted to make sure that
everything was on the table so people knew who they
were voting for. And I think that's important. And I
think if people are willing to accept the fact that
young people do stupid things and make mistakes and they
can move on, and that's a good thing. If people
don't like that part about people's lives and they can
always go and vote for someone else. I think we
are in general, and I'll put my minster for youth
hat on at the moment, we are far too tough
(31:08):
on the decisions that young people make, particularly in a
world where everything they do is filmed and photographed and
put online forever, and it has significant impacts on their
ability to have promising careers later on, just because they've
done something stupid when they it's.
Speaker 2 (31:21):
What about the tragedy that we've been talking about this
morning of the run it straight death and Palmston North.
Speaker 3 (31:25):
Yeah, pretty shocking, really, and it's hard to reflect on
that in a sense other than I think it's a
dumb thing to commercialize. I think it's understandable that young
people like to go out and do these kinds of things.
Speaker 2 (31:43):
When you were nineteen, you could imagine yourself doing it.
Speaker 3 (31:47):
Something similar. I mean, I was a rugby player at school,
I mean, and at lunchtime we'd play sort of we'd
reenact little state of Origin games, and it's always fun
to do the big head ups. I was reflecting on
this before about how I almost said what I did say, Well,
this is just similar to sort of like a version
of ball rush on steroids, but actually it's the opposite
bor rush, because bull rush at school you were trying
to avoid getting smashed.
Speaker 2 (32:05):
Complete opposite.
Speaker 3 (32:06):
Just one is actually set up to pretty much cause
the greatest collision and the greatest impact. And it is
a real tragedy that it has cost someone in their life.
And I would hope that people would look at that,
especially all the protections we put in place around concussion
protocols and the impact that's having on some of our
traditional professional sports, and then you come out with something
like this which was designed to essentially cause collision and
(32:26):
cause impact. It's a concern. And look, you're never going
to be able to stop people doing things in their
own spere time and take risks. And we don't want
to be a zero risk society. But at the same time,
if you're throwing money behind it and you commercializing it,
I think you should stand with the consequences of that.
Speaker 2 (32:40):
So will the government look into a new road of
national significance the motorway grade stayed Highway one horn be
bypassed Lincoln Rosly Road to the Southern Motorway near Templeton.
Speaker 3 (32:49):
Oh, it's an interesting idea. Look, I'm the Associate Minister
of Transport. I've got some responsibility for South Island roads
of national significance. So let's put it on the list.
You are policy creating on the fly here, John, I
like her.
Speaker 2 (33:01):
That list is long.
Speaker 3 (33:02):
It is a long Well, we're a big island. I
did the mass the other day. If the South Island
was a country, it'd be there's sort of two hundred
and twentieth least pop densey populated country in the world.
Big island. Not so many people, lots to.
Speaker 2 (33:14):
Do, big job, all right, Enjoy the rest of the day.
Thanks Thanks James Mega, Minister for the South Island.
Speaker 1 (33:20):
For more from Canterbory Mornings with John McDonald, listen live
to news Talks It'd be christ Church from nine am weekdays,
or follow the podcast on iHeartRadio,
You're listening to the Canterbury Mornings podcast with John McDonald
from News Talk ZB.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
To eleven so. In January this year, Prime Minister Christopher
Luxon decided to make James Meaga the very first Minister
for the South Island and the Minister for the South
Island is with a snow.
Speaker 3 (00:22):
Can I jameson Morning John to Fear.
Speaker 2 (00:24):
About an hour ago, I spoke with Chris Hopkins regular
catch up and I asked him about your role and
here's what he had to say.
Speaker 4 (00:34):
A lot of the projects that we had underway in
the South Island, the ones that the current government are
scaling back. I think that's why they need a Minister
for the South Island. But we were building did Eten Hospital,
Nelson Hospital, we did have roading projects in the Canterbury
region that have been cut back by this government. I'm
not surprised they feel they need to suddenly insute a
new voice of the South Island because clearly the South
Island isn't getting a look in their government.
Speaker 2 (00:54):
So it's a pr job.
Speaker 4 (00:56):
Oh, totally a pr job. I mean he's not actually
doing anything, he doesn't actually have any authority to do anything.
He doesn't have any budget, he doesn't have any decision
making ability. It's basically just a way of saying, oh,
South Island, we haven't gotten you yet, we're not doing
anything for you. But here have somebody who you can
look to and say, oh, that's up to soon.
Speaker 2 (01:11):
James Mago, what's your response to that?
Speaker 3 (01:13):
Well, I think it speaks volumes that Chris Sipkins thinks
the only way you can achieve something in this country
is by having a big bureaucracy and a massive budget
to spend money on achieving nothing. So it's disappointing to
hear those comments. I'd like to hear something more positive
about the aspirations of the south Old. I think that's
why I'm.
