The future of some road and rail projects could be in jeopardy as the federal government vows to review the country’s infrastructure pipeline.
Infrastructure Minister Catherine King said a 90-day review of the Infrastructure Investment Program would be undertaken.
The review, led by a panel that specialises in land transport infrastructure, will not look at projects already under construction or election pledges made by the Labor government.
The infrastructure pipeline is worth $120 billion and has 738 projects, 162 of which have a government commitment of $5 million or less.
That is in comparison to 146 projects when Labor was last in power a decade ago.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said no funding cuts would happen in next week’s budget and the goal was to make the infrastructure pipeline more sustainable.
He accused the former government of using the pipeline as a means of pork barrelling.
“We want to make sure that the sort of disasters that have occurred, whereby projects that might have cost hundreds of millions of dollars, had yet $80 million or $50 million attached to them with no prospect of it being included,” he told reporters on Monday.
“Projects were being announced with no consultation with state governments, with no state government funding, that couldn’t possibly be delivered.”
Ms King said the pipeline was clogged and many projects were delayed and subject to overruns.
“A lot of them are completely underfunded, there’s billions of dollars that are needed to actually deliver all of the projects in the pipeline,” she told ABC Radio.
“That’s new money we would have to find and we’re just simply not in a position to be able to say today can we deliver each and every one of those projects and have we got enough money to do so.”
The minister said she did not know the number of projects that could go, but the review would be made public.
“What I want to have very detailed knowledge of is with every single project that’s in that pipeline at the moment, can it be delivered?” Ms King said.
Nationals leader David Littleproud accused the government of using the review as a smokescreen for further budget cuts.
“You’ve got to ask the question about the sincerity of Catherine King in this government. This is about setting up a budget that regional Australia pay,” he told Sky News.
“If the road and rail infrastructure isn’t right and to get product from a paddock to your plate, or onto a ship, then the bills aren’t paid and your cost of living goes up.”
Opposition infrastructure spokeswoman Bridget McKenzie hit out at the review, saying the government’s “razor gangs” would be cutting critical infrastructure projects.
“Continually cutting back on infrastructure projects will be a handbrake on economic growth and a barrier to driving national efficiencies needed to support budget repair and tackling inflation,” she said.
“At the very time when the government budget repair strategy should be to invest in productivity enhancing capital and cut back on unnecessary recurrent expenditure, Labor seem determined to do the opposite, dooming the nation to a slow and painful recovery.”
State and territory governments agreed to support the review at a meeting of national cabinet, with local governments to be consulted as the government considers priority projects and their ability to be delivered.
By Andrew Brown and Tess Ikonomou in Canberra
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