Bernie Ripoll (Oxley, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

A comprehensive and accessible rail transport system is a critical and essential link in the Australian transport chain that joins communities and strengthens industry. The Rudd government in its last budget continued its commitment to rail infrastructure by delivering important priority rail projects and spending to support job creation in the short term, and economic growth and productivity in the longer term. As we will see a number of local rail projects from around the country, it is pleasing to see a broad range of members representing different states and, with them, different priorities and needs. Tonight I want to focus on my home state of Queensland and the funding that was set aside for nation building from the Building Australia Fund.

Firstly, it is important to note that the $668 million in this year’s budget for Queensland road and rail projects is 80 per cent higher than the 2008-09 funding, with $318 million provided immediately to keep key projects moving forward. Locally in South-East Queensland we saw initiatives such as $20 million for a Brisbane inner-city rail feasibility study and $365 million in equity investment in the Gold Coast light rail project. Work on the Brisbane inner-city rail feasibility study continues, and will see two new rail tunnel corridors being identified to meet growing demand for rail services in Brisbane. As I said, the Rudd government has committed $20 million to make sure that that does take place, with the project due to begin in 2010.

Work on the $850 million Gold Coast light rail project is expected to begin in 2011 and be completed by 2013. The planning and construction of the project is expected to support 2½ thousand jobs. The project will provide public transport to 20 per cent of the Gold Coast population, removing 40,000 cars from the road network and foster urban renewal and boost the local tourism industry. It is projected the Gold Coast light rail will cater for 80,000 trips a year, increasing public transport from four per cent of journeys to 10 per cent by 2026. Both of these are important nation-building projects and feature cooperation between all levels of government and the private sector for the good of South-East Queensland, one of the nation’s fastest growing regions.

This leads me to a great example of where these partnerships truly do work in concert, and that is in the western corridor of South-East Queensland—particularly in my electorate of Oxley. We had the member for Blair here, who also mentioned that it particularly works well in the electorate of Blair. The Queensland government has been planning for the duplication of the Centenary Highway between the Ipswich motorway and Springfield, together with the extension of the passenger rail branching from the Ipswich line at Darra and then running along the Centenary Highway through to greater Springfield.

The rail project is one of the priority projects in the Queensland government’s infrastructure plant, which supports the South-East Queensland regional plan and is designated as a vital piece of infrastructure for the western corridor. The project has now been broken up into stages, with stage 1 now progressing to completion. It will be part of the duplication of the Centenary Highway from the Ipswich motorway to the Logan motorway. As a result, we will see a new passenger rail line being built with 650-space commuter car parks. Stage 1 is due for completion in 2012. Stage 2 will also be part of the Queensland state government’s and the federal government’s commitment to the corridor.

Further to that, the cost of a rail component as part of the project to Springfield in the South-East Queensland regional plan is projected at $872 million. If funding can be brought forward, then we will see the great possibilities of what rail transport can bring to that corridor. This will then allow both the road and rail projects to be delivered together, and of course that would mean greater efficiency and a greater effective corridor for the area. The original delivery was for 2012, but it has now been pushed out to 2015. But many thousands of jobs can be expected to be created and millions of people moved along the corridor.

I believe that the western corridor will continue to drive strong residential growth for the next decade, with significant investment accompanying infrastructure needed to be delivered both in a public and a private manner. For South-East Queensland, we need environmentally sustainable transport environments of the future. In this place we often speak of better ways to find these sorts of projects; in the western corridor we are ready to deliver both through public funding and through private funding. What we need now is to bring forward these projects.

All members of parliament support more effective transport systems that provide growth in a sustainable manner. Often the critical missing components that are the hold-up are the political will to achieve the desired outcomes and political cooperation. That is not the case in the western corridor. The three levels of government work together in a most constructive manner, as does the private sector, including developers in the corridor. They are all prepared to make these projects technically feasible, and I know they can work in a great partnership together.

I commend the motion to the House and I encourage government at all levels to get more involved and provide the essential, critical environmentally sustainable transport systems for the future—and there is no better place to begin than in the western corridor of Queensland. (Time expired)

Luke Simpkins (Cowan, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Given that this motion is about rail infrastructure, I take this opportunity to speak of the value that railways have added in Western Australia and the fact that our future economic development will continue to depend on railway infrastructure serving the commodity sector. As I will outline, the great Western Australian success story, the way in which the hard work and commitment of the private sector has paved the way for Australia, is very much a story that could not have been written without railways.

