Latest / Early Edition with Ryan Bridge / Todd Valster: Rail and Maritime Transport Union General Secretary on the new ferry announcement

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Todd Valster: Rail and Maritime Transport Union General Secretary on the new ferry announcement · Early Edition with Ryan Bridge

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: We got a little bit more out of the government
• 0:01
  Speaker 1: on the cook Straight Ferries deal, but not a whole heap.
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: It's agreed to go forward with Winston Peter's proposal, which
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: will include road and rail decks and capacity for fifteen
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: hundred passengers. Some say though the capacity we will be
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: less than we currently have. He says. The plan has
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: two new ferries crossing Cooks Straight by Christmas twenty twenty nine,
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: which is where our old fairies basically run out of life,
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: and it claims he claimed anyway, that it will be
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: ultimately cheaper than the last government's option. So I'm joined
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: now by Rail and Maritime Transport Union spokesperson Todd Volster.
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: Hello Todd, good morning. We still don't know how much
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: is this going to cost, particularly particularly port side, so what's
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: your pick.
• 0:41
  Speaker 2: Look, the good news is the Roald that's the main thing.
• 0:45
  Speaker 2: So you know, we can't get past that. It was
• 0:48
  Speaker 2: going towards the monster advisory as groups.
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that was my third question. My question is how
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: much is this going to cost in your extvansion.
• 1:00
  Speaker 2: It's completely unknown. We don't know what the breakout costs
• 1:02
  Speaker 2: with HI and iye is whether they were able to
• 1:07
  Speaker 2: make a deal or whether there's a deal there with
• 1:10
  Speaker 2: with High and Die around the canceled ferries. So that's
• 1:15
  Speaker 2: completely unknown what it's going to cost. That'll come out if.
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: We don't know what a deal costs. If we don't
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: know what a deal costs, do we really have a deal?
• 1:24
  Speaker 2: Well, they're saying that it's commercially sensitive. They can't say
• 1:26
  Speaker 2: how much it's going to cost because that would that
• 1:28
  Speaker 2: would alter the bidding arrangement. So you know, the main
• 1:33
  Speaker 2: takeaway is they're rail enabled and we weren't going to
• 1:35
  Speaker 2: get mail enabled. But we can't go past how long
• 1:39
  Speaker 2: this has taken. I Rex was very very drawn out
• 1:44
  Speaker 2: and then we've had sixty months of limbo about what's
• 1:47
  Speaker 2: going to happen in the future. It's been very disturbing
• 1:49
  Speaker 2: for my members, my rail maritime transport members working out
• 1:54
  Speaker 2: attempts in both Wellington and Pickton. So yeah, the sure
• 1:58
  Speaker 2: side thing is definitely a concern and they're saying that
• 2:02
  Speaker 2: they'll tart them up a little bit, but it needs
• 2:05
  Speaker 2: to be more modest than what the Irax project was.
• 2:07
  Speaker 2: But how modest is it going to be?
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  Speaker 1: Well, exactly, they say a rebuild and picton because that's
• 2:11
  Speaker 1: really behind, but just a revamp of Wellington. But I
• 2:15
  Speaker 1: understood that Wellington the because there was making it earthquake proof.
• 2:20
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that was definitely a concern. It was also making
• 2:22
  Speaker 2: it one hundred year asset that it didn't need to be,
• 2:24
  Speaker 2: so you know, it's fair to say that there was
• 2:27
  Speaker 2: the infrastructure on land that blew things out. The deal
• 2:31
  Speaker 2: for the boats was an eat font deal. The original deal.
• 2:35
  Speaker 2: People talked about Ferraris and Toyotas or something or Corollas,
• 2:39
  Speaker 2: but it was never The concern around the boat build itself.
• 2:43
  Speaker 1: Was still on the port side. It's all in the
• 2:45
  Speaker 1: port side, all the port side, so they reckon the
• 2:48
  Speaker 1: boats are here by twenty twenty nine. There's an awful
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: lot of construction work that would have to happen so
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: that they can dock. Do you think the whole thing
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: is achievable? And also the current boats end of life
• 2:58
  Speaker 1: is twenty twenty nine, so we're cutting it pretty fine right.
• 3:01
  Speaker 2: To the edge. Yeah, those boats are probably nearly three
• 3:05
  Speaker 2: decades old by that stage, so it's definitely taking it
• 3:09
  Speaker 2: to the edge. I understand from what mister Peace was
• 3:12
  Speaker 2: sing yesterday is that there has been significant surveys of
• 3:15
  Speaker 2: the boats and recommendations on how to keep them going
• 3:18
  Speaker 2: for that long. But you know just as well, we're
• 3:20
  Speaker 2: not in aviation running around with city of your old planes.
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: And I think you if you turn to a Volster
• 3:25
  Speaker 1: told Volster from the rail m Maritime Union.
• 3:29
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• 3:32
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• 3:35
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