City Deal falls short
Hobart has for a long time held high hopes for the City Deal. It was seen as a way of transforming the city. But it seems like a grand opportunity has been missed.
Opinion
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PRIME Minister Scott Morrison flew into Hobart yesterday morning, signed what was sold as a “$1.43 billion City Deal” and quickly flew out again. So brief was his visit, that he didn’t even leave the environs of the airport.
Hobart has for a long time held high hopes for the City Deal. It was seen as a way of transforming the city. Projects floated as potentially being part of the deal have included a University of Tasmania STEM Centre for the City, an Antarctic Precinct, Macquarie Point, the Northern Suburbs Light rail. The deal was touted as a once-in-a-lifetime chance to rethink our city.
As it turns out, the two major initiatives under the City Deal seem somewhat remote from the idea of transforming the city of Hobart: the already-announced replacement of the Bridgewater Bridge and money to revamp Antarctic stations.
Those two projects account for more than 70 per cent of the money committed under the City Deal. That leaves around $400 million in spending over 10 years.
The State Government is on the hook for more than $214 million of this amount. There $100 million — already announced — to move the sewerage treatment works from Macquarie Point and $105 million for transport initiatives over 10 years. Many were state election promises.
Local councils are chipping in $50 million. The Federal Government’s contribution outside of the Bridgewater Bridge and the Antarctic station revamp amounts for around $137 million over 10 years: $30 million for affordable housing, $25 million from the Urban Congestion Fund and $82 million to upgrade facilities at Hobart Airport to enable the hope of international flights to be pursued.
Outside of the Antarctic spending and the Bridgewater Bridge, the City Deal announced yesterday amounts to a spending injection from the federal government of an average of less than $14 million dollars a year.
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The Federal Government delivers around $1.3 billion dollars a year in specific purpose payments to Tasmania — mostly for health and education. The infrastructure component of this amounts to around $150 million a year. Contrast that $14 million a year to the $118 million in additional federal spending promised by the Liberal Party in the seat of Braddon alone during the last election campaign.
The negotiation of this City Deal has taken a long time and it will be some time yet before we are able to see all of the detail surrounding the funding announcements made over the last few days and signed off on yesterday.
Few of the high hopes that were held out for the City Deal appear to have been fulfilled. What remains appears to be a combination of feasibility investigations, old commitments and the rebranding of spending that were inevitable infrastructure announcements.
It remains to be seen how much of the money will show up in the Federal Budget in April, or in the nine budgets following that. Disappointingly, it seems like a grand opportunity to set our city on the path for the future has been missed.
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