Speaker 2 (01:28):
Here, all right, I'll pick up on that. If you
thinking you've got a question for the minister, you can
get in touch oh way one hundred and eighty ten eighty,
or you can text us on ninety two ninety two,
just along those lines. And I'm not going to hold
back James, because if I do, people hold on you
got your coward when the minister walked in. But my
(01:49):
view is that your role it's a little bit like
chrisit happiens view is that it's nothing more than a
sop to the South Island. Why should I think otherwise, Well.
Speaker 3 (01:57):
I think you should look at what the role is
actually there for. We've got a big agenda in and
around growth. We want to get the economy grown because
that means higher and comes more jobs, better opportunities for people.
The South Island is going to play a big part,
hopefully a disproportionately big part of that. So I think
the Prime Minister has said we need a voice inside
government to make sure that we can leverage every bit
we can in the South Island. And if you've seen
(02:18):
what I've been doing over the past three or four
or five months, getting around the South Island as many
places as possible, figuring out where those big opportunities are
and feeding those through the ministers. You'll see that coming
in the next few months.
Speaker 2 (02:28):
See why do we need a minister though, because it
seems you don't have a ministry, You don't have staff.
You can go a couple of people working for you,
but you don't have a department. There is no Department
of the South Island. You don't have resources that you
can call on, so you're doing nothing more than waving
the flag.
Speaker 3 (02:46):
Well, we run a leanship and we've got a strong
minister who's an advocate for the South and so the
reality is that ministers can't be everywhere at all times,
and some of those ministers having clearly big portfolios. You
think of what Eric Stanford's doing in education, she's got
to have someone who can tell her what's happening on
the ground in the South Island and around education and
school property. You've got the Tourism minister who needs someone
(03:08):
to tell who were are the big issues in tourism,
whether that's cruise, whether that's access to the Milford Sound.
And I'm the kind of person that can do that
for them. I can do the work for them on
the ground, and I don't need a big bureaucracy. I
don't need a large office. I can get around and
do that myself. The taxpayer already pays me enough money
for me to do my job, and that's all I'll
go and do.
Speaker 2 (03:24):
So you mentioned cruising there, what can you do for
the people of Akaroa, for example, who are really dreading
the next cruising season and having less ships coming through.
Speaker 3 (03:34):
Well, there's a lot that's happening in cruise or has
happened to cruise in the past few years. One of
the big issues is around biofiling. I've heard loud and
clear from the crew sector that that's presenting a large barrier.
Most of our big ports are seeing a downturn in
cruise over the next few years and that has a
big impact on local businesses. And I know there are
issues around Littleton and Akaroa over the past few years
(03:54):
about the impact that a lot of cruise ships have
on the area. But we're also going to see the
detrimental impact of fewer cruise ships. So it's about working
with Louise Upston and the Minister for Biosecurity on what
our biofailing standards are to we make sure that our
costs stay under control, so that cruise ships have some
certainty that when they get here they're not going to
have to lift their passenger fees just to cover those costs.
And how are we more welcoming to cruise. What can
(04:16):
we do to use that IVL to encourage them to
come here.
Speaker 2 (04:18):
It doesn't sound like you can do much in.
Speaker 3 (04:21):
Terms of increasing the cruise. I think we can do
a lot. I think we can invest in our port infrastructure.
We've seen a bit of that over in the West Coast,
and there'll be more to come in and around there.
We can look at what we're doing in our airport
infrastructure space and supporting our airlines. A lot of our
cruise passengers come to our country through our airport, so
if we've got good air connectivity to other countries and
through the regions, we can get more cruise passengers in there,
(04:42):
and we can actually start talking more positively about cruise
I mean, for about six years we labeled them as
the petri Dishes of the sea, and I'm sure that
had a very negative impact on people's willingness to come
here and to spend money on those cruise ships. So
I think we can do a lot in that space,
and there will be more coming from Louis all right.
Speaker 2 (04:57):
Some questions coming through. Someone wants to know whether you
had any input in the supercars coming to christ Church.
Speaker 3 (05:05):
I was aware of the prop I was coming through
through MB and.
Speaker 2 (05:09):
Did you advocate did you have anything to do with
getting them across the line?
Speaker 3 (05:11):
Those applications were in pretty much at the same time
I became the Minnesota So not for that particular project,
but I'm very happy that five point nine million dollars
will be coming to bring the supercars here. We saw
the big impact it had in Topor and it's going
to be a massive, massive benefit for not only the
people in around Christis but the wider South Island. People
love their car racing. I mean, I've got levels out
in Timrew, I've been to the thunder down under there.
(05:32):
I know what people think about car racing in the
south Old. So it's going to be a huge benefit.
But those are the kind of things are the exact
kind of things that I can help advocate for. The
major events, fund funding, regional infrastructure funding, school property, all
those things are things that I can have input into.
But I guess my challenge is there is a lot
that government does and I can try and dip my
toe into every single area and try to have my
(05:52):
say in everything, or I can focus on the big
priorities that Southold has really want me to.
Speaker 2 (05:56):
Focus all right, Well, Matt wants to know what your
stance is on commuter rail in Canterbury.
