NSW Roads Minister, Michael Daley, reaffirmed his commitment to the future construction of an M4 East at last month's Roads Australia Sixth National Roads Summit in Sydney.
The Minister, who was keynote speaker at the two-day event, told attendees he would ‘build it tomorrow’ if funding was available.
But with the global financial crisis wiping a forecast $10 billion off state government revenues - the equivalent cost of the project - and the availability of private funding still severely impacted, neither the Government nor the private sector was in a position to proceed at this point in time.
“I’m committed to building projects like the M4 East and the M5 East duplication, but we will find the solutions together and I’m determined to keep talking about them,” he said.
Notwithstanding, Mr Daley said there was good news for the road industry with the State Government’s record $4.4 billion 09/10 roads budget, coupled with the $7.5 billion in Federal funding it would manage over the next five years.
“This includes funding for major projects like the $1.7 billion Hunter Expressway as well as the continued upgrade of the iconic Pacific Highway,” the Minister said.
Mr Daley confirmed his openness to exploring different delivery models involving the private sector to ensure the best individual outcome for each major road project.
“The nature of commercial arrangements should be flexible. The job should determine the contract, not the other way around,” he said.
Mr Daley also indicated his support for the Alliance model “where it’s appropriate”.
“One of the things it does is share the work around, and I do like the philosophy of creating the right conditions in the road sector for smaller contractors to become medium contractors, and for medium contractors to grow and play with the big boys,” he said.
Mr Daley committed to continue working closely with the roads industry through Roads Australia on a range of issues, including greater certainty in the planning of projects.
This year’s National Road Summit, sponsored by RA members ARRB, SKM and Hyder, ran under the theme of Foresight and included presentations on congestion pricing and road financing, sustainability, Intelligent Transport Systems (ITS), the challenges and opportunities for delivering road projects in the current economic climate, and RA’s policy initiatives.
The presentations from the 2009 Summit will be sent directly to all registered attendees.
Submitted by Mark Bowmer on Friday August 7th 2009 12:25pm