Matt Thistlethwaite (Kingsford Smith, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Foreign Affairs) Share this | Hansard source

I am glad that the assistant minister agrees that these are good projects, because of course these were all projects conceived and delivered by the Labor government. They were re-announced by the new government once they occupied the Treasury benches; they are seeking to claim credit for projects that were put in place by the former Labor government. It is typical of this government, seeking to claim accomplishments that the previous government put in place and to try to pass them off as their own.

Just last weekend we saw the Prime Minister with the assistant minister for re-announcements here, the member for Mayo, and Barry O'Farrell, the New South Wales Premier, re-announce the $3 billion NorthConnex link—the F3 to M2 link. This was originally announced sometime last year by Barry O'Farrell and by the then roads and infrastructure minister, Anthony Albanese. So it is probably more appropriate to say that this is a recycling or a re-announcement of a project that was put in place by the Labor government.

I am a former senator; I was proud to represent New South Wales. One of the great joys of being a senator is that I had the opportunity to travel around New South Wales. I saw firsthand the investment that the then Labor government was making in the New South Wales roads infrastructure. During its period in government, the former Labor government doubled the investment in roads infrastructure throughout Australia to $46½ billion and it upgraded 7½ thousand kilometres of roads throughout the country. It lifted the local government road grants program by 20 per cent.

If you drive up the Pacific Highway now, from Sydney to Brisbane, you will go past a number of projects. You will go past the Bulahdelah bypass being built. You will travel onto one of the best road projects in Australia's history, the Kempsey bypass, with the longest pylon bridge in the world—built under a Labor government. You will pass the Woolgoolga bypass, and you will go past the excellent new piece of road that bypasses Ballina. These are four major road projects worth billions of dollars that will cut about 1½ to two hours off the trip between Sydney and Brisbane—invested in and built by a Labor government, contributing to our nation's productivity. Over the six years of our nation-building program, from 2008 to 2014, we increased federal spending on the nation's road, rail and public transport infrastructure from $132 per Australian to $225 per head of population.

Labor also made sure that rural and regional communities got their fair share, with almost two-thirds of our infrastructure funding earmarked for projects in regional Australia. We doubled the roads budget and initiated the biggest road construction program since the creation of the National Highway network 40 years ago. Australia-wide, that $46.5 billion program went about building and upgrading 7½ kilometres of road, as I have said, with a key aim of complete duplication of the Hume and Pacific highways connecting the nation's three biggest cities—Brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne.

In August last year Labor had already completed 137 major projects, with work underway on a further 67. Some of those I have already mentioned are being claimed by the government as their own. We fixed 1,944 notorious black spots on local suburban streets and country roads, and it is pleasing to see that in this bill the Black Spot Programme is being continued. We installed 95 new and refurbished rest stops as well as 46 new and upgraded parking and decoupling bays, providing truck drivers with more places to pull over, take a break, catch up on sleep or check and reconfigure their vehicles. We assisted councils around the country with maintaining and upgrading their local roads, with 17,200 projects being funded by the federal government at the time.

Labor also worked to roll out the largest investment in interstate rail since the Fisher government built the transcontinental railway almost a century ago, with $3.4 billion over the life of our six-year nation-building program. Compared to the former Howard government, we invested more than twice as much in about half the time.

Labor's record on infrastructure in government, particularly in my state of New South Wales, is something that I am quite proud of. We committed $5.5 billion over six years to road and rail transport projects servicing Sydney. These included $840 million for the northern Sydney freight line upgrade and $800 million for the Moorebank intermodal terminal. This is a particularly important project for my community because the expanding port at Port Botany is seeing more and more container trucks on our local roads. The philosophy and aim of the Moorebank intermodal project was to upgrade the rail freight line that comes out of Port Botany terminal to put most of that freight onto trains. That train line goes to Moorebank with that freight, which is there transferred to trucks for the trip west. The majority of that freight would go north or west, and the approach was to ensure that that freight was not being transported around local roads in the Sydney metropolitan area on trucks. It was to be done on rail, reducing the disturbance for local communities, particularly in my area, and also improving the productivity of logistics and transport around the Sydney Basin.

We invested $980 million for the southern Sydney freight line; $405 million for the F3-to-M2 missing link, which was again re-announced on the weekend; $300 million to upgrade the Great Western Highway; $172 million for the Port Botany rail improvements; $98 million to widen the F5 at Campbelltown; $75 million for the upgrade of the Port Botany rail line; and $40 million for the Port Botany upgrade program. They are important projects for my community which tie into the Moorebank intermodal project and ensure we are not only upgrading important rail infrastructure but that it is an integrated transport system that works and complements other aspects of the flow, particularly for logistical traffic throughout the Sydney Basin. There was also an investment of $1.8 billion to deliver the M4 and M5 extensions in partnership with the New South Wales government.

Labor came to government as a party that wanted to build the nation, wanted to invest in infrastructure and ensure that we were improving the productivity of our nation by ensuring that our transport network was one that was integrated, that worked well, was efficient and also met the needs of an ever-expanding population, particularly around metropolitan Sydney communities. The doubling of the road budget and the increased investment in rail transport, particularly for freight, were all part of a nation-building project.

It is a shame to see the words 'nation building' removed from that important legislation by this bill, because that is what conceiving, planning, developing and building road and rail transport networks is all about. It is about building a nation. Economies grow and productivity improves when interconnectedness between communities and cities is set up and delivered. Under Labor our approach was one of nation building. It is a shame to see those provisions go from this aspect of the bill, but Labor will always be a party that supports nation building, a party that supports an integrated transport system. I am pleased to say that some of those aspects are met by this bill and commend it to the House.

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