Anthony Albanese (Grayndler, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Infrastructure and Transport) Share this | Hansard source

The crowd opposite says five. Well, one of the ones he named was the Torrens to Torrens project. Here I am, in this picture I am holding up, at the beginning of construction in August 2013! Another one was the east-west project, which those opposite thought was in South Australia! Many Melburnians would like it to be in South Australia, because in Melbourne it is about as popular as the Ebola virus. It has had no cost-benefit analysis. It is a project that is on the road to nowhere.

Those opposite could not name a single new project. In place of that is the magical infrastructure re-announcement tour: the Perth gateway project, North West Coastal Highway, Bolivia Hill, the Inland Railway, Tiger Brennan Drive. They are going around the country re-announcing projects that are already under construction. In terms of their imagination, you have to give them credit, because, for some of the re-announcements, they have come up with a new strategy: just give it a new name! So the F3 to M2 link, signed off on in June last year, has become NorthConnex. The Swan Valley bypass in Western Australia has become NorthLink. Giving it a new name does not make it a new project.

Those opposite stand here and they say they are not projects; the money was not real. But they go to opening after opening—the Hunter Expressway at the end of last year or, just a few weeks ago, the Gold Coast light rail project. It was opposed by the local member, Mr Ciobo, but he was happy to be on the first trip!

Mr Briggs interjecting—

The assistant minister for infrastructure, at the table, was happy to go to the opening of one of the Gateway North projects, even though they pretend that it is new. Sometimes they just forget!

The Treasurer this week stood up and said, 'We've got this new investment, the Regional Rail Link.' Seriously? Funded in 2009, at its peak more than 5,000 workers were employed as a result of that project. There are new stations at places like Footscray West, with new projects opened on the way to Ballarat, on the way to Bendigo, on the way to Geelong. But it is no wonder the government think it is new, because during the election campaign the Prime Minister said, 'The federal government doesn't fund public transport projects.' Where did he say it? He was in Melbourne—a $3.225 billion investment.

The member for Petrie has tried to claim the Moreton Bay Rail Link as a new project as well. One of the classics, though, I think, Madam Speaker, is that as you go to the airport this evening you will pass the Majura Parkway. Now, every parliamentarian saw when construction started on that, but that has not stopped the government claiming that as a new project as well. Sometimes they pretend it is new where the funding is actually less, like the Midland Highway in Tasmania. They have ripped $100 million out of that, but they claim that it is somehow new money.

Of course, there was no new money in the budget for infrastructure. What the government did was ripped money out of projects that had been properly assessed and approved by Infrastructure Australia, like the Melbourne Metropolitan, and the Cross River Rail project in Brisbane. They took money from properly assessed projects and gave them to projects that had no cost-benefit analysis.

It is worse than that, because they made an advance payment of $1½ billion to the East West Link project. One of the alleged five new projects that the Acting Prime Minister named today, it is not only not in South Australia; it is also not under construction and it is not under contract—and the Victorian government is desperate to try and put it under contract. So those opposite gave $1½ billion to it. The infrastructure minister's assistant said very clearly that they would make payments based on milestones. Here is a project, the second stage of which will not commence for at least two years, if ever, and they say they have paid $1½ billion in advance. They paid $2 billion in advance to WestConnex.

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