John MacDonald: The pawns in Chris Bishop's privatised RUC regime

When I heard Transport Minister Chris Bishop talking about the Government’s changes to the road user charges system, I had a bit of a Max Bradford moment.   Max was the National Party minister who told us back in 1988 that his reforms of the electricity sector were going to mean cheaper power prices.   Which is what Chris Bishop was saying yesterday about the plan to ditch petrol taxes and move all vehicle owners to road user charges which, at the moment, are only paid by people with diesel, electric, and heavy vehicles.   He said: “From a cash flow point of view, it’ll help people. At the moment, when you go and fill your car up you pay petrol tax at the pump, right there at 70 cents per litre, roughly.”   The part of yesterday’s announcement that really caught my eye was NZTA not being responsible for collecting and processing the road user charge payments. Instead, that’s going to be farmed out to private operators which the government says will encourage “fairer competition”.   And, in saying that, the Government is trying to sell some sort of idea that by not having NZTA involved, these charges are somehow going to be cheaper.   Which is why I had Max Bradford ringing in my ears. Because he was talking nonsense when he said his reforms back in 1988 were going to mean cheaper power prices.   And Chris Bishop is talking nonsense if he expects us to believe that contracting private outfits to take over is going to mean cheaper costs for vehicle owners.   The minister says it’s possible we’ll pay our road user charges through an app, which is why the government wants to get private operators involved. Because it doesn't want to spend the time and money developing the technology and the systems.   But will this “fairer competition” it’s talking about really mean things being cheaper at our end? Of course not.    And this is not me having a dig at any of the companies who might have heard that announcement yesterday and saw an opportunity. Because that’s what business is all about: seeing opportunities.    And, again, this isn’t me having a dig at businesses, but they don’t do these kinds of things for free.   Being in business is all about clipping the ticket as much as possible. And no business is going to want to get involved in the new road user charging system if it can’t clip the ticket. That’s just how it is.   Which is why I don’t like the Government's plan to take NZTA out of the picture.   Yes, I support the shift to everyone paying road user charges, because that makes sense. Because when you use a road, it makes no difference whether you drive an old dunger or something more modern – you’re still using it.   With road user charges, you pay depending on how many kilometres you drive instead of how much fuel you buy. And if you’ve got the most fuel-efficient vehicle on the market, why should you effectively pay less to use the same road as someone who can only afford an old gas guzzler?    You shouldn’t. So the move to us all paying road user charges will get no argument from me. What I am pushing back on, though, is the plan to get private companies running the new system.   To let private companies clip the ticket which, as far as I can see, will only lead to us paying more.  See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.