The government has revealed it wants to revive the old industry of assembling locomotives in New Zealand hard on the heels of buying back the trains from Toll Holdings.
Labour says assembling locos will create jobs and business opportunities but critics say it's economic madness.
New Zealand still repairs trains but the days when they were actually assembled here are long gone.
As the new owner of Kiwi Rail the government wants to revive an old industry.
"There is a possibility of assembling locomotives in New Zealand. It is probably a very logical thing to do from a currency perspective, from a value for money perspective," said Trevor Mallard, State Owned Enterprises Minister on TV One's Agenda programme.
"Well at the moment we take locomotives apart and put them back together at the Woburn workshops in Wellington and that's a good place to do it."
Mallard concedes more training would be needed but one expert says it's entirely possible.
"For years and years New Zealand built its own steam trains so there's no reason we can't build locomotives from scratch," says Bob Stott, rail historian.
However, opponents say it's back to the bad old days.
"When New Zealand had those sort of protections which saw us basically reassemble products that were manufactured overseas, every New Zealand paid the price," says Gerry Brownlee, National State Owned Enterprises spokesman.
"It's madness and it will really just exacerbate the extraordinary price we've already paid."
The government confirmed on Sunday that Kiwi Rail will be run at a loss for first few years, although it could be helped by funding changes.
"It may be for example that more of the transport funding which currently goes into roads will go into that area. It's got to be efficient and it's got to be transparent," says Mallard.
And efficiency will be the key question as the government turns back the clock, not only owning the trains again but maybe assembling them as well.