Two of the major users of railways for the transport of iron ore are BHP Billiton and the Fortescue Metals Group, or FMG. They demonstrate the importance of private investment and of governments allowing these developments to take place.

BHP Billiton’s iron ore has two railway lines and more than 120 locomotives. The Port Hedland to Newman line is 426 kilometres long, running out to the Mount Whaleback Mine but also with spurs to Mining Area C, known as the MAC iron ore mine; to Yandi 1 and 2; and to the Jimblebar Mine. Twelve trains a day operate on that line, normally with 208 wagons per train. Each wagon can carry 125 tonnes of ore, or 26,000 tonnes per train. Duplication of the line to Newman is well advanced. The smaller line is just 208 kilometres long and runs from Finucane Island near Port Hedland to the Yarrie and Nimingarra mines. It has one train a day, with a mere 90 wagons attached.

FMG is another example of private sector investment that has worked out very well. FMG operate a heavy-haul rail network between Anderson Point at Port Hedland and Cloud Break Mine. That is more than 250 kilometres of single standard-gauge railway line upon which they operate as many as five trains a day, with up to 240 carriages per train. Each wagon can take around 40 tonnes of iron ore.

Although I have spoken about the successes and the future of private rail in support of commodities in Western Australia, this motion also made mention of the assistance provided by the Australian government toward rail. In 1997 the federal and state governments agreed to centralise control of the national interstate rail network. In 1998 the Australian government established the Australian Rail Track Corporation Ltd to manage and develop Australia’s interstate track infrastructure. The ARTC owners have long-term leases of the interstate track. The ARTC currently controls interstate track from Kalgoorlie to the New South Wales-Queensland border, although its main focus is on the Melbourne-Sydney-Brisbane rail corridor.

The ARTC is a public company which is wholly owned by the Australian government. It is required under its charter to operate the interstate rail network on a commercial and sustainable basis. It does so through access fees to the track from commercial operators, proceeds from maintenance contracts, Australian government equity, commercial borrowings and direct funding from the federal government.

It was through the ARTC and AusLink that the previous government provided $2.4 billion in rail infrastructure; $820 million was also provided to ARTC for the Melbourne-Sydney-Brisbane rail corridor through untied grants. It should also be noted that the previous federal government helped with the second transnational railway line completed in 2004, with $191.4 billion contributed by the Howard government. That being said, the vast majority of the funding for the project was actually provided by private enterprise. Between 2004-05 and 2008-09, over $2 billion was allocated by the Howard government under AusLink. Between 1996 and 2007 an additional $1.3 billion was invested in rail from outside AusLink, which included the Commonwealth part of the funding for the Adelaide to Darwin railway.

Infrastructure investment in 2007 amounted to $56 billion for rail, which is more than 2½ times what it was in 1996 when it was $15 billion. Against a backdrop of paying off $96 billion of debt, these figures suggest responsible and effective investment. The reality in rail investment is that it is important for government to be involved, but it is vital for governments to facilitate private investment to meet the needs of industry. Rail is part of the great success story of Western Australia, and that will continue to be the case, but a measure of a government is how well it can successfully leverage private sector investment whilst also not running up huge debt. The coalition under John Howard succeeded. Peter Costello was able to do this very successfully.

Shayne Neumann (Blair, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am happy to speak in support of the motion moved by the member for Oxley, Mr Ripoll. I note that the member for Oxley has referred to both rail and road in his motion. The commitment of the Rudd Labor government to south-east Queensland in relation to the Ipswich Motorway upgrade and to the Gold Coast Rapid Transit rail is very welcome. The Brisbane future public transport network and the $20 million in funding that the federal government will commit for a feasibility planning study of the Brisbane inner city rail capacity upgrade—to be completed, it is estimated, in 2012—will make a big difference. If the federal government chooses to actually fund that inner city translink, that will be of great help not only to the people of Brisbane but also to people on the Gold Coast and in Ipswich. Like any city, Brisbane is a place where people come to work, for recreation, to get together to see a film, to have friendship and fellowship and just to shop. So that feasibility study will be most welcome and I urge the government to look seriously at funding it.

The Gold Coast Rapid Transit funding is particularly welcome not only for those people on the Gold Coast but also for other people in my area of Blair, in Ipswich and in the rural areas outside who use the Gold Coast regularly for recreation and holidays. Over the next four years, the federal government will invest $365 million on 13 kilometres of light rail and transit infrastructure from Griffith University to Broadbeach. That is very important not just for linkages for students but also for access to Broadbeach for recreation, shopping and the beach.