Speaker 3 (06:02):
Commuter rail or passenger rail. There's a difference between the two.
Speaker 2 (06:05):
Well, commuter rail will put it, well, what is the difference.
Speaker 3 (06:07):
Well, there's passenger rail. There's this idea that you could
run a passenger service between christ Chuch and Duneda, and
that's the old Southerner. And then there's commuter rail, which
is probably something you would look at more internal to
somewhere like christ Chutch.
Speaker 2 (06:18):
With this part, I think commuter is what he's asking.
Speaker 3 (06:20):
Yeah, but I think when you've got a city like
Christchutch which is growing as quickly as possible, and then
you've got towns like Rolston and Lincoln also growing well
as well, you have to look at all those options
to be able to get people around, and commuter rail
where it stacks up economically, will make sense. And the
government is willing to invest in rail. You've seen large
investments in metro rail for Aukland.
Speaker 2 (06:39):
Well, we have nothing for the Serve Island though.
Speaker 3 (06:40):
Not yet because we need to get our infrastructure in place.
Speaker 2 (06:43):
When you say not yet, what do you mean, Well.
Speaker 3 (06:44):
We're always looking at where we can make investments to
make sure we get the best economic growth story. So
you've got to look at the places that are producing
the most growth, and it is Canterbury. It is. You
look at the four fastest growing regions that asp survey, Canabury,
tesmen Otago South and they are the places where people
want to bring their business, they want to move. So
as a government, we're going to make sure we're making
good investments to get the best being for our buck
because it is a limited pot of money and there
(07:05):
are infrastructure marns all over the place.
Speaker 2 (07:07):
So if the rail Minister or the Prime Minister said
to you, James, what do you reckon commuter rail for
the greater Christricch area, what would you say?
Speaker 3 (07:13):
I'd say to them, Look, does it stack up economically?
What's the governments would you want it? Would you say,
I'd love it for commuter rail as a concept. Absolutely,
anything that helps people get around our cities and our towns,
I'm absolutely supportive of. What we need to be considerate
of is what is the cost of government, what's the
cost of ratepayers, what's the benefit to the private individual
who benefits from that commuter service, and what's the wider
(07:33):
public benefit and where's the mix there, because there's always
going to be a trade off between what the user
pays for that service and what the public pay for
the general public good. And you know, there are tough
decisions that we need to make in all these spaces
where government makes investments. So what we need to do
as a government and as a minister for the south
Old who needs to advocate for south Old projects, I've
got to be cautious as well. If I'm advocating for
(07:54):
specific projects in and around christ Rich what does that
mean for the availability of transport funding down in central Otarga?
What does that mean for fixing up the roads on
State Highway six along the west coast, which had.
Speaker 2 (08:05):
Shows that you've almost got an impossible job.
Speaker 3 (08:07):
It's almost an impossible job, almost, but nothing's impossible, John,
if you put your mind to.
Speaker 2 (08:11):
It, how do you know that you will have been
a success in the role?
Speaker 3 (08:14):
I think there's a few things that I want to
see happen over the next eighteen months to show some
success in this role, that the key priorities are following
on from what nicol Willis wants, grow our GDP, increase
our exports, improve our public services and improve our transport infrastructure.
Speaker 2 (08:28):
It's the same for everyone that's.
Speaker 3 (08:30):
Across the country, but specifically for the south On. I
want to see us disproportionately outperform the rest of the
countries so that we play more of a part because actually,
at the moment our population is about twenty three to
twenty four percent of the country. We sit just under
that in terms of our GDP produced now, depending on
the measure you look at now, I think we can
do better in that space, and so I'm trying to
figure out, and I have done that over the past
(08:51):
few months, where are the biggest places, biggest projects that
I can influence and I can have as say over so,
is that something like the data grid project down in
south and is it something like the transport options in
and around Queenstown, whether that's a new gondola. Is it
investing in our roading network on the west coast to
make sure that we have tourism operators have confidence that
they're going to be able to do a loop around
the South Island because as much as we love you know,
(09:13):
coming and depicted in heading down to Vicargo, I think
tourists want to do a looper in the South Old
not just up and down state Higo one. I've driven
that highway enough times to know that it's a beautiful
drive one way, and it's a beautiful drive both ways.
But if you're a tourist, you probably want to see
it once, you want to see some other things.
Speaker 2 (09:26):
It's a lot of stuff to achieve before the next election,
it is.
Speaker 3 (09:29):
And if I can make some progress in some spaces,
I will be happy, But there's always more to do that.
You're never going to achieve everything in the world. You're
never going to please everyone. But if I can work
hard and I can make a difference in the south on,
I think they would have achieved something.
Speaker 2 (09:41):
Jee It's been a touch from in Vcargo James and
he wants to know whether you can please get the
Southerner service restored and going all the way back to
all the way down to in Vicago.
