Page 2281 - Week 08 - Tuesday, 12 August 2014
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project due to Minister Corbell’s emotional attachment. The true monetary value of the government’s commitment is likely to be much higher, given the occurrence of the commercial-in-confidence contracts which this government tends to engage in.
The funding for capital metro comes at a time when we still do not know the exact cost of the project, with the $614 million cost projection used by the government now up to three years old. The government is also continuing to hide key details about the project. We still do not know, for example, whether the cost of relocating the pipes and wires that lie under the proposed route is factored into the government’s $614 million cost projection. The uncertainty of these costs has led the Centre for International Economics to say that light rail is a source of risk to the financial position of the territory.
What we do know, though, is that the project does not stack up. The government admitted as much in their own report when they first explored the possibility of developing light rail in the Gungahlin to the city corridor. The report said:
… economic returns that can be delivered through LRT—
light rail transit—
investment alone are likely to be economically marginal and the net economic outcome for LRT under even minor adverse circumstances is likely to result in negative economic returns.
Since this time, Infrastructure Australia, the Centre for International Economics, the Productivity Commission and others have all questioned the viability of the government’s light rail project and encouraged the government to drop it.
Despite these warnings, the government has continued to push ahead with the project. The government last month trumpeted the fact that capital metro will be used 13,000 times a day in 2021. The reality is that less than one per cent of Canberrans will use capital metro to get to work or school every day. Even on the Gold Coast, where they originally projected 50,000 people would be using their light rail, they are now suggesting that only 17,000 to 25,000 will use it. If the Gold Coast can only get 17,000, I find it highly unlikely that the ACT will get 13,000. This figure confirms the suspicion of many Canberrans that Canberra simply does not have the population and the population density to support light rail.
For good reason, capital metro was an issue of considerable interest during the estimates discussion. This is going to be the biggest capital works project the ACT has ever seen. It is right for this Assembly, on behalf of all Canberrans to provide the scrutiny that such a project warrants. I fully endorse estimates committee recommendation 65:
The Committee recommends that the ACT Government table in the Legislative Assembly, after the preferred tenderer has been selected, the final cost‐benefit analysis, the estimated total cost to the ACT, and the delivery model for the Capital Metro project prior to the signing of any construction projects.
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