Alex Hawke (Mitchell, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I rise today to speak about the government's commitment to infrastructure in Sydney. This is perhaps one of the most important and significant infrastructure investments in Commonwealth history, and it is particularly important to my electorate and to people in Western Sydney and Sydney more generally because infrastructure provision has perhaps been the single biggest challenge and issue for people in our major metropolitan cities over the past few decades.

Not only have we seen unprecedented growth in the north and south-west sectors of Sydney but we have seen governments, particularly state governments, who have failed to commit to the important road and rail projects that are required to sustain such growth. There is also social infrastructure. Suburbs in my electorate, out in Kellyville and Rouse Hill, are only just getting parks and social infrastructure on line, decades after housing has been put in place—another example of poor planning.

So it is with great joy that the majority of people in my electorate and in Sydney more generally see the great commitment of this government to better infrastructure in this budget. In difficult economic times it is particularly pleasing to see a government that understands that we need key infrastructure upgrades to ensure ongoing economic prosperity and ongoing social cohesion and that improvements in our major cities and economies will deliver great benefits to all.

Of course we have a state Liberal government in New South Wales now that is committed to great rail upgrades as well. The North West Rail Link is worth $10 billion. There will be eight railway stations: Cherrybrook, Castle Hill, Showground, Norwest, Bella Vista, Kellyville, Rouse Hill and Cudgegong Road. There will be 15.5 kilometres of tunnels—it will be the single biggest rail tunnel in the southern hemisphere—between Bella Vista and Epping. And the people of my electorate will soon be able to catch a train every five minutes in peak hour.

Unlike previous Labor administrations, not only is this project on time but it is also on budget. These are phrases that were lost to the lexicon of Australians—'on time and on budget'. A government produce a project on time and on budget? Never heard of in 16 years of a Labor administration! People have lost their faith in the ability of government to deliver. But not only is the New South Wales state government doing a fantastic job it is on time and it is on budget.

In this budget we see a great commitment to road infrastructure, in particular in Sydney, and this has been sadly missing from the previous Labor administrations, particularly when you consider we had an infrastructure minister who was based in Sydney. You might have thought that having an infrastructure minister based in Sydney would have meant more infrastructure funding for Sydney. You would have thought, 'Sure, wouldn't that be the case?' But, of course, we saw a six-year Labor federal administration with zero.

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