Auckland road pricing report released

Well the government’s study into road pricing in the Auckland region is out, and it raises a number of questions. It is motivated, rightly, by the desire to reduce congestion, but some want it to raise money to pay for trains (wrong) or roads (right as long as you aren't wasting the existing money collected). It is fairly well accepted by liberal free marketers and by environmentalist lefties that road pricing makes sense – after all, it is just people paying for the use of a scarce resource – road space.
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The way you currently pay for roads doesn’t bear any resemblance to demand, just the cost of maintenance. It is right that, like phones, hotels and airlines that if you want to use a road when demand it highest you should pay for it – and as a result, you are guaranteed a certain level of service (uncongested road). The quid pro quo is that when the road is quietest you should pay very little – to encourage people to spread journey times.
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Think about it like airlines. Most business people fly at the beginning and end of the work day, simply because their time is valuable and their plans can change quickly, so they pay expensive fully refundable fares. There are a lot of them flying at the same time, so fares are expensive, rarely will you get cheap fares on those flights. On holiday most people make plans well in advance, and are price sensitive. They will fly in the middle of the day or later in the evening because they are prepared to adjust their trip around flights they can afford – they pay less, but the planes get fairly well filled. The peak time business travellers make airlines a lot of money, but off peak leisure travellers don’t – but they pay enough to make it worthwhile to keep the planes flying and offering a frequent service. With road pricing the same would happen.
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Now I could argue the case for road pricing till I am blue in the face, so what about this report?
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The Greens' reaction is the usual “need more public transport”. This is the same as the ARC which is obsessed with trains. Of course with road pricing, you don’t need to subsidise public transport – the roads are priced according to space taken up by vehicles. As buses take up less space per person than cars, then buses pay less on average. Trains pay nothing (as they should be paying the cost for using the track). Uncongested roads mean buses can travel freely, but cars travelling on those roads are paying for a good level of service – in short, you’ve levelled the playing field, letting private bus and rail operators provide service where and when there is demand. The Greens don’t want money raised from road users spent on roads – which is economic nonsense. As long as motorists are paying for the efficient use of the roading network (which at peak times would be expensive) then it is not their business at all. The Greens advocate the silly and Orwellian parking levy option, that would have every single parking space in central Auckland, on private or public land, taxed for a small period of the day. It wouldn’t work very well, except to encourage more businesses to shift out of the city to places where public transport is even less suitable for commuting to. It is wrong to think good public transport is a pre-requisite to road pricing - road pricing exists now, it's just very blunt (petrol tax) and 20% of the pricing is spent on activities other than transport. It is also wrong to think Aucklanders became "car dependent" because of poor public transport, more like Aucklander's got poor public transport because they chose to use their cars. Auckland's tram and rail systems wound down in the 1950s and 1960s because cars were more convenient and quicker - they still are in many cases. The socialist philosophy that people are forced to use cars is nonsense, as long as you have open entry for commercial public transport services (which has only existed since the early 90s).
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National has fortunately been balanced in its response, wanting to look at the report carefully. Hopefully it wont reject it outright, but consider how road pricing can be used to replace rates for funding local roads – though if that happens then governance of local roads would have to change radically to avoid local authorities gouging consumers like their gouge ratepayers.

Brian "Red"Rudman doesn't think it will happen, although he is wrong about the system for charging being expensive - it would be far cheaper per transaction that the system for the ALPURT B2 toll road being built to bypass Orewa. He is right about ARC's profligacy in seeking a $400 million more expensive version of the Avondale extension to SH20 though.
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The option not being considered in the report is network charging. There already is a form of this with road user charges, which could be extended to all vehicles using new technology – you could have a prepaid smartcard that deducts funds for distance travelled over the network, with premiums for travelling on the busiest roads at peak times, and discounts for off peak travel. However, this requires a sophisticated on board system, and should replace petrol tax altogether.

I don't believe anything will happen on this, for now. Congestion charging is very risky politically, and Labour wont want to do it, although it may encourage more toll roads or new motorway lanes being toll lanes, as exists in some states in the USA. It will be a brave government that introduces it and motorists will want something in return; far less congestion and money dedicated to roads or worthwhile alternatives. Until the SH20 western ring road is built, and of the seven segments that need completing only four have guaranteed funding (and three are actually under construction right now, and to be fair one section Auckland local authorities can't even agree on) so that it probably ten years away.

