Finance Minister Grant Robertson has defended the Government’s spending on infrastructure, after it announced a $12 billion injection into the sector last week.
But the details of exactly where that money will be spent is yet to be confirmed.
Mr Robertson told Q+A tonight that Labour’s record on infrastructure is "far stronger" than the oppositions, despite National today saying that it is the party for infrastructure.
“We inherited an infrastructure deficit. We had years where there was almost no spending at all going into capital,” said Mr Robertson.
“The previous Government just weren’t consistent in their investment, we’ve significantly lifted it since we’ve been in office and now we’re going to do some more.”
You can watch Q+A's full interview with Finance Minister Grant Robertson in the video above.
When asked by Q+A host Jack Tame as to why the Government has waited until now to start making the investments, Mr Robertson said he challenged that.
“We inherited a forward capital spending plan of $30 billion, we increased that to $40 billion and now it’s up to $50 billion so we actually have made those investments,” he said.
“We made some serious commitments around what we wanted to do in social spending, in education and in health and we were committed to making sure that we fulfilled those budget responsibility rules.
“Now we’re in a position having done that first two years, met those debt targets, we are in a position to spend.” Mr Robertson didn’t elaborate on any more detail as to where the spending would go.
“As we’ve announced, around $6.8 billion of it goes to transport.
“That will be a mix of public transport, rail, cycling but also roads as well.”
When pressed by Tame for specifics, and why he couldn’t say more, Mr Robertson didn’t budge.
“We’re going to make the announcement in the early part of next year.
“There’s a whole range of big projects here that we need to make sure we are being absolutely straight up with New Zealanders about what they’re going to get and when they’re going to get it.”
He said there is a range of short, medium and long term projects.
"One of the things we are trying to address is the pipeline of activity. A lot of the people involved in our roading construction are really busy at the moment finishing roads like transmission gully down in Wellington. What they want to know is what comes next, that's what these projects will do," he said.
The full details of the projects will be released early in the new year according to Mr Robertson.
SHARE ME