Infrastructure
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MICHAEL LESTER. Political Culture and the Limits of the APS Independent Inquiry.
There is an old saw that cautions politicians never to establish an enquiry unless they know the outcome beforehand. The Prime Minister appears to have learnt that lesson from the ‘can of worms’ exposed in his Royal Commission on Banking. Turnbull has announced an ‘independent inquiry’ into the future of the Australian Public Service (APS). Continue reading »
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GLEN SEARLE, CRYSTAL LEGACY. A closer look at business cases raises questions about ‘priority’ national infrastructure projects.
Infrastructure Australia’s latest infrastructure priority list has been criticised for being “too Sydney-centric” and for giving Melbourne’s East West Link, cancelled in 2014, “high priority” status. The cancelled Roe 8project in Perth was removed from the list. So how does a project get onto Infrastructure Australia’s list? This requires submission of a full business case, Continue reading »
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JOHN AUSTEN. Trouble in infrastructure paradise NSW revisited.
The mixed reception for the infrastructure works of NSW Premier the Hon. Gladys Berejiklian MP continues. It is mostly bad news punctuated by the odd piece of what the NSW Government considers good news. Continue reading »
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MARION TERRILL and DANIELLE WOOD. The infrastructure budget trap
The federal government has foreshadowed infrastructure ‘presents from Santa’ in next week’s budget. But unlike gifts from Santa, someone ultimately pays for infrastructure spending even if clever accounting hides it from the government’s bottom line. Continue reading »
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LAURIE PATTON. Vindicated: NBN Co. boss admits multi-technology mix (MTM) flaws.
The departing head of the trouble-plagued NBN, Bill Morrow, has finally come clean. He has finally conceded that reusing Telstra’s ageing copper wires is creating major problems. Continue reading »
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JOHN MENADUE. Media catch-up on Newcastle Port.
Drawing on a report from Deloitte yesterday, Matt Wade in several Fairfax newspapers breathlessly told us that restrictions on privatised ports was adding to Sydney’s gridlock. He added that the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission is now investigating the secret restrictions on Newcastle Port which were introduced when Port Botany and the port of Newcastle Continue reading »
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ANDREW HAMILTON. Clerical culture produces poor fruit.
In a recent ‘Eureka Street’ article, I remarked that in the Catholic Church clericalism is a pejorative term. I tried also to identify some of the attitudes and behaviour associated with people regarded as clericalist. The article sparked a lively conversation. Continue reading »
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JOHN AUSTEN – More on the Sydney transport mess-the Western Sydney dud ‘deal’
Announcement of a Western Sydney ‘city deal’ by the Prime Minister and Premier was touted as securing a rail line through Badgerys Creek airport. It does not. In fact, it merely committed to yet another review about what to do. That may turn out to be lucky for taxpayers and Sydney. Continue reading »
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QUENTIN DEMPSTER. Positions vacant: NBN Co’s ‘death seat’.
After Mike Quigley and Bill Morrow, who’s next for NBN Co’s CEO ‘death seat’? It can be called an executive death seat because the NBN’s business plan to start recouping the cost of the Turnbull government’s mis handled $49billion multi-technology mix (MTM) rollout has been shredded. Continue reading »
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PAUL BUDDE. The departure of Bill Morrow – what’s next?
In the running up of the development of the NBN in the years between 2007 and 2009 some 400 people from the industry were involved in providing input into the design of this new infrastructure, they included senior engineers of all the major telcos as well as experts in e-health, education, smart grids and the Continue reading »
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JOHN AUSTEN. Immigration and infrastructure.
While immigration – and a big Australia – is presented as the cause of infrastructure woe the real culprit is policy failure: deficient planning, bad structural arrangements and absence of road congestion pricing. Continue reading »
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ANNE HURLEY. Former Internet Australia directors support NSW Business Council call for a National Broadband Service Guarantee
Last year the NSW Business Chamber conducted a statewide survey of members. It has since called for changes it believes will help save business an average $9000 per year resulting from problems related to the NBN rollout. Four former directors of Internet Australia, the NFP peak body representing Internet users, have come out in support Continue reading »
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JOHN MENADUE. Cars, not immigration, are killing our cities.
This week on Four Corners many commentators blamed immigration for many of our ills. It was a diversionary tactic. I think that immigration is Australia’s great success story. Many of the problems that immigration cause are the result of policy failure in other areas like housing and transport. Continue reading »
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ANNE HURLEY. Questions should be asked about the Coalition Agreement and its potential impact on the NBN rollout in rural Australia?
Over the last few weeks we have been inundated with reports of the Barnaby Joyce saga. One aspect of the saga has involved a call for transparency in the provisions of the agreement between the Liberal Party and Nationals – the Coalition Agreement – pursuant to which they operate as the Government for all Australians. Continue reading »
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JOHN AUSTEN. We need a Metro public inquiry in NSW to sort out the railway mess
A recent opinion piece in the Sydney Morning Heaald effectively called for a stop to criticism of the NSW Government’s approach to Sydney railways – in particular Metro – and for everyone to get onboard the transport ‘revolution’. I can’t agree. Continue reading »
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HYLDA ROLFE. Summer of our disconnect. (Part 1 of 2)
Some National Parks in New South Wales are taking a beating. On occasion, it’s difficult to distinguish the businesses that are officially sanctioned in them from the activities usually undertaken in normal commercial venues. Should they be there at all? It is time to sort things out. Continue reading »
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The roads club is having a great spend.