Speaker 3 (09:51):
Yeah, well, it's an interesting prospect. There was a report
done a couple of years ago by MB. They spent
about fifty grand on this report, and what did ended
up coming out was saying that if the way you
make it work is if you run a passenger service
once a day between christ Church and Denial christ Stitch
in Vicago at one hundred percent occupancy at one hundred
dollars a ticket, and then you pay it off in
(10:12):
eight years, that's a challenge, right. It means it's going
to be incredibly expensive and you're going to have to
rely on consistent high patronage to make that work. That's
probably why it hasn't happened so far and probably why
it won't get off the ground. But look, if there's
you know, if people again can make the numbers stack up,
and the government's open and willing to put a little
bit of public transport money into it, it's something you
can look at it. At the moment, one hundred dollars
(10:32):
a ticket and one hundred percent occupancy not paying its
face for about ten years, it's unlikely to happen, especially
when we've got relatively good connections between in the Cargo
and christ Church and our roading network.
Speaker 2 (10:43):
So it sounds to me you've softened Steve up for
a know there.
Speaker 3 (10:46):
Well, it's a no, it is certainly not at the moment.
We just think the numbers don't work, and I'm happy
to point Steve to that report. I just think one
hundred dollars a ticket for one way between Christrichen and
v Cargo is not realistic when you can jump in
the car and do that trip in six and a
half seven hours and you get through.
Speaker 2 (11:00):
Someone's been in touch obviously from Queenstown so does admitist
to have any plan to fix the disaster that is
Queen's Own's traffic issues. It seems that the National government
has opened the floodgates to allow every man and his
dog to reside in Queenstown without any long term plan
to make the area more user friendly.
Speaker 3 (11:15):
I'm in Queenstown from the ninth through to about the eleventh,
and I'm meaning a few interesting people. They're one of
which is proposing this idea of a commuter gondola. Now,
when I first heard that proposal, it struck me to
be something similar to, you know, the monorail scene off
the Simpsons, where they're trying to sell this fantastic, you know,
hypothetical solution to people's transport issues. But then I looked
(11:36):
into it more and more and it actually seems like
it could be a bit of a goer, particularly that
the proposers don't want a lot of government investment into it.
The challenge in Queenstown is, if you.
Speaker 2 (11:45):
Have it's not the only reason you say it's to
go because.
Speaker 3 (11:48):
It's hugely It can be hugely successful if you don't
need to draw on government resource for it, If the
private sector can get out and solve our transport problems
without government needing to put a huge amount of investment
into it means we can put those limited resources elsewhere
where perhaps the private sector aren't able to step up.
So putting that aside, Queen's Son's got a unique situation
because it is geographically constrained about how you get people
(12:10):
into the town. And of course all the growth is
happening out Frankton Way, so you've got to think about, well,
what is the solution to get people in and out
of the CBD. But then where do we want to
focus the future growth in Queenstown And that's where the
Council has a big role playing that.
Speaker 2 (12:22):
We'll come back to those questions you're talking about Queenstown before.
In response to the question about the transport mess in Queenstown,
what's your position on the idea of an airport at Terrace.
Speaker 3 (12:35):
It's an interesting propose. I know Kros Airport we're looking
at a while ago and it's been put on ice. Look,
we're pretty agnostic as to where that kind of infrastructure
grows or goes again. You know, it's an investment for
the Christiach Airport themselves to make. If they can make
it work. There are challenges around Queens Steam.
Speaker 2 (12:53):
You're feeling very diplomatic there.
Speaker 3 (12:55):
Well, I've got to be a little bit cautious to
because the government has an ownership share in Christiach Airport,
So I don't want to be saying things or directing
people in a certain way. But look, my job in
this role and my Associate Transport role, is to encourage
regional connectivity. If there are projects that would improve that
and are realistic and could get off the ground, then
they could be supported. But at the same time, Queenstown
Airport continues to grow. It's not quite at capacity. It
(13:18):
has some constraints in terms of how it can get
planes in and out in terms of flight noise levels,
and of course you've got one agree report as a
possibility for expansion as well, so there are options there. Again,
if an ensity like christ at Sheport thinks it can
get it up and running and make it work economically,
then it's worth I don't think government should get in
the way of that, whether or not government tips money
(13:38):
into it.
Speaker 2 (13:39):
Which would you be in favor of being fast tracked?
Speaker 3 (13:43):
I'd be happy for it to go on a fast
rek schedule. If consenting in regulation was getting in the
way of making it happen. If there's a way that
we can make it more affordable. The fast Trak process,
of course, maintains those existing controls, but just brings everything
into one place at once, and it seems like it
would be ideal for a large project like that. But
my understanding at the moment is that there's not really
much that it's been sort of put on hold as
(14:03):
other options are pursued, So I'm not sure if it's
a realistic optunity for fast Trek right now.
Speaker 2 (14:07):
I think it's got zero social license. I think that'd
be a problem with it.
