Winston Peters: Minister for Rail on the Cook Strait Ferry announcement

The newly appointed Minister for Rail Winston Peters has said very little about the Government's ferry plans, mostly sparring with Newstalk ZB host Heather du Plessis-Allan over her questions. 

“We inherited, coming back into government in 2023, an unholy mess where the costs were blowing out to $3.2 billion," Peters told her. 

“And then you had all the other uncertainties as well. That was not the project they were charged with doing when I was last Minister of Railways. 

“So this was a circumstance which took some time to unravel. But here we are set to go now, and very shortly we’ll announce what the long-term future will be. 

“But what we want is efficient, effective transport systems in this country. And the ferry operations in the Cook Strait are critical to that,” he said. 

Peters said he was not trying to “better” any deal put up by Finance Minister Nicola Willis, as questioned by du Plessis-Allan. 

“No, no … for the third time, no,” Peters said. 

“Probably some claimed insiders have been telling you that, but it’s not true. 

“The wider it gets reported, it just carries on. We’ve got to do better.”  

Peters said rushing out the Government’s plans would “set the bottom price from where the shipbuilders will start increasing their profits - and we’re not going to start making those silly mistakes”. 

“I just told you that three times and now I’m telling you a fourth time. 

“You’ll have plenty of time under the Official Information Act in the future to find out whether what I'm saying is true. And when you do, can you please go on the programme and say, ‘I’m so sorry, I maligned Winston’.” 

The Government has announced their plans to procure replacements to replace the aging Interislander fleet. Photo / Mark Mitchell

Peters said: “I admit it’s taken too long. But we’ve been in the job less than one day, give us some time and we’ll show you what we can do. 

“What you’ve got to do [as a Government] is find out from all sources what is the best option at the best price for the greatest level of efficiency with the greatest longevity.” 

Peters said the break fee was confidential “for a whole lot of reasons”. 

“Do you know anything about commercial practice? That’s why it’s confidential. Which law school did you go to? 

“This is embarrassing for the country, you’re quite right. The darned boats were only 20% of the costs.” 

Peters sparred with du Plessis Allan several times. 

“You’re telling me it’s embarrassing? Of course, it is. I’m here to fix it and I’m going to fix it,” he told her. 

Peters said he had “no idea” about Act leader David Seymour’s comments about the ferries. 

“Who said that was true?” Peters said in response to du Plessis Allan’s questions. 

“You know, I’ve never seen so much rudeness. Somebody is trying to explain to you about a critical issue that costs so much to the taxpayer and you’re interrupting. Here’s the point: It’ll cost way, way less than [iRex], and that, I’m certain.” 

He said the final decision would come “just as soon as we can responsibly make it”. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Now we have waited a year for the fairies decision,
and it looks like we're going to be waiting quite
a bit longer because we got very little yesterday. No fairies,
no price, no decision by the looks of things. The
new Minister for rail we did get, that is Winston
Peters and he's with us now morning, Winston, good morning.
So what's going on? Why no decision yesterday?

Speaker 2 (00:18):
The reason for that is that we inherited coming back
into government in twenty twenty three an unholy mess where
the costs were blowing out to three point two billion
and rising to where as Treasury said four billion, and
then you had all the other uncertainties as well, and
the massive infrastructure costs was eighty percent of the whole deal.

(00:39):
So that was not the project that there were charge
was doing when I was last Minister of Railways, and
so this was a circumstances that took some time to
try and unravel. But here we are set to go
now and very very shortly we'll announce what the long
term future will be. But what we want is efficient,
effective transport systems in this country, and the ferry operations

(01:05):
in the Cork Strait are critical to that.

Speaker 1 (01:07):
Okay, So is it the case this has been reported
this morning that Nikola Willis has actually hammered out a deal.
But those fairies are not rail enabled and you want
a chance to try and better her deal? Is that
what's going on?

Speaker 2 (01:19):
No?

Speaker 1 (01:21):
Has she hammered out a deal? No, there is no
deal with Staina.

Speaker 2 (01:25):
Roro third time.

Speaker 1 (01:27):
No, So where is the nine hundred million dollars coming from? Then?

Speaker 2 (01:32):
Well, for somebody doing guess work and being repeated by
the mainstream media, it's sad to say, I hope you
don't repeat it because it's not true, it's not accurate,
it's not based on anything at all.

Speaker 1 (01:41):
Is that your fiscal envelope?

Speaker 2 (01:44):
Sorry? And I can't understand why these sorts of chivalerts
get so much airtime.

Speaker 1 (01:50):
Is that how much money she's given you?

