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Speaker 1: Very and cruise passengers might be facing a new levy.

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Speaker 1: So the government's weighing up how to fund a permanent

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Speaker 1: rescue tag for the Cook Straight. Temporary options arrived. It

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Speaker 1: will be in service until Dune next year. Apparently long

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Speaker 1: term solution needed obviously. The Maritime Union spokesperson Victor Billow's

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Speaker 1: with us victim Morning, Good morning. Is there anything unique

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Speaker 1: or different about the Cook Straight as regards having a

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Speaker 1: service per se.

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Speaker 2: Well, obviously the Cook strait's a very rough piece of

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Speaker 2: water with a lot of inter island ferries going between it,

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Speaker 2: and there's been a number of issues there over the

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Speaker 2: last few years, so it is a special piece of water.

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Speaker 2: But nonetheless, this new plan, I think is for these

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Speaker 2: rescue tags to be used throughout New Zealand.

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Speaker 1: What have we done previously and who's paid for them?

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Speaker 2: Well, previously it's kind of been a little bit of

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Speaker 2: a mess, to be honest, because we've had in the past,

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Speaker 2: for example, we've had vessels get into trouble and then

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Speaker 2: sometimes you know, the money is able to be obtained

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Speaker 2: from the company that operate to them. But the problem

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Speaker 2: is a lot of the vessels on the New Zealand

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Speaker 2: coast overseas vessels, and it becomes a bit more complicated

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Speaker 2: once you get into the funding model for these things.

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Speaker 1: Okay, this thing that's filling until June of next year,

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Speaker 1: could that carry on or is this a stop gap

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Speaker 1: measure that needs to be fixed properly.

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Speaker 2: Well, it definitely needs to be fixed properly with a

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Speaker 2: long term plan. But we're happy to see that the

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Speaker 2: MMA vision, which is the vessel that's been temporary put

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Speaker 2: onto the into Wellington to be a rescue vessel, we're

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Speaker 2: pleased to see that, but I mean that does need

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Speaker 2: to be a long term plan, and we're not entirely

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Speaker 2: sure that the user pays model is either the right

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Speaker 2: one or an easy one to.

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Speaker 1: Enforce, isn't it you just tagg it on? I mean,

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Speaker 1: I would imagine with the hundreds of thousands of people

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Speaker 1: crossing the straight on any given year, to be next

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Speaker 1: to nothing, You barely notice it, would you.

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Speaker 2: I think they're pretty expensive to maintain a vessel, but

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Speaker 2: you need to have it. And the reality is is

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Speaker 2: that the inter Island line in blue Bridge, the private operator,

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Speaker 2: you know, it would be a major hit for them,

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Speaker 2: and we have to come and start saying, well, maybe

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Speaker 2: this is something that's actually a national, national infrastructure. I mean,

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Speaker 2: we don't treat roads in a similar way. We have

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Speaker 2: a much more a different way of getting them. So

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Speaker 2: we're just wondering how that's going to work out. And

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Speaker 2: of course there's also the question a lot of these

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Speaker 2: vessels that this rescue take my service may may be

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Speaker 2: overseas vessels, and that becomes how do you get the

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Speaker 2: money off them? It becomes another question?

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Speaker 1: All right, good point. Well, Victor Billa, who's the Maritime

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Speaker 1: Union spokesperson. For more from the Mic Asking Breakfast, Listen

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