"New Zealand's largest roading project is heading for a $63 million blow-out in cost," Labour MP Mark Gosche said today.

"The Albany-Puhoi project (ALPURT) was originally costed at $165 million in 1995 but the current estimate stands at $228 million.

"This is an extraordinary increase in cost even taking into account the additional lanes that are being added."

Mark Gosche said in light of the revelation, the Government should speed up its review of road funding body Transfund's performance on this and other projects.

"Already an investigation of eight large projects showed an average 26 percent over-run on budgets and scoping studies carried out by Boston Consulting Group and Sinclair Knight Merz have already identified possible savings of between $17m and $30m.

"These sorts of cost over-runs are just not acceptable.

"The Minister of Transport has enough evidence to make him act now to manage taxpayers' money properly, Mark Gosche said.

© Scoop Media

Gordon Campbell: On the Sony cyber attack

Given the layers of meta-irony involved, the saga of the Sony cyber attack seemed at the outset more like a snarky European art film than a popcorn entry at the multiplex.

Yet now with (a) President Barack Obama weighing in on the side of artistic freedom and calling for the US to make a ‘proportionate response’quickly followed by (b) North Korea’s entire Internet service going down, and with both these events being followed by (c) Sony deciding to backtrack and release The Interview film that had made it a target for the dastardly North Koreans in the first place, then ay caramba…the whole world will now be watching how this affair pans out. More>>