Melbourne’s high-capacity train builder has worked with North Korea’s Kim Jong Un
VICTORIA has hired dictator Kim Jong Un’s train builder to supply its advanced new $2 billion high-capacity fleet.
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VICTORIA has hired dictator Kim Jong Un’s train builder to supply its advanced new $2 billion fleet.
The Changchun Railway Vehicles built rolling stock for the despised North Korean dictator’s Pyongyang metro and also for the Tehran metro in Iran.
The Chinese-state owned company will build the shells of 65 new trains in Beijing, which will then be assembled in Victoria.
Public Transport Minister Jacinta Allan signed the contract — which was Victoria’s biggest ever order of trains — with the Evolution Rail Consortium led by Engineering firm EDI Downer in November last year.
But a parliamentary inquiry heard that EDI Downer has had a chequered history of delivering train projects in Australia — being fined for delivering one project over budget and late.
Liberal MP Tim Smith said at a parliamentary inquiry the Chanchung Railway Vehicles company had little experience building trains in Australia.
“Have they only built train for Tehran and Pyongyan,” Mr Smith said.
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Ms Allan told the Public Accounts and Estimate Committee the train contractor would provide 60 per cent of the work done in Victoria and that Downer EDI was well known in Australian train manufacturing.
But Downer EDI built the trouble plagued $3.5 billion Waratah trains project for NSW government in 2011, which came in over budget and about 18 months late.
Liberal MP David Morris said the supplier seemed to have a “bad track record” delivering large-scale train infrastructure projects.
Ms Allan said the “Rolling Stock” division in the Transport Department would ensure local content and performance targets were being met throughout the life of the contract.
Ms Allan said the high-capacity project would create 1100 jobs, with trains rolling out each year from 2018 until the Melbourne Metro project’s completion in 2026.
She said since 2011 the NSW government had granted a contract to Downer EDI to build a further $1.7 billion worth of trains.
Public Transport Victoria chief executive Jeroen Weimar said extensive reference checks were done with the NSW government and independent engineering firms advice
“The Changchun Railway Vehicles Company is the world’s largest train manufacturer. They have built successful projects across the US, Europe and Australia,” Mr Weimar said.
He said the company would only receive funds from the government if the trains met quality standards.
The high-capacity trains will be 20 per cent longer than the existing fleet and run through the to be completed metro tunnel on the Cranbourne-Pakenham line.