KEY POINTS:
The communist politicians who run the world's most populous nation must look with some bemusement at how New Zealand's "private enterprise" party has twisted itself into knots over road tolls.
China uses public private partnerships (PPPs) to rapidly expand its highway network, and on most new major carriageways motorists are paying tolls to private companies.
It's built up so much expertise in financing and constructing big projects to time that China's free trade deal negotiators suggested that New Zealand should invite Chinese companies to tender for similar projects here, with the added incentive of cheap finance to boot.
But when National's shadow infrastructure minister Maurice Williamson raises the sensible suggestion that Kiwis might be happy to pay a $3 to $5 toll to use major new highways or tunnels, instead of sticking to the alternative slow route, all hell breaks loose.
This is fundamentally surreal stuff.
And yet more evidence that New Zealand has become an economic cul-de-sac when it comes to the willingness to openly debate policies that are run-of-the-mill as far as most of our trading partners are concerned.
Talk flat taxes (as Russia does) or incentivising the private sector to finance and build education infrastructure (as Australia does), or putting time limits to welfare benefits (as US Democratic President Bill Clinton did) - and so-called debate quickly morphs into sloganeering, name-calling, "hidden agendas" and failed "policies of the past" - cliches trotted out even if the policies have never been tried here in the first place.
Trouble is, the politician who bangs on most acutely about this lamentable state of affairs is National's finance spokesman Bill English - the very person who suggested Williamson was just being "exuberant" - after some bright spark journalist multiplied $5 by 10 to get the $50 a week figure that a National government "would force" motorists to pay for using some major new projects.
Instead of sticking behind Williamson and saying (forthrightly) that tolls were indeed a preferred option - but that there would always be a free alternative and that nobody would be forced on to a toll road - English let himself be dragged into a no-win argument where he ended up undermining the spokesperson by saying $2 was the likely toll, not $3-$5.
The upshot of this latest snafu is to rub home (yet again) the obvious gap between what some prime National spokespeople think is policy and what English - who is in charge of policy development - believes is electorally sustainable.
The gap needs to be bridged. Not just from an electioneering perspective, but also because, based on current polls, MPs like Williamson will be Cabinet ministers by year's end.
The all-round mastery of detail at senior levels is looking pretty shaky right now. For MPs intent on occupying Treasury benches by December this is concerning.
The absurdity of National's own-goal was proved yesterday when the Government released Sir Brian Elwood's report into using a PPP to build the $1.89 billion Waterview Connection project in Auckland.
The Elwood report affirmed that a PPP would deliver greater value than a conventional procurement path.
The report - which was put together by a team of officials and business leaders - was effectively a "generic blueprint" which Transport Minister Annette King said could lead to other PPPs in the future, such as a new Auckland harbour crossing or Wellington's Transmission Gully.
The report did not recommend that the PPP should be partly financed through tolls. That decision is up to Government. What it did say was that preliminary modelling indicates that between 12-40 per cent of the project's total costs could be raised by tolling - although the redistribution of traffic on to untolled roads could be high.
The report was pretty standard stuff, which is hardly surprising given the commonplace nature of PPPs in Australia, the European Union (including Britain and Ireland), Japan and Canada.
In New Zealand, legislation provides for PPPs where the asset remains in public ownership but private companies shoulder the risk.
Finance Minister Michael Cullen has made clear that he favours a $2 charge for Waterview, which is at the lower end of the scale. The Government would still be fronting most of the cost.
So when the politicking is pared away, both major parties are considering PPPs for major new infrastructure; the only debate is about how big the user fee (if any) should be.
The problem for National is that English's clampdown on a shadow minister who was simply promoting what should be obvious policy for a private enterprise party, will lead to spokespeople becoming gun-shy in saying anything meaningful if it has not first been sanitised by "party central".
English doesn't have this syndrome all to himself. Party leader John Key long ago parked the refreshing approach he used to take in staking out clear policy differences for a "don't frighten the horses" approach.
Instead of trying to bury Williamson, English and Key should flesh out just how a National Government would use PPPs to build and maintain schools, hospitals and prisons in New Zealand. Labour has drawn a line in this arena.
Cullen and King have asked officials to examine the Elwood report before making a decision by late October/early November.
The first aspect the ministers have to decide is whether to ordain a PPP approach. Odds are they will. Cullen has made it clear this is not an "ideological issue".
After all, Tony Blair's Labour Government in Britain used PPPs to rescue run-down public services, building schools, hospitals and roads.
The second decision is whether to apply tolls to partially fund the project. Logic says they should - as Cullen has signalled.
But if the ministers want to twist the knife electorally against National, they may opt to fully fund the project from state coffers. The real danger is that the whole issue could become subject to political gaming in the countdown to the election rather than being treated on its merits.
