Building Nations 2024: Collaboration centre stage at infrastructure conference

Infrastructure Minister Chris Bishop delivers a speech at the Building Nations 2024 conference. Photo / Claudia O'Neill

Collaboration and a renewed push for a bipartisan approach to infrastructure were the dominant themes on the opening day of Building Nations 2024. Infrastructure New Zealand chairwoman Tracey Ryan opened the two-day conference, calling on industry players, government and iwi to work together to unlock the nation’s potential.

Prime Minister Christopher Luxon told delegates at the conference his Government intends to be an infrastructure government across the public and private sectors. The opening address was a prerecorded video as the PM is attending the Pacific Islands Forum in Tonga.

The Prime Minister said there is a need for better procurement processes and value-focused business cases: “The national infrastructure pipeline, which includes both current and planned projects and covers roads, water infrastructure, schools, hospital and energy, is now almost $150 billion.

“We have to change the way we do things. The Crown must become more sophisticated and more capable of procurement. Our business cases must focus on value for money, not compliance.”

Infrastructure Minister Chris Bishop used the conference to announce the Government’s National Infrastructure Agency, before talking about the importance of building a bipartisan consensus and a more mature, depoliticised approach to planning and development.

Bishop says one of the most powerful images he has seen in the last year was when the New South Wales Labor premier rode on the newly opened Sydney Metro line with two former Liberal premiers.

“He paid tribute to a great project. It was opened under Labor but was funded, consented and delivered by the Liberals. That’s the point of infrastructure. It is long-lived by definition and projects tend to finish long after the politicians who started them have moved on.”

He says that, as Infrastructure Minister, he wants New Zealand to succeed and that means having the institutions, funding frameworks and consenting pathways to get on with delivering regardless of the governing party.

“There will always be a bit of disagreement. National and the Greens are not going to agree and everything. But we agree on more than we disagree on.”

Former Green Party leader James Shaw spoke in his new role as an operating partner at Morrison, a New Zealand-based internationally focused infrastructure manager. He said getting a bipartisan agreement requires both sides to compromise on things that are important to them.

“The National Party needs to agree that things that lock us into long-term fossil-fuel dependency are out of bounds. On the flip side, Labour will have to accept that private capital isn’t only going to be required, but that it has a leading role to play.”

Shaw’s focus is on climate change and he said infrastructure holds the key: “In every category that you can think of, climate solutions are infrastructure-related. In electricity generation and distribution, in transport, in building, construction, water and waste management. Also in data, which now underpins everything. No one thought about data as infrastructure 10 years ago. But we can’t do anything much without it.”

He gave the example of Parnell-based start-up Neocrete, which was set up in 2018.

“Most kinds of infrastructure use a lot of concrete. Neocrete is now getting 30 to 40% carbon reductions in its cement. The company reckons it will have a zero-carbon concrete by 2027″.

Shaw said the investment potential of climate change is huge: “Climate change amounts to an asset replacement programme in every infrastructure category. It’s the biggest asset replacement programme since World War II. It requires gargantuan amounts of investment.”