Chief Minister Andrew Barr: “If you were to ask Canberrans what their infrastructure priorities are, and unsurprisingly we have, the health system, the hospital, comes out well ahead of other things.” Photo: Michelle Kroll.
Chief Minister Andrew Barr remains convinced that “big, flashy” announcements such as a stadium by the lake and a new town centre will not cut it with an electorate focused on bread-and-butter issues such as health.
Mr Barr was speaking at the end of the first week of the official campaign in which Labor stuck to small local announcements while the Canberra Liberals unveiled their plans for 125,000 more dwellings in the ACT by 2050 – 100,000 of which would be in a new town centre to be developed at Kowen Forest, in the east of the ACT near the NSW border.
The “bold and ambitious” town centre plan and pledge to build a 30,000-seat stadium at Acton Waterfront have dominated the media, but Mr Barr said voters were rightly sceptical of promises that may not be able to be kept.
“People take with a grain of salt big, flashy infrastructure announcements, particularly when they perceive them to be undeliverable or unrealistic,” he said.
Labor research had shown clearly that Canberrans wanted practical and deliverable projects, particularly in health.
“We are very focused on thousands and thousands of individual conversations at a grassroots level on telling a story about infrastructure, obviously,” Mr Barr said.
“But the big issue is health.”
At the Region leaders’ debate, Mr Barr was quick to name the Northside Hospital as Labor’s priority project in its well-canvassed infrastructure pipeline.
“That’s why we set aside the money in the forward estimates, that’s pretty critical,” Mr Barr said.
“If you were to ask Canberrans what their infrastructure priorities are, and unsurprisingly we have, the health system, the hospital, comes out well ahead of other things.”
Mr Barr said the Liberals’ Kowen Forest proposal would create a dormitory suburb with no employment base disconnected from the rest of Canberra, saying most of it would be closer to Bungendore than Canberra.
That was why the government ruled it out as a development prospect five years ago.
He said the economics of developing a town centre there on challenging terrain also did not add up.
“There won’t be an affordable component there because it’s so expensive to develop, to get all of the infrastructure necessary out there will be a massively costly exercise,” he said.
Mr Barr said there were numerous examples where additional housing could plug into existing infrastructure close to existing employment and transport.
He flagged Labor had more announcements to make in the coming weeks on housing and urban renewal precincts.
Mr Barr also criticised the Liberals’ plan to sell discounted land to first-home buyers, saying it would deliver an unearned windfall gain unless you were going to tie them to that block forever.
At resale the price would jump to reflect the current market.
“Our view is that long-term build to rent is a better way to ensure that housing remains affordable for the long-term, not just for the benefit of the first buyer,” Mr Barr said.
He said the Liberals appeared to want to bulldoze nearly everything and set aside all good planning and environmental principles, and the Greens were against almost any new suburban expansion.
“Labor’s position is to strike an appropriate balance to do so after a thorough investigation of the suitability of areas and look for a practical way forward,” he said.
“Our city will continue to grow, but there are obviously limits to our city footprint.”
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