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Submitted by MrOrnery1951 on Fri, 17/12/2010 - 9:32am.
Since it's all about cost, maybe the government should just
outsource itself to China. Think of the savings. Eventually
we could become New Zealand Ltd, a wholly-owned subsidiary of
China Inc.
Kiwirail is a State Owned Enterprise as per this link and the
links on this page.
From memory, the minister in charge can't interfere with the
day to day running of the company.
This statement pretty much covers why Hillside as the third
placed bidder could not get the contract, i.e. you would not
expect a commercial company to do that and SOE's are probably
designed to stop the loading up of employees to keep the dole
queue artificially low as in the 70's and early 80's.
State-Owned Enterprises (SOEs) are owned by the Crown but
operate as commercial businesses.
Submitted by sunshine on Thu, 16/12/2010 - 12:59pm.
The price of petrol will continue to rise (given that oil is
a finite resource), and therefore we will need to rely more
on public transport. Why doesn't the DCC fund
light-rail
services between Mosgiel & Dunedin and Port Chalmers
& Dunedin? Light-rail carriages and cable-cars are surely
able to be made by Hillside workshops. Let's buy local and
protect the industry and skills that are left in our city.
Submitted by Peter MacDonald on Thu, 16/12/2010 - 12:19pm.
It's interesting to note that a lot of NZers don't realise
Kiwi Rail is a government department, like Air NZ, and NZ
Post, and that's the very reason Kiwirail executives should
be handing the contract to Hillside.
Hillside Engineers are the best in the world. Not only would
they be getting a superior product produced in Dunedin, but
they would also be investing in the NZ economy.
The Chinese product will no doubt have to be improved by
Hillside Engineers. [Abridged]
I think you will find Kiwirail was renationalised in 2008
when the Labour Govt paid a huge $665m to buy it back from
the Australian onwers. Since then many millions more has been
budgeted for rail infrastructure going forward.
Kiwirail is the trading arm of NZ Railways Corp, a State
Owned Enterprise, therefore we all own it, and it is not a
private corporation in the normal sense.
Submitted by Talburtz on Thu, 16/12/2010 - 8:25am.
KiwiRail is a private corporation. If it was a state owned
enterprise all of your arguments I have read above would be
valid. You are all bang on. However you are all totally out
of touch with reality here.
Kiwirail is a private corporation and this means its prime
directive is to make money for its shareholders. The reason
for its existence is to make a profit. That is the
goal.
Pretty much the number one way for a corporation to make a
profit these past two years around the world is to cut costs.
The number one cost cut here is labour.
You can't accuse KiwiRail of being irrational, or illogical.
You can't accuse them of not looking after the NZ public good
either. Because despite whatever the politicians might say,
looking after the NZ public/economy has nothing at all to do
with KiwiRail. So of course we also should not allows
ourselves to be fooled by the name 'KiwiRail'.
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