Ms Catherine King (Ballarat, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the member for the constructive way in which she has engaged on this bill. The thing that I've really have learnt throughout all of this process is just how passionate people are, not only about infrastructure and investment but also about getting much more transparency around how that investment is made. That being said, the government won't be supporting the member's amendment, because individuals with appropriate skills and qualifications in infrastructure investment are really hard to come by. There's a really limited pool of people, and we don't think they should be excluded from contributing to the work of Infrastructure Australia solely because of who they may have been employed by in the past. There are lots of people who work in construction and infrastructure investment who have worked on projects that the Greens political party may or may not like, but I can't make decisions about who commissioners are on that basis.

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