Speaker 2 (01:51):
Though?

Speaker 1 (01:52):
Has she set a fiscal envelope said you've got nine
hundred million and you can go away and do with
it what you will.

Speaker 2 (01:58):
I find this person extraord Heather, Probably some claimed insiders
have been telling you that, But that again is not true.

Speaker 1 (02:07):
No, I mean this has been widely reported by multiple
different media outlets.

Speaker 2 (02:11):
Well, that's the point. The wider it gets reported if
it starts off off as a piece of shipleth or
shipleth or a deceit or bye, it just carries on.
But you know, and we've got to do better.

Speaker 1 (02:21):
Well to tell us how much money you've gotten? Said
it right?

Speaker 2 (02:26):
Well, now, why would I possibly do that given that
we've got to look at all aspects of this, including
potential rescue boats in the sound so to speak, or
in the cook straight because all this infrastructure has been
let go all the time. And here we've got a
massive job in front of us, and to rush out
and say what we're going to do is start saying

(02:46):
what we're going to buy them for is to set
the bottom price from which the ship builders will start
increasing their profits. And we're not going to make those
sary mistakes because it's bad business.

Speaker 1 (02:56):
But don't you think they're going to do that anyway?
I mean even at let's say you negotiate with the
Swedish guy, is that just going to hit the Google
and find out that there's nine hundred million to play with?

Speaker 2 (03:05):
Well, they can hit the Google as long as I like,
but they won't be finding as nine hundred million. Okay, Okay,
I just told you that I told you that three times,
and you're repeating it for four time. See what's wrong
with the Zillers media here? You just go keep on
reporting utter total crap.

Speaker 1 (03:18):
The more indignant you get, the more I believe that
it's the truth. I'll tell you're winstea okay.

Speaker 2 (03:23):
Okay, And I know you'll have plenty of time on
the Official Mation Act in the future to find it
whether I'm saying or not true. And when you do,
can you please go on the program and say I'm
so sorry, Yeah, I'm aligned, Winston.

Speaker 1 (03:32):
Go do that, I will. Winston explains something to me.
Then if you haven't, if if Nikola hasn't been hammering
out a deal, then you want to better. What the
hell have you guys been doing for a year.

Speaker 2 (03:44):
Well, look, we got hold of a program that I
commissioned in May of twenty twenty, which was to be
four hundred point one million dollars.

Speaker 1 (03:54):
Ye, but you can do it year ago, Winston. You
guys have had more than enough time to come up
with something better than this.

Speaker 2 (04:01):
Well, when you say we can canceled a year ago
trying to unravel those things, we took a bit of time.
I admit it's taken too longer, but we've been the job.
But just now lessen one day, here's a chance, and
we'll show you what we can do, as we did
in past times on when we were running.

Speaker 1 (04:16):
But this makes no sense to me. Okay, so you
canceled something. It's literally almost to the day. You canceled
something in on about the fourteenth of December last year.
So why did you guys not immediately go out to
the market and see what you could negotiate to be
able to announce in December twenty twenty four.

Speaker 2 (04:33):
Well, that's not the way. If I was in charge
of it, I'd have done anyway for a start, because
what are you going to do is find out from
all sorts is one of the best option, the best price,
for the greatest of level of efficiency and the greatest
level of longevity. But I was hearing so much going on.
They were talking about the current fairies being one out
of time, that they've expired the US day by their

(04:53):
use by data it expired. All that was total nonsense.
Their use day by data is way beyond twenty twenty nine.
It's a question of proper maintenance.

Speaker 1 (05:02):
All right. Now, what's the break fee that we're going
to pay the South Koreans.

Speaker 2 (05:07):
The break fee. Yeah, well that's in commercial and it's confidential.
It's it's confidential.

Speaker 1 (05:14):
Why is it confidential?

Speaker 2 (05:16):
For a whole lot of reasons why it's confident? And
Minister Nicholas told you all that, but give me one.

Speaker 1 (05:24):
Give you what, give me a reason why it's confidential?

Speaker 2 (05:28):
Well, do you know something about simple commercial practice? Feel
about business and ethics? Do you know anything about commercial practice?
That's why it's confidential.

Speaker 1 (05:35):
You have a deal, you break the deal, they will
have written in the contract if you break the deal,
this is how much you pay. So how much do
we pay?

Speaker 2 (05:42):
Which law school do you go to?

Speaker 1 (05:44):
You don't have to go to a law school. Contract lawyers.

Speaker 2 (05:48):
Dore's nothing about business.

Speaker 1 (05:50):
This lawyer can't even give me a reason why it's confidential.

