Jamie Briggs (Mayo, Liberal Party, Assistant Minister for Infrastructure and Regional Development) Share this | Hansard source

You can see why he had so much support among the Labor branches. The contender is back and he is working hard. He is available if they are ready; there is no question—big speeches in the parliament. Unfortunately, like usual with the member for Grayndler, there is not much truth to the delivery. He gives a good speech but he does not actually give much truth in the speech. We will correct some of the false assertions that he has made and we will put on record exactly what this government is doing and why this could Prime Minister will be remembered as the infrastructure Prime Minister.

We will start with Labor's record because the member for Grayndler wanted to make much of it. He wanted to make much of his new-found love of cost-benefit analysis. Some do not remember, but the member for Grayndler was Deputy Prime Minister for a short period. But, during that time, he was also Minister for Communications. In fact, he claims that it was a golden era in communications policy. I think that is his claim. The only problem with the member for Grayndler's new-found love of cost-benefit analysis and economic analysis of government spending on infrastructure projects is he refused to allow Infrastructure Australia—or anyone for that matter—to do a cost-benefit analysis on the NBN. There was no cost-benefit analysis on the biggest spend on an infrastructure project in Australia's history. We are a bit sceptical about the genuine commitment from the member for Grayndler about cost-benefit analysis and economic assessments of projects before they are funded by government.

In respect of Labor's record when they were in government when it came to infrastructure, the first point we should make is that the Business Council of Australia's report card on Labor's stimulus package made it very clear that during that time that they increased spending. We remember the money they inherited from the Howard-Costello era that they spent during the GFC, the member for Lilley. Fourteen per cent of that money was spent on economic infrastructure. The rest of that money was spent on free money—the $900-cheques. The Pink Batts program was infrastructure under Labor as were overpriced school halls.

The member for Grayndler is fond of referring to the Global Competitiveness Index. We went and had a look at the Global Competitiveness Index and we looked at how Australia has performed. In 2007, the 2008-09 report of the global competitiveness index ranked Australia's overall quality of infrastructure as 25th in the world. In 2013, in the 2014-15 report, we dropped 10 places to 35th—that was during Labor's period in office. The IMD World Competitiveness Centre, in its yearbook, ranked Australia fifth best on basic infrastructure in 2007. By 2013, we had dropped to 22nd. In 2015, we are back to 18th. We have got work to do and we are doing that work.

What we have seen since we came to government, in last year's budget and in this year's budget, is some nearly $17 billion more spending over the forward estimates on infrastructure than Labor would have spent had they been re-elected.

The member for Grayndler is fond of claiming that there are no new projects in the budget. That is completely false. In fact, there are 85 or nearly 95 new projects under this government. We are focused on building more infrastructure for more jobs and a stronger Australia. The projects that are new and funded by this government include: WestConnex stage 2; the Perth Freight Link, a very exciting project in Western Australia, and there will be more to say about that project in the coming weeks—

Ms MacTiernan interjecting—

I knew I would get the member for Perth going on that one. It was just a little fly-fishing exercise. Chuck her 20c and there you go. The North-South Corridor; the Darlington project, which, the member for Grayndler at one point said was a low priority project. We are funding that and the Torrens to Torrens project and we will have more to say about South Australia in the coming weeks. The Toowoomba bypass project is a project the member for Grayndler has never liked, has never supported. We know the Queensland government is working away on producing that and there will be announcements. There will be $1.2 billion spent on that project. The member for Grayndler does actually support the Western Sydney Infrastructure Plan as do some sitting on the backbench but the member for Chifley is not one who supports this.

There will be $3½ billion worth of roads in Western Sydney along with a new airport, the Western Sydney airport, the first airport in Western Sydney, delivered by the infrastructure Prime Minister. We have doubled the Roads to Recovery money with $350 million of new funding. We have doubled the Black Spots Program with $200 million of new funding. There will be $3 billion in a locked box to build the East West Link project. We want to do that because Infrastructure Australia's audit rightly identified—just like Sir Rod Eddington did and just like the Leader of the Opposition did twice in two submissions—Melbourne needs an additional east-west crossing.

As for public transport projects, we are funding public transport projects. We are funding the Sydney Rapid Transit Project, which will be a second harbour rail crossing and which will increase the public transport system's capacity by 60 per cent. We are contributing funding to that project. We are committing funding to infrastructure projects right across Australia and we have more to come. We will have more to come through the Asset Recycling initiative. The Victorian government will shortly announce their intentions with the Melbourne port; there will be a new infrastructure project out of that. We very much welcome the decision of the Western Australian government to sell the Fremantle port. There will be new infrastructure projects from that decision. The South Australian government has signed up to the Asset Recycling initiative, and we welcome that decision. Obviously, the New South Wales government will get first-mover advantage with the lease of its electricity assets and it will spend billions of dollars on new infrastructure projects.

We are getting on and building infrastructure projects right across the country. In the member for Bradfield's electorate, we are building the NorthConnex project.

Mr Albanese interjecting—

This is the thing with the member for Grayndler: he was very good at announcing his intention to do things, but he was not any good at delivering the projects. He was good at delivering things like the pink batts program and overpriced school halls but not real infrastructure. We are spending billions of dollars in the cities; we are spending billions of dollars in the regions; we are doing it to improve Australia.

We are also reforming the system. The Productivity Commission report last year made recommendations about how we could improve infrastructure delivery across the country, and we are working with the states to do just that. We have improved the operations of Infrastructure Australia—we made them truly independent for the first time. No longer does the minister appoint the CEO at his whim, as the member for Grayndler did last time.

Mr Albanese interjecting—

Let's understand what he did last time, Mr Deputy Speaker. The Labor minister appointed someone heavily associated with the Labor Party for five years. Then two months before the election he brought forward the next five-year contract—he gave him five years two months before an election—so let's not have this tripe that we hear from the member for Grayndler about true independence from Infrastructure Australia. That was delivered by the 'infrastructure' Prime Minister. Infrastructure Australia has got on with the audit of—

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