James Stevens (Sturt, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Yesterday we saw the latest development in a concerning narrative from the government around infrastructure funding. The front page of the Australian Financial Review indicated that the government are going to change their approach to infrastructure funding with the states and, where it is national productive infrastructure, they'll move away from the 80 per cent-20 per cent model. This is going to have an enormous impact in my home state of South Australia. In particular, it means that the Truro Bypass Project is now almost certain to be scrapped in South Australia because of both the 80-20 change and also because it seems the government will not fund projects worth less than $250 million. As it stands, this project is around $200 million.

The Truro bypass will get heavy freight out of suburban Adelaide. It will lead to the implementation of the Greater Adelaide Freight Bypass. I think Adelaide's the only capital city in the nation where Highway 1 runs through the suburbs of the city. Portrush Road, which is also Highway 1, runs through the heart of my electorate. For most of my life I've lived within a few hundred metres of Portrush Road. I and anyone who lives in the eastern suburbs of Adelaide knows how significant a burden on traffic it is, but also what a high safety risk it is having all of this enormously heavy freight, most of it destined either for Port Adelaide or the northern suburbs of Adelaide, coming through the suburbs.

The Truro bypass would mean that we could move all that heavy freight out of suburban Adelaide and send it back around the Adelaide Hills to connect into Port Adelaide or the northern suburbs of Adelaide, perhaps onto other freight destinations north or west of continental Australia. It was something that we eagerly anticipated. It has been funded, and the state Labor government, of all people, have it in their budget and were expecting that promise to be honoured by the government. Now it seems that promise is going to be broken.

I hope the Labor government decide to fund the project by however much they need to themselves, because even if federal government funding is cruelly ripped out of this project, it is still such a vital project for South Australia that it must go ahead, even if that means 100 per cent funding from the South Australian state government.

The Truro bypass is absolutely vital for the infrastructure of South Australia, so for the Albanese government to make these changes and rip this funding out of South Australia, directly impacting my constituents in Sturt by seeing this heavy freight continue to rumble through Portrush Road and through suburban Adelaide, is absolutely disgraceful. It needs to be condemned. South Australian Labor members of this government need to stand up to the Prime Minister and say, 'Don't rip that money out of South Australia.'