Overspending on roads may be already damaging national productivity as well as adding to debt burdens of future generations. Continue reading »
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JOHN AUSTEN. NSW needs an inquiry into Sydney transport
A dreadful start to 2018 for Sydney transport made NSW Minister Constance the unwelcome centre of attention. The spotlight will turn to the Premier who was formerly the Minister for Transport. Continue reading »
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JOHN MENADUE. Infrastructure, rent-seekers and lobbyists.
As our mining boom has receded, Australia has seen unprecedented sums flow to transport infrastructure projects -mostly in our two biggest cities. But we have a real mess on our hands. Continue reading »
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JOHN AUSTEN. Newcastle port – some progress in undoing a privatisation fiasco
Pressure is mounting to overcome the ridiculous anti-competitive constraints on Newcastle port. Continue reading »
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LAURIE PATTON. Supporting call for innovation push – highlighting the need for a focussed approach including a national smart cities and communities strategy
We need our national innovation strategy to be targeted at solving identifiable problems and assessed according to its contribution to social benefit as well as economic outcomes. Continue reading »
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GEORGE RENNIE. The Revolving Door at the Infrastructure Club
The revolving door of politics represents a particularly difficult problem for modern democracies. And when senior public servants leave their positions to work as lobbyists for the infrastructure industry – an industry that takes a lion’s share of government spending, and is afforded substantive protection from scrutiny by “commercial confidentiality” – that problem grows substantially. Continue reading »
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MICHAEL McKINLEY. Defence policies and alliances have become a new religion. Part 5 of 5 : White Papers, Strategic Reviews, Papal Bulls and Encyclicals
Government pronouncements in Australia, especially in the fields of Strategy and National Security, it is claimed, are determined by scientific rationality and definitely not configured according to religious belief. This is both fraudulent and a dangerous conceit: religion, has not been banished; indeed, the present reeks of ecclesiastical history and religion (more specifically, its deformation, Continue reading »
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JOHN AUSTEN. Roads – another year of inaction and congestion-causing deficits
Spending on roads continues to vastly outstrip road revenues, increasing our national debt. This easy access to funding is why we spend too much on the wrong roads and has stopped road reform – as stated in a post in Pearls and Irritations last year: . Continue reading »
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ANNE HURLEY. The Government just doesn’t get it when it comes to the NBN debacle
As I was writing this article in response to Paul Budde’s speculation about life following the NBN roll-out in 2020, the Government released its response to the first report of the Joint Standing Committee on the NBN. Sadly, if predictably, the Government seems to still be clinging to the forlorn hope that somehow things will Continue reading »
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DYLAN McCONNELL. A month in, Tesla’s SA battery is surpassing expectations.
It’s just over one month since the Hornsdale power reserve was officially opened in South Australia. The excitement surrounding the project has generated acres of media interest, both locally and abroad. The aspect that has generated the most interest is the battery’s rapid response time in smoothing out several major energy outages that have occurred since it was installed. Continue reading »
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ANNE HURLEY. Bad advice: why Mr Turnbull’s NBN is such a failure
These days you can’t buy a new car without airbags and ABS brakes. The Internet of Things is transforming the way we live our lives, run our businesses and grow the crops that feed the world. We’re developing autonomous vehicles and there’s talk about travelling to Mars. Yet millions of Australians are being sold broadband Continue reading »
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JOHN MENADUE. The Ausgrid decision and the growing power of security and intelligence agencies. A REPOST from August 2016
The Ausgrid decision on Chinese investment raises two important issues. The first is how do we get a proper balance between security concerns and the wider benefits of the relationship. Our major strategic ally the US sees China our major economic partner as a rival and threat. Read about a recent discussion between Hugh Continue reading »
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LUKE FRASER. Is Sydney in thrall to an infrastructure cargo cult? (Part 3 of 3)
In the first two posts, the vast scale of Sydney major transport projects was estimated at $85 billion – a figure larger than all European spending on transport public private partnerships for the last five years; the posts also examined apparent strategic flaws in Sydney’s Westconnex and Metro projects which threaten poor returns and unhelpful Continue reading »
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LUKE FRASER. Good debt, bad debt: Poor infrastructure choices, no reform – and Lee Kuan Yew -A REPOST
In the Fairness, Opportunity, Security policy series and the resulting book, Dr Michael Keating AC and I wrote of Australia’s out-of-control transport infrastructure spending that: ‘It is scandalous that this investment escapes proper scrutiny, while at the same time the proponents are calling for cuts in other government programs, including education and training programs that Continue reading »
