Kingmaker Winston Peters' Ports of Auckland policy would cost

Wednesday, 27 September 2017

NZ First leader Winston Peters has a 'cast iron commitment' to shift Ports of Auckland.

NZ First leader Winston Peters will decide the next government but one of his key election policies about shifting the country's biggest port was criticised for making no sense.

Peters arrived in Wellington on Wednesday to meet with his caucus ahead of coalition negotiations which would decide the next government.

A shipping industry commentator says shifting the country's biggest port would add time and cost to imports and exports.

Both Labour and National have told NZ First they are ready to talk about a coalition, but the kingmaker has said he would wait until October 7 when the special vote results roll in.

In August, Peters said his party had a 'cast iron commitment' to relocate the Ports of Auckland within 10 years.

Ports of Auckland is investing in three new cranes as it looks to shore up for future growth.

* Winston Peters promises shift of Auckland port to Northland

This would see the country's biggest port move its operations to Northport at Marsden Point near Whangarei by the end of 2027.

Auckland mayor Phil Goff and local iwi Ngati Whatua Orakei both came out in support of the relocation.

But a shipping industry commentator said in August moving the port would make no sense from a freight point of view, because of the added time and cost to both exports and imports.

'For a port, you really want to be as near as possible to your target market that you're serving,' Dave MacIntyre said.

'Auckland is an import port predominantly so basically for the flow of imports into Auckland, the majority of them stay in the greater Auckland area.'

He said Northland would also be ill-equipped to handle up the volumes unless it had a rail link.

'If you don't have a rail line, you can just imagine the truck traffic that would require.

'To be honest, I don't think that would be tenable.'

MacIntyre said moving things to Northland also called into question the port's present strategy which involved inland hubs in the Waikato and Manawatu.

A council report suggested shifting the port to the Firth of Thames or Manukau, and MacIntyre said that would keep costs down, but both options would require major infrastructure investments.

Manakau was also on 'the wrong side' of the country for many international shipping lines which travelled down the east coast to other ports.

But MacIntyre said there would come a time in about 40 years when Ports of Auckland did reach its capacity and it was unlikely to get consent to expand either into the harbour or on land.

Already growth was evident, with Ports of Auckland reporting a 5 per cent rise in container volumes in the last year, and a 20 per cent jump in imported cars, which was placing pressure on the wharves.

Port chief executive Tony Gibson said in August the company had been asked to investigate the idea of removing cars from the wharf and shipping them into Northland, but the carbon emissions did not make it worthwhile.

'We don't have an issue about moving but what we are going to do is we're coming out in October with a wider port development plan, and what people will see is we're being very transparent about what we need to do,' he said.

To cope with the growing volumes, the port is also considering building a large carpark, the first stage of which would hold 1500 vehicles.

On Wednesday, Ports of Auckland said it had placed an order for three new container cranes for delivery late next year.

These would be used on its new deep-water container berth and would ensure it had the infrastructure to meet the growing needs of Auckland and the upper North Island, deputy chief executive Wayne Thompson said.

'The new cranes are part of our strategy to grow our container throughput while respecting Aucklanders' desire to protect the Waitematā harbour.

'It is a sustainable solution.'