New Zealand, says the country’s Infrastructure Minister Chris Bishop, used to be a world leader in infrastructure but poor asset management practices are putting that at risk.
In a keynote address at IPWC 2025, Bishop said that while the current generation of Kiwis could thank their parent’s generation for the quality of the infrastructure they enjoy, the nation had lost its way in a “Gordian knot” of regulation and higher costs.
“We used to be good at infrastructure in New Zealand,” said Bishop. “We used to be world leading. We used to be innovative.”
“We can thank past generations for that, and now what we need to do is build on that legacy, so in 20 years time, my kids will look back and thank this generation as well.”
The National Coalition Government in New Zealand had a “big agenda” to drive down costs and cut red tape, while also seeking to build a bi-partisan consensus with other political parties to take the nation forward.
Some of the current practices, however, were “pretty shocking.”
Bishop gave the example of the government asking New Zealand Police to quantify their assets – their police stations and other buildings – and to assess their condition as part of a wider national exercise.
Answering a question at the end of his speech, Bishop said the police had only a “vague idea” of what they owned and they “don’t know the state they are in.”
Bishop conceded New Zealand had “done a poor job on asset management and asset maintenance.”
He said that while “every politician likes to turn up and cut the ribbon” on new assets, it was equally important to maintain the existing asset base even though this was not “glamourous.”
“In New Zealand we have schools with leaking rooms,” Bishop said. “We have sewage leaks in hospitals. We have asbestos in police stations, and we have service outages on commuter rail.”
Bishop said it wasn’t possible to measure metrics around spending on asset renewal and maintenance of publicly owned assets “because it’s not even reported.”
He said that around 45% of New Zealand infrastructure was owned by the central government, 25% by local government and 30% by the private sector.
“So if you do the numbers we don’t even have data for a good chunk of assets in New Zealand, it’s pretty hopeless,” Bishop said.
“The (Infrastructure) Commission tells me that for every 40 bucks spent on new infrastructure, we should be investing 60 in maintenance and renewals.
“That is not the case right now.”
A pattern of “build and forget” had put New Zealand at the bottom of OECD tables for asset management practices among developed nations.
“If we don’t sort it out, these problems are only going to get worse as assets built during the post war investment boom period wear out,” Bishop said.
On the question of new infrastructure, Bishop advocated a practice of standardising the design and production of assets, such as school classrooms, to get the cost down.
“When I became Minister, I couldn’t wrap my head around why school classrooms cost NZ$1.2m on average,” he said.
“I can build a house for that. It’s just a school classroom.”
“We’ve now got that down to NZ$600,000 because we’ve adopted more standardised designs rolling out of the factories.”
Bishop said he had “pushed the boat out a bit” and moved away from the idea of “bespoke, architecturally designed palaces” and moved to repeatable designs, even though this hasn’t won the approval of architects.
“We don’t need public art on highways,” he said.
“NZ$4m sculptures as people drive past. They can’t see them because they drive at 110 kmh.
“We don’t need any of that stuff. Strip out as much cost as you can. That’s what the New Zealand public want and frankly its going down pretty well with most people, but not with the architects.”
Bishop also talked about a changed approach to infrastructure with a plan developed independently of politics through the Infrastructure Commission.
While there were competing visions on infrastructure this was a “healthy tension.”
“If we can just agree on 80% to 90% of it that would be a big step forward,” Bishop said.
“The Greens are never going to sign up for building roads, and we’re never going to sign up to build all the cycleways they want, but that’s fine.
“There’s a legitimate public debate about those things, but if we can just agree on the systems reforms on things like congestion pricing, user pays, the sensible use of public-private partnerships, and get some consensus, then there would be a big step forward.”
