Rt Hon Winston Peters
New Zealand First Leader
Member of Parliament for Northland
7 NOVEMBER 2016
Mothballing of Rail Lines Mindless And Short-Sighted
Shutting down and mothballing rail lines is short-sighted madness - the planned re-opening of the Napier-Wairoa line
proves that, says New Zealand First Leader and Northland Member of Parliament Rt Hon Winston Peters.
“Washouts from flooding were used as an excuse to mothball this line in 2012 and now millions of dollars will have to be
spent to upgrade it.
“John Key and his government have an agenda to shut down our national rail network which is putting thousands of heavy
trucks onto the nation’s highly unstable, high cost roads and they can’t cope.
“On Saturday an editorial in The Press in Christchurch commented on the concern over the number of trucks on State Highway One from Christchurch to Picton.
The newspaper called for heavy trucks to be pulled off the road and the freight put on the main truck rail line, as New
Zealand First has done. It’s common sense.
“New Zealand needs a combined road-rail-shipping strategy, not a truncated transport network we have at the moment which
is focussed excessively on road alone,” Mr Peters says.
Speech to rail forum: http://nzfirst.org.nz/news/mindless-mothballing-rail
ENDS