The Ipswich Motorway upgrade is also critical and the federal government has put forward $1.95 million in funding for it over the next four years. It will spend $884 million in additional works between Dinmore and Goodna and you can see that happening right now. There is also a rail corridor, secured by the state government, which goes up from Springfield through to Ipswich, linking the University of Southern Queensland at Springfield to the Ipswich campus of the University of Queensland. That is an important infrastructure corridor and I would urge the federal government to look at that in the future.

This government has put an enormous amount of money into south-east Queensland for rail and road, but these things are particularly important. The member for Oxley mentioned the western corridor, the area between Ipswich and the south-west suburbs of Brisbane through to Forest Lake and Springfield. In 20 years, about 85,000 people will live in Springfield and it is estimated that Ipswich will have a population of about 434,000. This is all part of the south-east Queensland regional development plan, so road and rail infrastructure is particularly vital.

One in seven people in Australia lives in south-east Queensland. It is the area where the biggest regional councils are—big regional councils created through council amalgamations. Councils like Lockyer Valley, the Somerset Regional Council, the Scenic Rim Regional Council and the Ipswich City Council are large councils not only in the area they cover but also in population compared with some of the more rural and regional areas of our country. Local government plays an enormous role in this and the South-East Queensland Council of Mayors has played a strong advocacy role in getting south-east Queensland moving, but the federal government is strongly committed to road and rail infrastructure and the runs are on the board.

The Ipswich Motorway should have been funded many years ago by the previous, Howard government. There were 11½ years of inertia, idleness and ignorance on the issue. The people of the western corridor, from south-west Brisbane through to Ipswich and the rural areas outside it, were frustrated all through that time. It is the Rudd government that has put the money into South-East Queensland in terms of Gold Coast rail, the Ipswich Motorway upgrade and so many other roads, whether they be the Cunningham Highway south of Ipswich or the Warrego Highway west of Ipswich. We are seeing resurfacing everywhere. It is all part of the Rudd government’s nation-building and stimulus strategy, sadly and regrettably opposed tooth and nail by those opposite, to their shame and discredit. I commend the member for Oxley for his motion. It is apt and appropriate.

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

I welcome this opportunity to reject the brash Labor statements about infrastructure in Sydney. Coming from an electorate which has the highest rate of car ownership in the country—that is, the highest number of cars per household of any electorate in Australia—I can attest to the fact that rail is a very important link with communities as a transport option. I can also attest that the New South Wales state Labor government has failed to deliver a rail line for the north-west of Sydney for 16 years. That is 16 years of failure in an area that has the highest car ownership rate in the entire country. My area, one of the fastest growing communities in Sydney, has been left behind by governments which refuse to allow either a government option or a private sector option in the delivery of rail.

When you take into account the rhetoric that we hear from Labor members opposite about climate change and emissions and saving the planet, you would think that a rail line in north-west Sydney was one of the top priorities for a Labor government or indeed a Labor Party. In Sydney, the biggest city in Australia, with the highest rate of car ownership in the country, what did we get from the Rudd government? On 7 October 2008 last year, a date that will live in infamy, that belies this motion, we heard, ‘No votes in north-west metro, Rudd tells Rees’. That is what the Prime Minister said to the Premier. There are no votes in delivering rail to the north-west of Sydney—that is what we are to believe from a cabinet meeting leak last year that was revealed to the public. The New South Wales state government was rejected for federal funding for infrastructure for the north-west of Sydney because there were no votes in it.

When you look at the record of the state Labor government in New South Wales on infrastructure delivery to the outer suburbs of our major cities, you see that they have clearly failed them. They not only cancelled the north-west rail line; they cancelled the south-west rail line. In 2008, what we did not know when this story broke about the federal government’s refusal to build a much needed rail line in the biggest city in our country—because there were no votes in it—and what we do know now is that the federal government was planning to cut off Sydney completely from the infrastructure funding teat. There is plenty of money being spent on infrastructure in this country. That is absolutely right. I will be interested to hear what the member for Lowe has to say about this. But Sydney received virtually nothing in the infrastructure spend from the Rudd government. There are a number of possible reasons for this.

