Promises made by National and Labour to build a new hospital in Dunedin needed to be treated carefully, New Zealand First leader Winston Peters said yesterday.
Speaking to a campaign meeting in Dunedin, Mr Peters queried where the $1.4 billion for the hospital would come from, given the Government had not allowed for any funding in its May Budget and it was not seen as an expenditure item in the pre-election fiscal update (Prefu).
"These two documents are where you lay out your policies and costings and there was no hospital. Once the polls turned for [Prime Minister] Bill English, the promises came roaring out."
Both National and Labour had neglected Dunedin, he said to loud applause from the about 260 people attending the meeting.
Labour neglected the city because Dunedin people had always voted Labour and National neglected the city for the same reason.
However, Mr Peters did not mention Labour won the electorate seats at the last election but National won the party vote.
Mr Peters said he had visited Dunedin in a campaign bus earlier in the year and had been told other political parties had not taken much interest.
"They’re coming to see you now. They have come rolling into town, promising you a new hospital. Don’t you feel good?"
National would build the hospital with a public-private partnership (PPP), but New Zealanders did not know who the partners would be, he said.
There was a lot of concern about PPP projects National was involved in around the country, he said.
The NZ First leader then turned to the job losses already announced in Dunedin, including those at Cadbury and the University of Otago.
But while the Otago hinterland was the wealth creator for the rest of New Zealand by selling its products overseas, most attention was focused on the infrastructural problems faced in Auckland.
"Auckland doesn’t give a rats about you. Dunedin is getting a raw deal from central government."
New Zealand was introduced to the neoliberal experiment by Roger Douglas. Thirty-three years later, New Zealand was waking up to the realities of life, he said.
The Hillside workshops had been closed by the Government and KiwiRail. Wagons, previously built in the city, were imported from China.
Once here, they were found to contain asbestos and Mr Peters questioned why no-one had been fired as a result.
About 70,000 rotten sleepers had been imported to fix New Zealand’s rail lines, but no-one had been fired. Nor had anyone been fired when the propellers fell off interisland ferry Aratere, he said.
"Meanwhile, those poor guys from Hillside, the people who lost their jobs, had moved to Australia or on to other jobs."
NZ First would help regional New Zealand by reducing the value of the dollar by renegotiating the Reserve Bank Act, returning GST from tourist spending to the regions and employing trained young New Zealanders first, he said to rapturous applause.
Mr Peters gave no clues as to which party he would support to form the next government. Both Labour and National came in for scathing criticism.
