Source: New Zealand Government
KiwiRail continues to lift its performance in line with our long-term performance expectations, Rail Minister Winston Peters said today.
“We make no apologies for bothering to fix New Zealand’s rail system after decades of mismanagement and malaise, and we are seeing the benefit of the taxpayer’s investment,” Mr Peters says.
“The half-year result of a $73.4 million operating surplus and a 7 percent lift in volumes is evidence that our no-nonsense commercial discipline is paying off, and is a credit to the hardworking ops, track gangs, crews and wider team at KiwiRail.
“Schedule reliability drives customers and volumes and the steady improvement in reliability is thanks to the firm focus on this metric by every worker combined with vastly better locomotives, shunts, wagons and carriages funded when we were last responsible for rail.
“New Zealand’s freight rolling stock will shortly be the youngest in the world – brand new wagons have rolled off the assembly line in the rebuilt Dunedin Hillside Workshops, yard operations have benefited from new shunts, and soon the old South Island locomotive fleet will be entirely replaced by state-of-the-art Stadler locomotives.
“The network is also improving because we changed the law in 2020 to fund rail like we fund roads, but with an emphasis on maintaining infrastructure better and replacing old assets. The two major storms in the last month saw just one washout, whereas a decade ago it was normal to have days of shutdowns to fix slips, washouts and clear floodwaters.
“The Infrastructure Commission recommended last week that 60 cents of every infrastructure dollar go to maintenance and renewals, but we already do that in rail and the ten-year forecasts show this will rise to 75 cents.
“Interislander has also performed well, with 100 percent reliability over the busiest Christmas and New Year period while moving more than 52,000 passengers and 14,000 vehicles to cap off the half-year.
“Freight is a tough business, but with a firm focus on reliability, cost control, a strategy set years ago with a healthy dose of experience and commonsense, the hard work does pay off.
“We extend our thanks to Chair Suzanne Tindal and her entire team,” Mr Peters says.