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There will probably be a populist lobby opposing road pricing, and given the options in the report I wont be surprised. There are better solutions that having a local authority controlled central cordon to raise extra money to pay for pet schemes – road pricing should be about motorists paying to use roads with the money being spent on roads. However, this is when debate should occur - Auckland's congestion wont be fixed by building new roads paid for by people who aren't using them or by building railway networks also paid for by people not using them. The roads are run by Soviet style central planning - that is what needs to change, pricing is one step along the way.

Nationalist radio quota bluff

Lindsay Mitchell and PC have both blogged on this and I agree with them. The government shouldn't be threatening the radio industry with quotas if it doesn't play enough local music. Like Oswald Bastable said in his comment, "it makes as much sense as saying we must have a percentage of NZ books in our homes". The local music industry has long wanted to force itself on listeners and radio stations - ignoring that there are few other countries where it is easier to set up a radio station and do it yourself.

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One fact that the government tends to quietly not mention is the official advice it got back in 2001 that it could not legally impose local content quotas on radio or television, without significantly renegotiating two trade treaties it has signed.
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Firstly, CER. You see for several years, the NZ film and television production industry argued in court in Australia that the Australian local content quota for commercial television (55%) should treat NZ programmes on a non-discriminatory basis. It won, and so New Zealand programmes have national treatment in the Australian market. Of course this is quid pro quo, and any New Zealand content quota for radio would have to treat Australian music as if it were New Zealand. There is no getting around this, unless CER is renegotiated, and I doubt the Howard government would want to give up one form of trade access, unless New Zealand could offer another – and there is precious little left to offer. It would also be incredibly bad form for New Zealand to withdraw access after arguing for it in Australia only recently. The CER Trade in Service Protocol is here.
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So a New Zealand quota would, at least, have to be an Australasian one.
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Secondly, New Zealand’s WTO General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS) commitments include a multilateral commitment for open entry into the audiovisual services market. This includes for TV programmes and music. In short, it grants national treatment for overseas produced content. Now the Clark administration has been trying to negotiate a “cultural carveout” to trade away this commitment, along with Australia and Canada (two other culture nationalists), but it means New Zealand would have to liberalise something else in return.

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Generally, you can’t pull back a liberalisation commitment at the WTO without offering one of equal or better value in return. So, not only would a local content quota have to be Australasian, but it would have to be open to ALL OTHER WTO member states on a non-discriminatory basis. So that includes the EU, USA and well, everyone but Cuba, North Korea, Russia, Syria and half of Africa and the Arab world.
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The threat to impose a compulsory quota was effectively a threat for private radio stations to get a foreign government to argue in a WTO panel dispute on its behalf. That isn't easy, but not impossible. It is also very bad form to pass laws that are against your treaty obligations.

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and why do these obligations exist? You can thank the National government of 1990-1999 for signing up New Zealand to the WTO commitments at the Uruguay Round, and separately the CER Services Protocol because of the Lange/Palmer Labour government, of which Helen Clark was a part. Wonderful stuff!

and out comes the fascist

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Well my post on Milosevic got some excitement, if you look in the comments a foaming at the mouth Serb, who on the one hand makes a fair point about atrocities committed by all sides in the Balkans, but then defends Milosevic because you see if YOUR side commits some murder, rape and pillaging in the name of self-defence (including setting up a state just for your own kind, never mind if your neighbour has a different ancestry) it’s ok. That's why I have posted a swastika - because it is precisely the same philosophy as Hitler.
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Let’s make it clear, I fully defend the right of any person, anywhere to defend themselves, their family and their property from attack. That attack can come from your neighbour, a gang of thugs, invading army or indeed, your own government. If “anonymous the hater” had bothered to read a bit more about who I am and my philosophy, he (I assume it is male) would know this.
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I could go into the chain of events in Yugoslavia which, since I don’t come from there, I couldn’t possibly be allowed to have an opinion on (hey can’t judge the Holocaust either, how could I POSSIBLY know what the Germans were going through), but what it comes down to is one simple philosophy:
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“Our side is better than your side, and we'll kill you to prove it”
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It is a childish, pre-modern, knuckle dragging nationalism – where who you are and who your friends are is based on ancestry. That is why “anonymous the hater” likes Milosevic – he authorised the oppression of thousands of people, but hey “he was one of our guys”.
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Opposing Milosevic does not mean I don’t also oppose the nationalism of deceased Croat leader Franjo Tudjman, or the Janus like Alija Izetbegovic (Bosnian Muslim leader). A curse on all their houses when they advocate murder.
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“Anonymous the hater” however is a knuckle dragging nationalist, who Hitler, Milosevic, Pavelic and the KKK would be proud of. Let me dissect his response:
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Scott, you are so full of blind fury and hate against people you do not know in place you have never been.

