Seven years later, Labor said ship lift work is set to begin

Darwin’s long-awaited ship lift project is set to begin, the government has promised, seven year after it was first announced. Read why it was delayed.

Dredging work for the Darwin shiplift construction is expected to begin this month after the NT government awarded the head contract to the joint venture partners seven years after the project was first proposed.

Clough-BMD chief executives joined Treasurer Eva Lawler at East Arm on Friday morning to announce final contracts had been signed.

But it was left to NT Infrastructure Commissioner Louise McCormick to try and explain why the shiplift project had taken seven years to get off the ground.

Clough chief executive Peter Bennett, BMD Group chief executive and Territory Development Minister Eva Lawler.

“For a project as complex as the ship lift project, assessment is very detailed and we need to undertake our due diligence to make sure that we have the right partner, the right equipment and the right design for this project,” Ms McCormick said.

The government hoped defence boats would be serviced in the first quarter of 2025, with the remainder of the facility operating by 2027.

Six months of the delay was caused by Clough Group, one of the joint-venture partner‘s, being placed into voluntary administration late last year, resulting in a buy-out by Italian company Webuild, which recommitted to the shiplift project.

Ms Lawler said the project would cost $515m but that would not all be borne by Clough-BMD.

Images of how the new Darwin ship lift will look

“Some of that has been purchased by the Northern Territory government so we’ve got some early lead time around some of the purchases there,” she said.

“We’ve also spent about $15m on upgrades to head works at East Arm.

“Over the past 12 months, we have been working hard to ensure construction can begin as soon as the head contract is awarded.”

A workforce of about 250 people will build the ship lift with about 100 workers onsite through the process.

It will be 26m wide and 103m long, with capacity to lift 5500 tonne vessels.

A computer mock up of the planned ship lift at East Arm. Picture: Glenn Campbell

Military vessels will be the first to use the new infrastructure.

Ms McCormick said the 20 hectare site had been secured from previous owner Paspaley through a land swap agreement.

Opposition Leader Lia Finocchiaro said the NT government had released 37 press releases and associated media opportunities about the project, raising community expectations of action when there was nothing to report and the project cost had blown-out from $100m to $515m.

Opposition Leader Lia Finocchiaro said the government should build the ship lift and stop announcing it. Picture: Pema Tamang Pakhrin

Ms Finocchiaro said the government should stop reannouncing the project and actually start building.

“This isn’t the government’s money it’s Territorians, and they deserve to know why they keep paying for nothing more than 37 expensive press releases and photo opportunities,” she said.

“Astonishingly, late last year when the CLP referred the ship lift spend to the Public Accounts Committee so proper scrutiny could be applied, the Chief Minister publicly said the committee would not review the project, completely ignoring the fact that the PAC is meant to act independently without interference.

“For a project that was meant to be operational by the end of 2022 the time for scrutiny is well overdue, it’s time for Natasha Fyles to come clean.”