Page 4352 - Week 13 - Thursday, 11 December 2014
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territory government has been to lead and to enable. The CBR innovation network is a very striking example of this combined public and private effort to accelerate innovation and growth and to maximise wealth creation for our community. Together we are transforming the ACT economy into an innovation ecosystem that supports company growth and job creation. There is much to do in this area.
Health is always the key to the security and comfort of Canberra families. The baby born with a disability, the sick child in the night, the anxious teen, the injured cyclist or motorist, the elderly person who faints or falls—all need to know that they will be cared for. In a good city and a good system this care should never rely on how much is in their wallet when they get hurt or when they arrive.
Today, Madam Speaker, health must be both generous and wise. This is critical to our fiscal future. An ageing society combines with modern habits of life to create huge pressures of chronic disease. If health spending is to be sustainable in the long term, investment in preventive health simply must accelerate. We will stay on this path. These are enduring priorities in social policy and major opportunities for economic growth.
Madam Speaker, we also have big projects to deliver in coming years. Capital metro is vital to Canberra’s economic future. I have been proud to be a member of a government which has invested in our first light rail system, and I will be enormously proud to lead the government that will deliver it. It is the right decision.
Our city needs jobs, and capital metro supports jobs. Our city needs investment, and capital metro supports investment. Our city needs a diverse, balanced economy, and capital metro supports a diverse, balanced economy. Our city needs growing returns on land, and capital metro supports growing returns on land. The business case estimates these economic benefits to be worth more than $1 billion to our city.
Alongside these economic dimensions, there are tremendous benefits for our community as a whole. I do not want this to be a city where the only work is white-collar and public service. We must never become a “no-degree, no-start” town. We need quality jobs for people with the widest range of modern skills. I do not want this to be a city that young people leave in search of a modern lifestyle. I do not want this to be a city that older people leave to find adaptable housing and a walkable, active place to live. One of my life’s great fortunes is that our extended family—retired parents, younger siblings and my beautiful niece—live here in Canberra, and I know this is an aspiration that so many families share.
I do not want this to be a city where it takes an hour to drive from Gungahlin to Civic, where the city to Russell to the airport corridor is a permanent bottleneck, where heavy traffic spills throughout the city’s south, while housing spreads ever further across the border to the east. I do not want this to be a city fuelled by petrol forever, and I do not want this to be a city forever designed around the motor car. Canberra is a jewel in 20th century urban design and Canberra can be a triumph of 21st century urban future—a clean-energy city where new jobs are renewable jobs.
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