While I generally agree with Brian Rudman – and he is certainly one of the Herald’s most thought provoking columnists – he doesn’t seem to understand that Labour politicians work with businesses in their electorates and get frustrated when jobs are exported – especially new economy jobs such as these which have gone to a French defence company.
Leading Auckland Labour Party politicians involved in the negotiations were also appalled with the comments, and that Mr Mallard had made no effort to check the facts with them.
I would be very very surprised if any politician had been involved in the commercial negotiations. It would be improper. The negotiations would have been conducted by officials from ARTA and NZTA.
He might have realised that he was the victim of a last-ditch PR campaign by Wellington-based Infratil, whose proposal had been found inferior by ARTA, ARC and Wellington government funding agencies.
I reiterate what I said in a comment on that post:
My source is someone who has enormous IT experience and was an early critic of the Police and INCIS. Remember it is IBM it must be best syndrome.
I did not discuss it with Infratil or any of their PR people.
As was clear in the very articulate debate between Jarbury and Tim Brown some people think it is important to develop and own the ticketing system and be responsible for all upgrades and others think this is not core business and it can be rented. Some people think the $10m+ plus spent to date on the bid process is good value for money and others think that knocking 20c off every fare in Auckland would have been a wiser spend. Some people think having something up for the RWC is a good idea and others think that 2012/13/14 is a better idea.
I’m not fan of all of that Infratil does. My view is that Labour should make it clear that it will reverse any Nact decisions to put schools into Infratils PPP arrangements.
However I’m not sure that we need to spend ratepayers or taxpayers funds on a system in Auckland when we haven’t had to in Wellington.
I honestly think that Wellington will regret going with the Snapper Card in the longer-term. Sure, they’ve got a smart-card on the bus system at the moment and they got it for free. However, the clear conflict of interest between Infratil owned NZ Bus and Infratil owned Snapper means that expanding the smart-card system to the trains and to other bus companies is likely to be very very problematic in the future.
It does sound as though Snapper has the potential to be just as “smart” as what Thales are offering. Tim Brown rightly pointed out to me that Snapper is based on a Korean system that drive the Seoul Metro – one of the best public transport systems in the world. However, that still doesn’t solve the conflict of interest issue.
There’s a great old saying along the lines of “if something sounds too good to be true, then it most probably is” and I would put the Snapper/Infratil situation into that basket. Infratil aren’t going to stump up the funds to put their machines on Auckland’s rail system, or on Birkenhead Transport and Howick & Eastern Buses. ARTA would have had to fork out big money to install the machines on those systems itself – or would have had to give Snapper/Infratil a pretty damn good deal to make it worth their while to make the investment.
I would much rather we spent the necessary money now to make the right decision, to put together the best system for Auckland – than put ourselves in the middle of a very sticky conflict of interest situation that’s going to haunt us for decades. Just for the sake of a measly $50 million or so?
I’m still trying to work out why Labour is focusing on this issue, rather than the $10 BILLION National plans to spend on the state highway system over the next decade, at a time of likely rising oil prices and when traffic volumes have stagnated over the past couple of years. Surely if you’re concerned about poor direction of public funds, that’s a far better target?
Labour’s not – the member for Hutt South is pretty keen to make sure the debate is an open one. This post was only to respond to Brian’s inaccurate and I think unfair comments.
Oh I think it’s a good debate for us to have Trevor. To explore exactly why ARTA made a very good decision.
(note – I do NOT work for ARTA).
jarbury – you think the potential conflict of interest with Infratil is a bigger issue than signing on with a foreign weapons manufacturer, which has a record of bribery and corruption?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thales_Group
Commercial conflicts of interest are managed every day, in both the private sector and in relation to public sector procurement. There’s no reason a conflict with Infratil can’t be managed. If the Thales and Infratil products are of at least equal utility, and Snapper will be cheaper, what is the problem?
LawGeek, what Thales do in other branches of their company doesn’t seem particularly relevant. Should Air New Zealand not buy Boeing aircraft because they also make a lot of military stuff?
I realise that conflicts of interest can be managed – however in this situation it would be a damn messy arrangement to manage. It would also involve a lot of trust between ARTA and Infratil – and quite simply I do not think that ARTA trusts Infratil at all. This is because Infratil have done their best to screw subsidies out of ARTA by holding them to ransom over withdrawing bus and ferry routes, and also Infratil’s hysterical opposition to the Public Transport Management Act.
Was that source who was an early critic of the police incis system Maurice Williamson? The other criteria fits him as well,’IT experience’. I seem to remember Donne told him take a hike even though Williamson was minister in charge of IT.
Just out of interest what is the yearly revenue from the ticket buying public for Auckland public transport. $45 million ?
The snapper card is NOT an integrated ticket. Being electronic is very different to being integrated. The situation in Wellington is not a one we want to see replicated in Auckland, where the ticketing policies are controlled by the major transport provider. Ticketing needs to be controlled by Regional councils, or in the case of Auckland the new council transport agency. Remember the snapper can not be accepted on trains, and on Mana/Newlands services.
I would say Thales has much more expertise at rolling these systems out on a large scale in many cities, and i’m not sure whether the teething problems with snapper have been fully sorted. I don’t want to see some very small short term cost savings come ahead of big improvements in ease of use in Aucklands public transport system.
I agree with Jarbury.
If Infratil controlled electronic ticketing then there would be a huge impediment to other companies entering the market and Infratil would be in a truly dominant position. Why would a compeditor want to provide electronic information to its biggest competitor?
The provision of eticketing should NOT be controlled by any entity that provides passenger transport services.
Infratil is not doing this out of the goodness of its heart, instead because it sees this as helping it to preserve or enhance market share.
Any short term financial loss will be minute in comparison to the effect on competition if Infratil controlled ticketing.
Does anyone know of a situation overseas where the same company that provides the ticketing system for the whole city also operates most (but not all) of the actual services in the city?
The only situations where you get that is when the service provider and ticketing provider is a public agency. I’m pretty sure there’s no other example of the kind of situation Infratil are trying to create here.
And for good reason too!
Hong Kong. Octopus, one of the world’s best integrated ticketing solutions, is owned by a consortium of public transport operators (the MTRC subway operator is the largest shareholder). Some participating public transport operators are shareholders in Octopus and some aren’t. There is no Govt/local authority ownership in Oyster.
Hong Kong is the only city in the world that makes a profit on public transport, without the need for subsidies. I think we should be comparing how great our cities are to cities of similar nature and try to provide better services to them
I think you (Trevor Mallard), should admit that your wrong on this issue and strongly support better public transport initiatives. I would like to think that Red alert blog has helped you form a better opinion on this issue.
Trevor I find your and Labour’s stance on this mind boggling… As Jarbury pointed out why are you focussing on denigrating an excellent system that avoids a conflict of interest and affects around 1/400th of transport spending NZ over the next decade..? Auckland PT enthusiasts were very relieved when Thales rather than Infratil got the contract…
I thought Labour was finally getting it on PT at the end of their term but where is the heat on the just released disgraceful NLTP where in Auckland 6% of spending will be on new public transport infrastructure..? All I hear Darren Hughes asking Joyce about why we isn’t building Transmission Gully fast enough..!