As I do the rounds with officials in Wellington, one refreshing new trend that is taking off is talking about productivity and efficiency. I’ve heard these two words more there in the first 6 weeks of the year than over the last 6 years. Getting the importance of productivity reinstated in the mix along with safety and emissions reductions is well underway, and long overdue.
Yesterday I spent the day in Wellington yesterday meeting with NZTA and with the Ministry of Transport. NZTA have asked NRC to help solve a particular productivity issue for road freight. Every week we field calls from officials on the technicalities of RUC, permitting, and roading seeking advice of how particular decisions could impact road freight. We are proud to be able to bring our expertise to bear to help deliver better outcomes for the industry.
Later in the day I met with officials in the Ministry of Transport team to discuss key initiatives for the road freight sector. When asked what are the key things the road freight industry want addressed, I talked about keeping up with road maintenance, a longer term plan for roading infrastructure, a fairer road funding model that captures the budget needed to maintain and build roads, and a refresh of regulations and rules to enable improved efficiency. Underneath all of this needs to be a comprehensive industry data set on road freight to inform policy.
Over the week the NRC team also helped out a lot of agencies, from Fire and Emergency NZ, the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment, the Ministry of Social Development to ACC. Providing advice and sharing our expertise on diverse topics such as permitting for fire trucks, immigration rules, commercial contracts and harm reduction is all part of our daily advocacy. This helps us build productive and trust-based relationships with government, and wins NRC the privilege of being asked to give advice on upcoming policy decisions.
On the member side, Saturday morning saw NRC host a very well attended member breakfast at I K and S M Newey’s Transport in Ruakaka for Northland members to talk through the upcoming Brynderwyn’s SH1 closure. A special thank you to Board members Ian Newey and Corey Burnett for hosting and Paula Rogers for running such a successful event.
We’ll be talking about a lot of these topics at the exciting upcoming Teletrac Navman TMS Conference in Christchurch next month, tickets are selling out fast with four weeks to go, so don’t miss out!
Justin Tighe-Umbers
CEO | National Road Carriers Assn
DDI: +64 9 636 2951
