Call for political parties to commit to transport priorities

In News•2 Minutes•By NZ Trucking magazine•June 9, 2023

Transporting New Zealand is calling on all political parties to make transport a top priority in this year’s election.

The organisation has released the Road Transport Industry Platform for the 2023 General Election. The platform spells out five policy priorities covering people, productivity, safety, decarbonisation, and resilience.

Among specific measures Transporting New Zealand would like to see parties committing to are:

  • An inflation-adjusted and real term 10% annual increase in roading maintenance budgets each year for three years over the life of the next Parliament to allow a catch-up in improving the state of our roads;
  • A targeted approach to speed management in high-risk areas, rather than blanket reductions;
  • A partnership with industry to boost engagement in the Road to success traineeship and driver qualification, to develop our local workforce;
  • Accelerated tax depreciation for low and zero emission vehicles, including Euro-6 and high productivity motor vehicles.

Transporting New Zealand interim chief executive Dom Kalasih said he is pleased that the Government has committed extra funding to roading resilience in this year’s budget. However, he says more details are needed.

“With severe weather events becoming more frequent and roads being the vital links between our communities, it is absolutely critical we increase investment in roading to make sure it is as resilient as possible,” he said.

“However, there is much more to do on State Highway resilience and we don’t really know how government plans to deliver on it. We are keen to hear more about the planning going into coping with these events as well as seeing the Government and Waka Kotahi actually walking the talk when it comes to delivering on projects.”

Kalasih said Transporting New Zealand also supports the new fund to provide grants towards the purchase of low-emissions heavy vehicles.

“It’s hoped that the $30 million fund over three years will result in 500 low-emission heavy vehicles hitting the road in New Zealand,” he said.

“It also fits within the provisions of our Green Compact, which is our roadmap for decarbonising commercial road transport by 2050.”