The AFR View

Projects culled, but it’s the same old lack of discipline

Catherine King has cleaned up a project pile-up that took a decade to accumulate. But there is nothing in place to stop it happening again.

Nov 16, 2023 – 6.01pm

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Fast rail, highways, port access and more than a few commuter car parks bit the dust on Thursday. Infrastructure Minister Catherine King has reshuffled the infrastructure project deck, scrapping 50 projects to pay for blowouts in others, while keeping everything inside the same $80 billion-over-a-decade budget cost envelope for existing projects.

But the long-awaited review led by top bureaucrat Mike Mrdak called for a total of 82 projects to go, and it isn’t known which were the 32 to be spared, or why.

The Australian Financial Review’s succinct take on the principles at stake in major domestic and global stories – and what policy makers should do about them.