Speaker 3 (14:10):
It could be an issue. I know there's a lot
of local opposition to it, and I know there were
some concerns raised by the christ Uch Council all the
councilors as well in terms of whether or not it
was drawing attention away from christ Church. But all these
complicating issues going to it. Underlying all that is it
is a region where people want to get to if
we can improve the connectivity to it. It's in particularly
from places like christ Chuch into Central Otago. I come
(14:33):
from Timuru. If I fire to travel to Queenstown, it's
driving the only way I can get there is to
drive because there aren't flights in and out of there.
I think if we can improve our connectivity to places
like that make it cheaper for people to travel, that
must be a.
Speaker 2 (14:43):
Good thing, all right, I guess, so says, get your
mate Chippy back on after listening to this genius minister.
Speaker 3 (14:50):
Well, I'm happy for Chippy to come on. He's probably
very busy man as well. I know it. Being in
opposition is like, but I'm a bit a chat to about,
you know, his lack of investment and and attention to
the South Oland and when he's going to put his
South Island spokesperson.
Speaker 2 (15:02):
Up right, I want to see what you if you
can answer this question because I've got no idea what
they held this person's on about. Could the government look
into funding it's on the aviation theme. Could the government
look into funding Coat one one one instrument landing system
it tries to ach airport. This person says this upgrade
would enable planes to land safely in forg significantly reducing
(15:23):
flight disruptions and by improving the airport's resilience and reliability.
Aukland Airport's got this. The Cat one one one you'll
be all over the Cat one one one Minister look.
Speaker 3 (15:36):
Not familiar with that specific three letter acronym. But in
terms of I think this is around being able to
have instrument only landings at places like Christiatch Airport. That's
the kind of infrastructure I think government can look at
when it looks at supporting airport infrastructure. We had an
issue this morning where we had a minister's plane circle
around a few times and head back home actually when
he's coming down to make an announcement around building consent authorities.
(15:59):
And that's a challenge because places like christich and Timuru
are subject to heavyweather Hamilton as well, where the conditions
more than often than and I am asking Civil Aviation
to make sure that we look at whether it all
have our rules and any airways and the like of
that are fit for purpose, whether or not we can
invest in new technologies to allow airplanes to land more frequently,
more regularly, reduce the delays and reduce the cancelations. Actually, interestingly,
(16:22):
we're going to be putting out data for the first
time this week which will show the performance of airlines
to our regions. In the past, we've only done it
for jets and for the main centers. But we're going
to be able to tell whether or not your town
is being served well by the airlines and what the
cancelation rates are, and all of that will put pressure
on airlines to perform and make sure we improve that connectivity.
But the idea of investing in those instruments sounds like
a reasonable one.
Speaker 2 (16:42):
All right, So what we do now about that.
Speaker 3 (16:44):
I'll go away and make sure there's enough money in
the kiddy to invest in that. I can talk to
christ at Shairport about whether that's something that they are
interested in, and I can talk to other ministers who
have access to infrastructure funding about whether or not that's
the kind of project that they'll be interesting and helping
me support. So I guess that's the part that's a
great example of my role. You bring me on the show.
You've got a caller who has an interesting idea that
(17:05):
hasn't been raised with me directly. I can then go
and work with my officials, plus advocate to ministers who
have accessment for structure funding and see if we can
work together to help fund that centrally.
Speaker 2 (17:14):
It sounds like with respect. So there's a lot of
talking in the job, not a lot of making stuff
will making things happen.
Speaker 3 (17:22):
There is as minimal talking as possible before we get
the stuff to happen. So the unfortunate reality which is
I'm finding in this job so far, is that there
is a lot of talking upfront, but there is a
significant amount of action happening. So for something like airport
infrastructure investment you've seen a little bit over on the
West Coast, You're going to see announcements made in their
future around some of our regional infrastructure around water. We
(17:44):
did an announcement a couple of weeks ago around rail.
So there are things happening. One of the problems is
that I think as a country is we've got stuck
in this regulatory molasses as people have described it, that
there is a lot of consultation and a lot of
decision making and a lot of you know, consultation on
the consultation, and not a lot of things actually happening.
IRIMA reform will help that. Ministers making decisions quickly will
(18:06):
help that. In my aviation role, I'm trying to turn
around certification and permission for new airlines and co sharing
agreements as quickly as possible so that we can get
that stuff happening. So I'm certainly trying my best.
Speaker 2 (18:17):
James, you said in your maiden speech when you first
entered Parliament, you talked about your upbringing and your father
leaving school when he was fifteen and working at the
freezing works for forty years, and your mother holding down
multiple jobs while she raised you and your two siblings
on her own. How would last week's budget have helped
people like your parents.
Speaker 3 (18:39):
I think if you look at what the budget did
in around health and education, they are accessing services when
I was growing up in the same way that EVENUW
Zelander did right, So if you can invest in equality education.
