Page 1418 - Week 05 - Wednesday, 10 April 2013
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remind members of the GDE, the Cotter Dam, the prison, the ESA headquarters, Barry Drive roadworks, Tharwa bridge and many others across the ACT over the course of this government. All these projects are examples of the way this government deals with major infrastructure projects.
The Canberra Liberals recognise the importance of improving infrastructure in our city. That is why we took to the last election the infrastructure Canberra policy. It would ensure there was a long-term strategic plan for infrastructure to ensure that projects are delivered on time and on budget, unlike this government, of course, for which “on time” and “on budget” are simply aspirational terms that never actually have to be achieved.
The government’s proposed city to lake project is another example of a grandiose scheme. Whilst there may be merits in it, the government have to clearly articulate how it is going to be possible. How are they going to fund it? What is going to be the liability to taxpayers? What is going to be delivered? When is it going to be delivered? Every time the government talk about a new project, every time they publish another report, every time they have another glossy set of artist’s impressions that do not get fulfilled, scepticism grows in the community.
When the government says, “We’re going to have light rail at any cost,” and when they have already spent a million dollars with almost nothing to show for it, scepticism begins to set in. If the government is serious about this plan, the government needs to say how this plan relates to all the other plans we have. There has been no shortage of plans over the course of this government. There may well be a shortage of vision, but there is no shortage of actual plans. But nobody seems to know how these plans interrelate? What is the status of past plans? Are they all now redundant? Or do those plans feed into this current plan? Are those plans going to be updated? Is the community going to be involved in this?
It would be very useful if the government provided a hierarchy of how all these plans actually interrelate; how these plans affect one another, which ones are current and which ones can be discarded? There are so many vagaries in all these documents that the government owes it to the community and to any potential investors to say what plans are current, what plans are redundant and what the genuine plan is for making some of these things a reality.
Whilst the subject of the motion may be interesting, I am concerned that there is pretty much no call to action. It does not give anybody any clear guidance. It is, in effect, a matter of public importance—or a matter of marginal public importance—and an opportunity to say some things in the chamber, but I do not see how it is a clear direction from this Assembly to the government or to the community about anything at all. It is an opportunity for us to soapbox but not much else.
I seek to use this speech to request that the government provide a hierarchy of plans, articulate which plans are in, which plans are out and provide some confidence to the business sector in particular but also to the broader community about what we can expect from the government over the next five, 10 or 20 years.
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