When you actually look at the way road-user charges are administered in New Zealand, it's a system that was set up in the 1990s, when it was intended that those who caused wear and tear to the roads—trucks on the road; heavy vehicles, it was presumed—would pay their fair share based on their weight, the number of axles, and the distance travelled. At the time, when New Zealanders understood how important user charges, road pricing, and having the people who used the service should pay for it was, actually, road-user charges seemed like a pretty smart idea and a pretty good way to recover the cost from heavy transport operators using the roads. But, like most Governments, they couldn't anticipate the future. They only looked in the rear-view mirror to come up with policy that solved problems of the past. 