I also mentioned in my maiden speech and in comments
following that that I think the only reason I was
ever successful was that my mum drove us into a
good education, having a good primary school. So making sure
(19:00):
that young people like me growing up had access to
quality primary school education is key. You're going to see
a lot of that from are Stanford, and I know
there's some announcements around local property upgrades later on today
in christ Church, which is going to be absolutely fantastic
for the region. So I think when you're looking at
that way that would be an important help. I think
the motivation for people to take control of their own
(19:21):
lives and to be better managers and better disciplines in
their own lives. My mum was a fantastic role model
growing up. I mean, we all relied on the social
welfare net that we all support and will continue to
support and put money into that.
Speaker 2 (19:35):
If you or one of your siblings have been out
of work when you were eighteen or nineteen, could she
have afforded to support you financially, Because that's what your
government is expecting of people now for.
Speaker 3 (19:49):
Those families who are in the position to do so.
So that's the nuance there as well. This isn't about
saying that you're all on your own. It's about saying
that we're families have the ability to support eighteen and
nineteen year olds, they should do so. The first responsibility
for looking after you and looking after your family should
fall on you. When you are unable to do that,
the second responsibility falls on your neighborhood and your community
(20:10):
and therefore the wider state. So in those situations where
you had a beneficiary household and a nineteen year old
that was also out of work, I think it's unlikely
that the responsibility then falls on someone who is also
on a benefit right. So that's the detail that's been
worked out through the policy that was announced by Ministerruption
over the election. But the fundamental core principle maintains if
(20:34):
my mum got to a point where she was in
a position to support me and my siblings, I would
have the expectation that we would rely on ourselves to
get ourselves into work before calling on support from other
parts of the country.
Speaker 2 (20:47):
You talked in your speech about what sounded like some
pretty dire times in your family life. How bad did
it get?
Speaker 3 (20:56):
Look, I think relative to some of the things that
other people went through growing up, probably not bad. But
I think it's all individual, it's all circumstantial and on
the whole, I had a pretty good life growing up.
I can't complain about anything I need.
Speaker 2 (21:09):
Do you think then that I'm not suggesting that you
over egged it or overcooked it or whatever, But do
you think maybe some of the media reports overcooked how
bad things were for you growing up?
Speaker 3 (21:19):
I think I was cautious to make sure that I
was trying to explain who I was and where I
came from. With the reality that, Yeah, I grew up
in an environment that was tough, and from my perspective,
it was a tough upbringing. But I was very clear
that I never went without I never went to school
without shoes on my feet, I never went to school
without a full belly, without books in my school bag.
So we had what was I thought at the time,
(21:41):
and I think is pretty typical, a typical upbringing from
a part of the country that comes from a poor
part of the community. Now, there are obviously people in
far tougher circumstances than I am, and I think that's
why it's important that we have that wealthy in it
and that safety net for those people. But I don't
think Look, I think people can take from that speech
what they took from it. I don't think overall that
people catastrophized.
Speaker 2 (22:02):
And know all right back to the questions, what is
the plan for State Highway one from christ Church to Dunedin.
Speaker 3 (22:10):
So the plan for State home from christ Church to Deneeds.
So the first part of that is that we in
the ndta's National Land Transport or that the Government policy
statement on land Transporters. There's all sorts of acronyms. There
is a port to port part of that, so little
import to timmer report looking at the resiliency and the
reliability of the road between those two ports, and it's
(22:31):
an export focused strategy, right like we want to make
sure that we've got goods on the road and on
our rail getting out to our ports and life overseas.
So the first part is looking at whether or not
it is viable to four lane parts of that highway.
Have we got enough passing lanes on? There? Are our
bridges reliable and resilient? And then looking further south, what
is the connection between the likes of Timmery down to Dunedin.
How do we integrate rail along the way there? You
(22:53):
saw the announcement with the rail hub down in Moscow
getting freight off trucks and onto rail to get into
the ports.
Speaker 2 (23:00):
Did you know about that before it was announced by
Called to Stuart.
Speaker 3 (23:05):
I wasn't aware of Call to Stuart one, No, But
I was aware of the Moscule freight hub and I
was at the announcement with Shane Jones, but I hadn't
been privy to Courter Stewart's proposal.
Speaker 2 (23:14):
It was a bit weird, wasn't it.
Speaker 3 (23:16):
Their timing? Yeah, well, I suspect they probably knew that
there was progress being made on the Port Taro Dines
Transport one and they wanted to put their proposal on
their idea out of there and look, if they think
they can get that working. And I know Carter Stewart
have a reputation of being able to produce things and
make things work down the South, then good on them too,
and now at Rolston as well. That the governments can
(23:36):
only act on the proposals it receives. And if Quarters
can get these across the line and get it working,
and you can have one in Moscow as well, there's
no reason why you can't have them both working in harmony.
Speaker 2 (23:46):
Milton and Moscule pretty close together though well testing the
South Island Minister on the geography.
