Parliament debates ferry stranding and contract

Parliament's urgent debate on the recent ferry grounding was a rollicking ride, and you might say the Speaker was to blame.

One of the many rule changes that came into effect with last year's birth of New Zealand's current Parliament involved urgent debates. It allows the Speaker to announce prior to Question Time that there will be an Urgent Debate, rather than after it (and immediately before the debate). On Tuesday he did exactly that.

The topic was the recent stranding of the Interislander ferry Aratere. Both Green and Labour MPs had requested the debate, but first dibs and the opening speech went to Labour's Chief Whip Tangi Utikere.

Plan B anyone?

He outlined the recent event and went on to talk about the current government's cancellation of a 2021 contract to have brand new ferries constructed in Korea and delivered and operating by February 2026. The ferry contract, he noted, had been cancelled in the face of increasing ferry failures but without any alternative plan.

"The situation is this: what occurred on Friday evening was in the context of having no plan B-no plan B. We are still waiting to hear what their plan is going to be."

Earlier, during Question Time, Chris Hipkins had repeatedly asked the Prime Minister about the status of the shipbuilding contract. Was it cancelled? If so, at what cost?

The answers were grudging and not filled with detail. Possibly the most detailed response from Christopher Luxon was that "KiwiRail have repudiated the contract, but there's ongoing commercial conversations."

The Government's lack of detail on responding to this issue was a recurring theme of the later debate. Certainly not much is known as yet.

"We don't know the full wind-down costs of that particular exercise. It could be $200 million; it could be 300 million. We don't know what the actual break penalty clause is as a result of cancelling these two ferries. It could be $100 million; it could be $200 million. That is on top of the wind-down costs. And then, of course, we have the shipyards that may still very well be building these ships..." - Tangi Utikere.

"...what we've just heard there from one of the shareholding Ministers for KiwiRail ...is that despite all of this bluster and approximately 10 minutes in a speech, we have no meaningful plans whatsoever for what is to happen in 2026 and beyond. - Chloe Swarbrick…

Go to this episode on rnz.co.nz for more details