Of course, we know that the incompetence of the New South Wales Labor government is absolutely breathtaking and that you would not give them a dollar to save themselves. That is an acceptable argument, something that we on this side are prepared to entertain. However, if you consider the vast need of the people of Sydney—it is our biggest city, it is one of our most poorly planned cities, it has a desperate need for better public transport infrastructure—the Rudd government failed to deliver anything but the smallest amount of money for a study for a metro line. I am sure the member for Lowe will endorse that, because the inner city metro line is proposed to run from the city to his electorate. There is already an existing heavy rail line that runs from his electorate to the city. There are bus transport alternatives, there are light rail alternatives and it is only a short transport time. But all those who live in the outer suburbs of our major cities, such as in my community in the south-west of Sydney, in Lindsay, Macarthur and Macquarie, have been left in the lurch by successive state and federal governments. They have been given grants of land, they have been allowed huge corridors of development, but public transport infrastructure has been completely and utterly unplanned.

Before anybody on that side gets up here and tries to tell us that this was part of the Howard government’s failure, this was promised continually in the last 15 years by a New South Wales state Labor government—promised, promised, promised, promised. The people of New South Wales voted for it several times and it has not been delivered. Now it has been shelved. Both the north-west and the south-west rail corridors in the biggest city of our country have been permanently shelved. It is to the shame of this Labor government that that has happened. It is a shame that it has spent no money on infrastructure in Sydney, and the voters of Sydney, the people of Sydney, the communities of Sydney, which are suffering from a lack of rail and transport options, should punish this Labor government for its absolute and utter mismanagement of rail infrastructure. (Time expired)

John Murphy (Lowe, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to support the motion moved by my friend and colleague the member for Oxley and thoroughly reject the assertions and scurrilous claims made by the member for Mitchell. I ask the member for Mitchell to put a search engine through his conscience and have a look at what Premier Fahey or Premier Greiner did on the very issues he has raised here tonight.

It is often said that the productivity of today is the prosperity of tomorrow. The Rudd government understands this, and that is why we are investing an unprecedented $26.4 billion over six years to ease the infrastructure capacity constraints by building road, rail and port projects as part of our national building program. This investment will drive our productivity by promoting the efficient movement of goods within and between our cities. The Rudd government also acknowledges that supporting our economy and tackling climate change are not conflicting policy objectives. For this reason, the 2009-10 Commonwealth budget includes $4.5 billion investment in the Clean Energy Initiative to assist Australia’s transition to a low-pollution economy and help us create green jobs. This includes $2 billion over nine years for carbon capture and storage, demonstration projects, $1.5 billion over six years for solar electricity generation projects and $465 million to establish Renewables Australia, an independent body set up to support leading-edge renewable energy technology research and development.

My electorate of Lowe has been affected immensely by the government’s investment in infrastructure. Perhaps the member for Mitchell is listening to this. As part of the Regional and Local Community Infrastructure Program, the largest ever one-off federal investment in local infrastructure across Australia, local councils have received grants designed to improve social capital and support jobs by improving local infrastructure. For example, Canada Bay Council has received $5.3 million for the upgrade of the Drumoyne oval, and that was very warmly received. In addition, some of Sydney’s busiest roads are located in my electorate. The Rudd government’s infrastructure investments are targeting dangerous black spots on these roads to improve the passage of vehicles, which in turn enhances our local productivity. As a result, the government is spending $180,000 to upgrade Centenary Drive in Strathfield, Concord Road in Rhodes and Punchbowl Road in Belfield.

It is not only my electorate that is benefiting. I know that in suburbs throughout Australia local infrastructure projects are being carried out that will drive up productivity and boost our future living standards. One very exciting project which I wish to draw to the attention of the House, particularly the member for Mitchell, is the $3.5 million investment for the University of Sydney’s Clinical Education Centre at Concord Hospital’s Clinical School, which was announced last week. Perhaps the member for Mitchell has not caught up with that. The funding is part of the Australian government’s $71.5 million Capital Development Pool Program. The Capital Development Pool Program provides funding for higher education institutions to build capital infrastructure. Concord Hospital’s Clinical Education Centre will provide clinical teaching for undergraduate and postgraduate specialist medical, nursing, allied services, pharmacy and dentistry students. The $3.15 million in federal funding will assist the centre to develop world-class educational facilities in the field of medical science.

I spoke on Friday to Professor Robert Lusby, Associate Dean of the University of Sydney’s medical school and Professor of Surgery at Concord Clinical School. I can assure the House that Professor Lusby and his colleagues at Concord Hospital and the University of Sydney are extremely excited about this infrastructure project which will improve the education experience provided to Australia’s future doctors and medical specialists.