Speaker 3 (23:52):
Here, they're close if you were traveling from Moscule to
Milton and you wanted to spend what set of forty
forty five minute drive, But it's not so close when
you're trying to get freight from say Milton all the
way into Port Charmers. So that's probably one of the
challenges with Quarters model compared to Moscules model. But again
we're willing to work with and partner with private sector
(24:13):
organizations that want to drive that economic growth story. And
so if quarters have a proposal, if Dines and import
Otarger have a proposal, if there's proposals for freight hubs
up in mid canabya Rolson, we'll look at them and
we'll make sure we invest in what makes sense. That
The challenge, I guess is you're probably not going to
end up with an inland port or an inland freight
hub at every single town along the way. So you've
(24:35):
got to make sure that at some point we're sensible.
We have that balance between making sure it's market lead,
but we also have the government leading and doing a
little bit of planning so that we have a New
Zealand wide.
Speaker 2 (24:43):
Approach to this. All right, got to get through the
questions coming through from people. Someone what about I'll share
the message. I'm not saying I know exactly what they're
on about. I say, what about biofouling for commercial shipping?
If you intend to grow exports out of this country,
focus needs to be on the ships that carry them
and making it easier for them to come here.
Speaker 3 (25:01):
So biofoiling is this idea that when ships come in,
if there is detritu, sore mollusks or some sort of
credit attached to the bottom of the ship. Our biosecurity
rules have wrapped up over the past five six years
to the point where if they are not clean, they
get turned around. Now we don't have very good biofol
and cleaning facilities in New Zealand, and particularly for our
crews and the riskers is that they won't come here
(25:23):
because they're risk being turned around.
Speaker 2 (25:25):
So what are you going to do about it?
Speaker 3 (25:26):
So we are looking at whether or not we can
relax some of the regulations around that to bring them
back to where they were, in line with maybe what
they do in Australia and other comparable jurisdictions. We're looking
at whether or not we could allow places like Ports
of Auckland to have their own cleaning facilities on site
there so that ships can come in and be cleaned
in a quarantine maintain space. And we're also looking at
(25:46):
whether or not there are ways to support proposals such
as the dry dock up in fargad A, which could
potentially be another opportunity for those vessels to come in
and be cleaned. I guess the idea is giving certainty
to those offshore operators that when they send their vessels
down to New Zealand, they're not going to get turned
around because they've got a limpet stuck to the front
of the ship.
Speaker 2 (26:05):
Wayne's got a question. Claying Order is sitting on millions
of dollars of undeveloped land in christ Church, costing the
government hundreds of dollars in rates. What can you do
to expedite building or building more much needed social housing
and christ Church.
Speaker 3 (26:18):
There's been a big review of Coying Order and it's
still underway. The challenge with Coying Order is your texture
or your call is correct. They are a massive property
owner and they have done a job in building some houses,
but we think that the private sector, in the community sector,
can do a lot more and you've seen that in
and around places like Christish Arralston in particular. So there
(26:38):
is a shift towards procuring housing through community housing providers
and giving them access to the income related rent subsidences.
They have capital to build on those places. The great
thing about that is that they then have the ability
to put live in tendency managers and support services around that.
They're generally run by people like Salvation Army and Vision
West up up in Auckland. So that's where we think
(26:58):
the real strength lies. We've also got a bit to
do in and around our planning, in our rm A
reform in our consenting space too. This morning I was
out at Rolston to announce the help announce the country's
very first building or private building Consent authority. That's the
idea that if you are a private developer or a
home builder, you get to choose whether you get your
consent done by the council or done by this private company.
(27:19):
And they have promised sort of things like ten day
consent in turners and same day inspections and lower cost
and faster bill times and all that kind of stuff.
So that's where we need to get in that space,
and coin Or does play part of that.
Speaker 2 (27:30):
Georgie wants to know what you can do about getting
decent hospitals in the South Island. She mentions Dunedin specifically,
but also we have issues here with our emergency department
unable to come up with demand and in fact it
was reported in the New Zealand Herald this week that
the four hundred patients a day the most of any
hospital in the country.
Speaker 3 (27:49):
Yeah, and I think a couple of years ago, I
remember those situations where Pegasus was short of staff and
so couldn't open.
Speaker 2 (27:55):
It's just last year service, last y.
Speaker 3 (27:56):
Yeah, So there's a number of things we can do
in that space. On the hospital side of things, everyone's
aware of the investment down in Deneen one point eight
eight billion dollars. I think there was the announcement in
the budget of the rebuild of Nelson Hospital then. But
locally here in christ Church, I think the best way
to take pressure off christ Church Hospital is to invest
in those wider primary health care services, so training more GPS,
(28:18):
getting more GP access, get just on that.
Speaker 2 (28:20):
What's happened, What's happened with the other the third medical school, It.
Speaker 3 (28:24):
Is still in progress. Decisions are still being made. I
think the business case is being developed for that one.
So that's the idea for people who are unaware of
a graduate medical school up in Whitecoat. It's something that
we campaigned on and part of the Coalition agreement is
to look into that with ACT. In the meantime, while
that is progressing and hopefully progressing through to completion, where
we are increasing the number of doctors being trained in
(28:45):
our existing med schools A Tago and Auckland by one
hundred per year. That will help in the long run.
