Ms Catherine King (Ballarat, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government) Share this | Hansard source

I will just say a couple of things. Again, I think the member is being a bit broad in her interpretation of what the Prime Minister previously said, as that amendment is not exactly the same, and I think is being cute about that, to be honest.

The second thing is that Infrastructure Australia will not be undertaking cost-benefit analysis, but they will undertake an analysis of the cost-benefit analyses that have been done by states and territories and project proponents. They will not actually initiate a cost-benefit analysis themselves, because currently they are bogged down with assessing multiple project analyses that have been done and what we want them to be able to do is to have a consistent analysis, a consistent framework for the country—because there isn't one; it's very variable across projects and across states and territories. We also want to free them up to be able to lift the level of the way in which cost-benefit analysis is done in this country—and that is their role; that is what we're trying to get them to do—rather than undertaking cost-benefit analysis on every single project themselves. So they will be evaluating whether the work on a project that has been done actually meets the quality of a cost-benefit analysis and then whether it is worthy of or available for Commonwealth investment. That is their role. You are changing the role and changing the bill in what you're actually asking to be done, so we won't be supporting that.

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