The $3.5 million is an excellent investment in our nation’s health infrastructure. A healthier nation boosts our productivity and prosperity, and that is what nation building is all about. The unprecedented level of infrastructure investment by the Rudd government stands in stark contrast to the indolence of the Howard government. The Howard government was idle when it came to our nation’s infrastructure. Rather than investing in our roads, ports, railroads, schools, universities and hospitals, the Howard government’s infrastructure policies constituted nothing other than bribery, as they spent millions of dollars on buying votes in marginal coalition seats whilst starving Labor seats of funds. The contrast between the policies of the Labor and Liberal parties could not be clearer, and I hope the member for Mitchell is listening. Labor is a party of nation building—(Time expired)

Scott Morrison (Cook, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Housing and Local Government) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

This is a motion of self-congratulation that we are used to receiving from this government. I am surprised that the member for Oxley has decided not to hang around for the accolades that he suspected would come but he probably just presumed they would come—as is so much the case with this government with motions of self-congratulation. But the truth about this matter, despite the arguments put forward by the government, is that Australia’s infrastructure challenge is massive: it is estimated at somewhere between $455 billion and $700 billion. This government seems to pretend to the Australian people that they can meet that all on their own. It is absolute arrant nonsense. They also claim to pretend that they invented the notion of infrastructure, that they invented the notion of bricks and mortar and that they invented the notion of engineering construction on 23 November 2007, which is also untrue. Prior to the last election the coalition pledged $31 billion on land transport infrastructure initiatives between 2007-08 and 2013-14. Labor is spending in response to that $26 billion. So they are still $5 billion short on what the Australian people would have got from the coalition government had they been re-elected.

If we go and look at AusLink back to 2004, the coalition government would have spent $45 billion to improve our land transport infrastructure. In 1996 infrastructure investment in Australia accounted for only three per cent of GDP. That is what we inherited as a government and we left it at 5.6 per cent of GDP. That is from $15 billion to over $56 billion—so much for Labor’s rewriting of history in relation to infrastructure investment in this country. A considerable component of achieving this objective, and I think this is why Labor fail to acknowledge it, was through harnessing private sector investment both in capital and in delivery of projects. Private sector investment in infrastructure increased under the term of the coalition government from 36 per cent of the total to over two-thirds. There is a good reason why encouraging private investment in infrastructure is a good idea, and that is because the surveys show time and time again that private sector delivered projects deliver on time and on budget more frequently. In fact, a survey by Allen Consulting concluded that under the model of traditionally procured projects through the government sector—and remember this is the government that says the government should be at the centre of the economy, not the private sector—23.5 per cent of the time they were behind time on delivery of their projects compared with privately procured and developed projects on average being 3.5 per cent ahead of time.

So the idea of encouraging the private sector to invest in infrastructure under the coalition government proved to be a success. It harnessed massive investment of capital in Australia’s infrastructure task, which still remains great. The coalition does not pretend it is somehow solved as the government pretends it is solved. There is a massive task that is still to be completed at the hands of governments of all persuasions in the future. The other point I would make is that, to achieve this, we not only harnessed private sector investment in this massive task but we also managed to pay off $96 billion of Labor debt in the process—an extraordinary achievement. On the day that the former member for Higgins has departed this place, it is important to acknowledge his achievement in delivering this outcome. Of the $22 billion in infrastructure that is boasted about in this budget, only $1.7 billion is to be spent this year and only $8.5 billion of this $22 billion total is actually going to be on roads, rail and ports. The government are leading people to believe that they are out there building roads, rail and ports—well, they are not. They are building many other things but not too much of roads, rail and ports.

The infrastructure challenge remains significant. Tonight I want to draw quickly on one part of that challenge, and that is the freight challenge that we face as a nation. Infrastructure Partnerships Australia has produced an outstanding report called Meeting the 2050 freight challenge. I table the report. The report shows that the freight task, from current levels, will double by 2020 and triple by 2050. The Bureau of Infrastructure, Transport and Regional Economics estimates a cost of $20 billion a year to our economy by 2020 if we do nothing, which is what this government is doing. Every one per cent increase in efficiency in this area will save $1.5 billion.

The solutions to this are not just about bricks and mortar. The government likes to think only about bricks and mortar when it comes to these matters, but it is about planning, approvals, regulatory reform, partnering, pricing and competitive neutrality between modes. These are the reforms that would be part of a real infrastructure reform agenda—not parading around the country in hard hats and luminous vests pretending to solve a problem which will take many years to solve. (Time expired)

Arch Bevis (Brisbane, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The time allotted for this debate has expired. The debate is adjourned and the resumption of the debate will be made an order of the day for the next sitting.