Speaker 2 (05:53):
You're never going to get an answer to Please go
back to something that.

Speaker 1 (05:56):
Makes I don't accept that, Winston. I don't think that's
good enough. I just think you guys don't want to
tell us. This is embarrassing to you how much you're
having to pay, and you should tell us because it's
our money.

Speaker 2 (06:05):
This is embarrassing for the country. You're quite right. It's
massively embarrassing that they went out there. The labor government
blew the whole thing out, tossing money around like eight
armed octopus. That done boats were only twenty percent of
the cost. The other eighty percent infrastructure about which they
told wrong.

Speaker 1 (06:21):
I don't thank you. Guys are embarrassed. I think you're
in a position to be throwing stones at the moment.
I mean you went and canceled the contract.

Speaker 2 (06:26):
Yes I am, Oh, yes I am, because I'm the
guy that sent them out book they find two boats
for four hundred one minute.

Speaker 1 (06:31):
Winston coming from nobody else. You're the guy who starts
the deal. Then you end up with a new government
canceling the deal and trying to fix the deal in
A year later, we still didn't have an announcement.

Speaker 2 (06:41):
So it's right, it's out the pardon between I'm the
guy that started the deal. Yes, but they didn't do
the deal that I askedn't do. They end up in
twenty twenty one buying these two fairies with enormous costs
of infrastructure heading towards four billion dollars according to Treasury
and rising. And you're telling me it's embarrassing. Of course,
it's embarrassing. It's embarrassing to all of us. But I'm

(07:02):
here to fix it, and I'm going to fix it.

Speaker 1 (07:04):
You're usually the guy who battles for the for the
little guy, and you're you're you're the guy who always
tells us when need transparency. So where's the transparency on this? Then?

Speaker 2 (07:12):
Oh, it'll be out there like as clear as daylight
britten in the stars. When I get the solutions out there,
You'll know all the facts. You'll know everything about the
nuts because it's not a negative story that you are
on the program.

Speaker 1 (07:23):
Now, when David Seymour said it's going to be roughly
the cost of the I rex, are we talking about
the I rex at four billion or three billion? Which
means that you guys are going to run up a
bill of one and a half to two billion.

Speaker 2 (07:32):
I've got no idea why he made that comment, because
now that's true.

Speaker 1 (07:36):
Well, he's sitting around the cabinet table, so he knows
what's going on.

Speaker 2 (07:39):
Isn't he what you asked him? May I made because
on last night I saw him on TV denying it.
He used the word he said, he said, he used
the word approximately and approximately could mean a huge approximation
that was different from what he said. You know, that's
why trying to put you on the program. Asks me
about it.

Speaker 1 (07:52):
Now, Hey, listen, have you guys even factored in how
much you could because the vast majority of the cost
of this thing is going to be the port upgrades?
How much is that can cost?

Speaker 2 (08:00):
Us? Well? Who said that was true?

Speaker 1 (08:03):
You said that was true. I mean the fairies were
five hundred and fifty milis thought that was great. They're
going to be about two point five Bill Heather.

Speaker 2 (08:11):
Heather, Yeah, hush us for a second. That's what the
program that I inherited looked like. Yes, where the costs
were eighty percent of were on the infrastruction.

Speaker 1 (08:19):
That's what I'm quoting back to you.

Speaker 2 (08:20):
I've never you know, I've never seen so much rudeness,
so much to want to explain to you a critical
issue costs so much of the taxpayer, and you're interrupting.
Here's my point, it'll cost way way less than that
on that on which I'm certain based on what were
based on simple experience.

Speaker 1 (08:35):
No that That's all I'm asking you is how much
is it? Because we still have to do the port
upgrades right because they are dilapidated.

Speaker 2 (08:41):
So how much A no, no again again again, that's
not true. I mean you've got all sorts of people
out thinking, well, here's my chance now to milk the
tax path for all I can. I know you don't.
Our job is to be responsible with the taxpayer's money
as we are about our own. And that's what we're
going to do.

Speaker 1 (08:56):
Okay, Winston. When do we get the final decision from
you guys? As second half of next Year's.

Speaker 2 (09:02):
Just as soon as we can responsibly make it okay.

Speaker 1 (09:05):
Hey, thanks for your time and best of love.

Speaker 2 (09:06):
You hang on you hang on here. That helps on
its way.

Speaker 1 (09:11):
Geez, I feel like I'm waiting a long time for
that help, Winston, thanks so much, look after yourself. Enjoy
your day, Winston, Peter's new rail minister. I just still
don't know what they've been doing for a year. For
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