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Pot calling the kettle black I think. I don’t have blind fury and hatred, I simply hate anyone who advocates murder, rape and deportation – it is utterly vile and disgusting. In this case, this was done en masse by Serb forces, and also committed by Croat and Bosnian Muslim forces as well. YOU have blind fury and hatred against Bosnian Muslims not just those who kill, but by implication the lot – you may as well advocate concentration camps and gas chambers. Actually there were camps where Bosnian Serb forces raped and abused civilians – but that’s ok because you say…

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I hate muslims with reason - majority of them think of themselves as superior and justified by god to do whatever they want to non-muslims.

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How do you know this? Asked them? Is not saying that simply showing YOU think of yourself as superior? So this justifies Bosnian Serb forces raping women and young girls because, hey, you’re superior and justified in raping and killing because YOU think THEY think they are superior. Think about it. You’re the same as those you accuse. You think you're in their heads, when you know nothing - it is no different to Hitler justifying gassing Jews for the same reason.

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My christian ancestors in Bosnia delt with hundreds of years of forced conversions, stealing christian children to be raised as yanisari, church burning, impalings on stake (read nobel prize winer Ivo Andric Bridge on river Drina) and other forms of genocide by muslims.

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You didn’t face this, and the Bosnian Muslims living today didn’t do this either – grow up – you’re not responsible for what your ancestors did, and they are not for what their ancestors did. The Cranberries song “Zombie” says a bit about the attitude you are showing.

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And we did not want to exterminate them, only to carve out our own state formed by bosnian counties where we were majority.

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Oops, shame that Srebrenica happened then – “we didn’t want to round up all the men and boys and execute them, we were just carving out a state, we just made a little mistake”. Can't make an omelette without cracking a few eggs then? By the way, if every nationality in the world formed states from majority areas there would be many many thousands of countries, and it would be ungovernable. Most European countries have significant national minorities, you see many people look past ancestry. Bosnia was not majority Muslim, it was roughly 43/31/17 between Muslim, Serb and Croat - it would not have threatened Serbs or Muslims, though that is exactly what Milosevic and Tudjman claimed after stitching up their deal to partition Bosnia between them.

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As far as muslims beeing peacefull and democratic, their police celebrates as holiday the day of forming secret paramilitaly units in Bosnia in 1989 - fully 3 years prior to referendum on bosnian independance.

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The police – ok - well that covers all the civilians, including the boys and girls killed or raped. In 1989 Milosevic abolished Kosovo’s autonomy and prohibited the use of Albanian in schools, cracking down on the use of the language throughout the province, but that's ok because although Albanians were 90% of the population (see they want a state too because they are the majority there), Serbs lost a war there in 1389 and that is a reason to run the province as a police state over the majority, like South Africa under apartheid. “Their side is worse than our side” doesn’t wash. In fact, you're argument is utterly banal.

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Referendum itself was illegal since existing bosnian constitution at that time prohibited any major decisions to be made without all 3 ethnic groups agreement.

Milosevic didn’t care much for constitutions when he overrode the constitutional autonomy of Kosovo did he? I doubt that constitutions matter much in an authoritarian state anyway.

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And muslim own demographic institute (easily found on the web) shows that out of 289,000 people killed in the was only about half were mulsims, and their civilian to military casualty ratio was 2:1. One third of the victims in the war were serbs, with civilian to soldier ration 5:1. In fact if you compare numbers of civilians killed in war, it was around 90,000 muslims versus 72,000 serbs - for poor defensless victims of genocide they did pretty well.

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Stalin said 1 person dying is a tragedy but 1 million is a statistic. It is ALL bad – I never denied that, regardless of whose statistics you use.

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Muslims had much higher military casualties due to inferior armament and organization in the beggining, but soldiers killed in the battle are not victims of genocide (according to muslims they are martirs) plus they started the war fully aware that they are weaker.

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Yes, the Yugoslav National Army was controlled by Milosevic and armed the Serb forces – not exactly a fair distribution of military resources funded by all republics. I don’t know what evidence there is to say that the Bosnian army attacked Serbia after the republic declared independence, and what evidence there is that the Bosnian government started killing Bosnian Serbs as part of official policy. If there is, I’d be interested. Many Bosnian Muslims were quite secular in outlook, not the fundamentalists that you paint them to be.

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Nobody in the west ever quotes these numbers, even though they are provided by muslim sources, it is always said that as a consequence of serb "genocide" several hundred thousand people were killed.

