Melissa McIntosh (Lindsay, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Minister for Population, Cities and Urban Infrastructure. Will the minister update the House on how the Morrison government's Sydney Metro-Western Sydney Airport rail investment is boosting the JobMaker plan and supporting our economy—

Dr Freelander interjecting—

Tony Smith (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Macarthur can leave under 94(a), and the member for Lindsay can start again.

The member for Macarthur then left the chamber.

Melissa McIntosh (Lindsay, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is to the Minister for Population, Cities and Urban Infrastructure. Will the minister update the House on how the Morrison government's Sydney Metro-Western Sydney Airport rail investment is boosting the JobMaker plan and supporting our economy as we come out the other side of the coronavirus pandemic?

Alan Tudge (Aston, Liberal Party, Minister for Population, Cities and Urban Infrastructure) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Can I thank the member for Lindsay for her question. Last week I joined the member for Lindsay, along with the Prime Minister and the New South Wales Premier, to announce this massive new railway line which will connect the Sydney Metro right across to the Western Sydney airport, due for completion in 2026. This is a huge, $11 billion investment by the two levels of government. What it will do is: it will construct 23 kilometres of new railway line from the member for Lindsay's electorate, at St Marys Station, along to the airport and then on to the aerotropolis. Six brand-new stations will be built in the process, including putting St Marys underground, which I know the member for Lindsay is keen on seeing.

What this actually will mean, when completed, is that someone can live in somewhere like Penrith or St Marys, jump on a train and, within 15 minutes, can be at the airport to jump on a plane, or indeed to work there at the airport. It could mean that someone, an international visitor, could arrive at the Western Sydney airport and jump on a train and be somewhere else in Western Sydney within 15 minutes, or indeed be in the CBD of Sydney within 60 minutes. So this will have huge benefits, this particular project, for Western Sydney overall, when it is completed in 2026.

But equally importantly, it will have massive benefits in the short term as well, because this project is an absolute jobs bonanza. Fourteen thousand jobs are being created through the construction of these 23 kilometres worth of rail—14,000 jobs. That's carpenters; it's plumbers; it's electricians; it's tunnel makers; it's crane drivers; it's truck drivers; it's all the other suppliers which go into that as well. And my expectation is that the vast majority of those jobs will be sourced from people in Western Sydney, because that's indeed what we're seeing with the development of the Western Sydney airport, where over 40 per cent of people who work at the Western Sydney airport are indeed locals. Fourteen thousand jobs are being constructed in this process. That's on top of the 11,000 jobs which are being constructed for the Western Sydney airport process, as well as 4,000 jobs in other roadworks which are going on around Western Sydney.

This is exactly what this government is about. It's about building infrastructure for the future. It is about congestion busting. And of course it is about creating jobs, and this is a fantastic example of exactly that.

But we are doing this right across the country. We're doing this in Melbourne with the North East Link, where 10,000 jobs will be supported; up in Brisbane with the M1, where almost 2,000 jobs will be supported; in Adelaide with the north-south road, which will be 1,600 jobs; Metronet in Perth, with 10,000 jobs et cetera— (Time expired)