But you know it takes about six years undergraduate, six
years residency plus your specialty, so you're looking at twelve
to fifteen years to produce a GP. We're going to
need access to more GPS sooner than that to relieve
the pressure. So we've done things like improving the ability
(29:06):
for GPS to be trained those who have come from
overseas and increasing the amount of stuff that GPS can
actually do some minor.
Speaker 2 (29:13):
Day surgeries as well. All Right, so you say that
when you're at university you were loudmouthed, obnoxious and opinionated.
Why do you talk about yourself like that.
Speaker 3 (29:23):
I like to reflect on that part of my life
as being a real growth period. Eight to overuse the
growth metaphor, But when I went to university and when
I was eighteen, when I went to university, I did
a lot of my growing up there. It's where I
was away from home for the first time in my life.
I had a lot more responsibility on my own shoulders.
And like I think many people, I think it'd be
(29:43):
hard pressed to find people who are at Universe who
aren't loudmouthed, obnoxious and opinionated. But in particular, I think
I had to do a lot of growing up, and
so I wanted to reflect on that period, especially walking
into politics and to a place where you have to
be a lot more nuanced and a lot more reason
in your views.
Speaker 2 (29:59):
Does you not want to be another Sam Muffin Dell.
Speaker 3 (30:02):
No, I don't think that was the case. It was
was certainly on my mind at the time of selection,
because had just gone through his issues and I was
the very first candidate to be selected after that. And
yet there was always a chance that people drew those
parallels between what happened to what Sam did in high
school and maybe some of my opinionated behavior at university.
Speaker 2 (30:20):
When you say opinionated behavior at university, what are you
talking about?
Speaker 3 (30:24):
While I was on the student executive there for a while,
and I ruffled a few feathers when I was at
my hall of residence, I got kicked out of my
whole residence in my second year basically around in appropriate
behavior with alcohol and getting into arguments and things like that.
And I think I was trying to reflect on that
and make the point that I'm pretty transparent about me
(30:46):
and my background, and I wanted to make sure that
everything was on the table so people knew who they
were voting for. And I think that's important. And I
think if people are willing to accept the fact that
young people do stupid things and make mistakes and they
can move on, and that's a good thing. If people
don't like that part about people's lives and they can
always go and vote for someone else. I think we
are in general, and I'll put my minster for youth
hat on at the moment, we are far too tough
(31:08):
on the decisions that young people make, particularly in a
world where everything they do is filmed and photographed and
put online forever, and it has significant impacts on their
ability to have promising careers later on, just because they've
done something stupid when they it's.
Speaker 2 (31:21):
What about the tragedy that we've been talking about this
morning of the run it straight death and Palmston North.
Speaker 3 (31:25):
Yeah, pretty shocking, really, and it's hard to reflect on
that in a sense other than I think it's a
dumb thing to commercialize. I think it's understandable that young
people like to go out and do these kinds of things.
Speaker 2 (31:43):
When you were nineteen, you could imagine yourself doing it.
Speaker 3 (31:47):
Something similar. I mean, I was a rugby player at school,
I mean, and at lunchtime we'd play sort of we'd
reenact little state of Origin games, and it's always fun
to do the big head ups. I was reflecting on
this before about how I almost said what I did say, Well,
this is just similar to sort of like a version
of ball rush on steroids, but actually it's the opposite
bor rush, because bull rush at school you were trying
to avoid getting smashed.
Speaker 2 (32:05):
Complete opposite.
Speaker 3 (32:06):
Just one is actually set up to pretty much cause
the greatest collision and the greatest impact. And it is
a real tragedy that it has cost someone in their life.
And I would hope that people would look at that,
especially all the protections we put in place around concussion
protocols and the impact that's having on some of our
traditional professional sports, and then you come out with something
like this which was designed to essentially cause collision and
(32:26):
cause impact. It's a concern. And look, you're never going
to be able to stop people doing things in their
own spere time and take risks. And we don't want
to be a zero risk society. But at the same time,
if you're throwing money behind it and you commercializing it,
I think you should stand with the consequences of that.
Speaker 2 (32:40):
So will the government look into a new road of
national significance the motorway grade stayed Highway one horn be
bypassed Lincoln Rosly Road to the Southern Motorway near Templeton.
Speaker 3 (32:49):
Oh, it's an interesting idea. Look, I'm the Associate Minister
of Transport. I've got some responsibility for South Island roads
of national significance. So let's put it on the list.
You are policy creating on the fly here, John, I
like her.
Speaker 2 (33:01):
That list is long.
Speaker 3 (33:02):
It is a long Well, we're a big island. I
did the mass the other day. If the South Island
was a country, it'd be there's sort of two hundred
and twentieth least pop densey populated country in the world.
Big island. Not so many people, lots to.
Speaker 2 (33:14):
Do, big job, all right, Enjoy the rest of the day.
Thanks Thanks James Mega, Minister for the South Island.
Speaker 1 (33:20):
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