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Well there was genocide, maybe 30,000 Bosnian Muslim civilians killed deliberately – you can’t deny Srebrenica was genocide, it was akin to the Nazis eradicating Jews from towns. Anyway, you are arguing statistics – there were plenty of Serb victims as that is no less a tragedy, but please stop denying that some on the side you support were barbaric murderers, just like some on the sides you hate were.

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We bosnian serns wanted the same deal protestants in norther ireland got - to stay with mother nation when others want to secede. Since you live in Britain you can relate to that.

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Yes I know of the disaster of Northern Ireland from 1920. Another example of mindless knuckle draggers hating each other because of ancestry and religion. Fortunately increasing number of Irish people have grown up, since Ireland is in the EU and the border between Ireland and the UK is very porous. There are no issues of trade or migration between them. There are communities in northern Ireland where foaming at the mouth hate filled cretins despise Catholics or Protestants because of who they are – but it’s just mindless bigotry. Look beyond it, it makes no sense whatsoever.

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Keep your rabid foamy blogger mouth off balkans, you lowlife scum, and do not insult the memory of bosnian serb heroes including my brother who defended their own people, and west indirectly. Hope some muslim brother blows you up in suicide bombing in London to thank you for your support of muslim cause.

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I love you too, I wouldn’t wish ill will upon you, until now - you ARE lowlife scum for hoping I get murdered because you simply disagree with me. Zeig Heil you fascist bully. I’ll comment on whatever I like, it’s called freedom of speech. Something that Yugoslavia didn’t have under Tito and which Milosevic wasn’t too keen on either. I don’t know if your brother is a hero or not, I wouldn’t dare judge individuals, but he didn't defend the West. Bosnia threatened no other country. You, on the other hand, would cheerily shoot, rape and terrorise men, women and children because of their ancestry. You want me killed because of what I have written – congratulations, Hitler, Stalin, Pol Pot, Mao, Saddam, Pavelic and Milosevic would be proud. Your attitudes belong in 1389, Serbs I know would prefer you joined the 21st century and looked forward. Imagine just for a minute what it would be like to treat people as individuals, if you didn't know their ancestry and join the enlightenment.

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UPDATE:

Just to prove my balance on the Balkans here is:

The Balkans (not much lesser) evil - Franjo Tudjman, Croatia's "Milosevic"

No sympathy for Slobo (more on Milosevic) and

Remember Srebrenica (the other side of Alija Izetbegovic and the tragedy of Serb deaths unreported)

Daily Telegraph obituary of Alija Izetbegovic

200th post

Well I can't believe I've posted 200 thoughts or rants about various things since I started - thank you for the comments, the bloggers who link to me and the ever growing number of hits.

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I started this blog to be an outlet for libertarian politics, objectivist philosophy and some considered thought about policies, current events and history. Sometimes I post vitriolic disgust at the nauseating behaviour of lowlifes, or bureaucratic busybodies, other times I take a more considered view, and then there are my rants on Transmission Gully - which is just another outrage of those addicted to Other People's Money (OPM = opium, no I wasn't the first).

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I hope to evolve the blog more in coming months, learning from those who are deserving of awards such as Not PC and Kiwiblog, and using the blog to inspire thought, rather than be a venting forum. Passion without reason is uncivilised, and reason without passion is lifeless - so I will continue to express both - in between time to work and live! I've said precious little about life in the UK so far, largely because I've been concentrating on getting established, having moved once, and settling into work and life over here with my girlfriend. However, there WILL be more on this.

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I am unapologetically a libertarian objectivist atheist, I strongly believe in the power and beauty of the rational passionate human individual, and in benevolence to other human beings who also exude and seek these values. I have been a socialist and Christian, I have voted Labour, National and ACT at various times, and came perilously close to joining both Labour and National at different points in my life. I have worked in government and the private sector, on issues ranging from transport to the internet to broadcasting to telecommunications to tourism.

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I hope you will continue to enjoy reading those posts that interest you, and if you don't well fine, bugger off then and go here.

Emirates cancels flights to Denmark because of cartoons

It appears the Danish cartoons are continuing to have an impact. Emirates has decided not to commence its planned service to Copenhagen. It has planned to fly there from 03 October 2006, but according to a Danish paper these flights have been cancelled.

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An aviation news forum quotes a TV report stating that it is not "politically correct" for Emirates to fly to Denmark.

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Is it therefore "politically correct" to fly Emirates at all?

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UPDATE: The route is postponed, but it has only been reported in Denmark. It was to have been Emirates' first foray into Scandinavia.