Interisland ferry problems show need for rebuilding coastal shipping

The Mar­itime Union says New Zealand’s ship­ping woes have now become worse, with the Inter­is­lander line hav­ing two thirds of its fleet going off line.

Two Cook Strait Inter­is­lander fer­ries are out of action as the Aratere is to under­go dry dock main­te­nance out of the coun­try and the Kaiarahi has devel­oped mechan­i­cal issues, which leaves just the third Inter­is­lander fer­ry Kaita­ki in oper­a­tion.

On top of the cur­rent con­ges­tion and ship­ping issues, this sit­u­a­tion has cre­at­ed anoth­er bot­tle­neck in an already stressed sup­ply chain.

Mar­itime Union Craig Har­ri­son says the Union has been advo­cat­ing for stronger coastal ship­ping for years for this rea­son.

“If we had a viable coastal fleet with more New Zealand ships, then it would be able to absorb any shocks from a sit­u­a­tion with the fer­ries, and deal with the wider reli­a­bil­i­ty issue with glob­al ship­ping lines miss­ing port calls.”

He says it is urgent that New Zealand rebuild a New Zealand flagged and crewed coastal ship­ping fleet that can pro­vide reli­able and effi­cient ser­vice for region­al ports and inter-island trade.

“New Zealand needs to learn from the very big mis­take it made in allow­ing coastal ship­ping to be run down.”

Mr Har­ri­son says the straight­for­ward solu­tion would be for the Gov­ern­ment to sup­port or under­write an extra ship being brought on by a cur­rent oper­a­tor, under a New Zealand flag and with New Zealand crew.

“A nation­al ship­ping line with coastal and region­al ser­vices could be a medi­um term option, along­side pri­vate oper­a­tors, as could a nation­al­ly co-ordi­nat­ed char­ter ser­vice for inter­na­tion­al ship­ping.”

A law change to give New Zealand coastal ship­ping pri­or­i­ty over inter­na­tion­al ship­ping car­ry­ing coastal car­go was required to pro­vide a lev­el play­ing field, he says.

Mr Har­ri­son says the glob­al ship­ping sup­ply chain is in chaos and the sit­u­a­tion is unlike­ly to improve for some time, in line with what inter­na­tion­al com­men­ta­tors are pre­dict­ing.

“There needs to be a nation­al freight strat­e­gy that brings in ports and coastal ship­ping and sets up a co-ordi­nat­ed plan going for­ward, rather than just leav­ing things to chance.”

Mr Har­ri­son says a nat­ur­al dis­as­ter or over­seas con­flict could leave New Zealand in a dan­ger­ous­ly vul­ner­a­ble state with­out the abil­i­ty to move its own goods on its own ves­sels.

“New Zealand must have a strat­e­gy that does not rely on for­eign inter­na­tion­al com­pa­nies to accom­mo­date New Zealand’s pri­or­i­ties.”