[Greens-Media] Government still can't say how much channel deepening will cost

[Amanda.Sharp at parliament.vic.gov.au]

6 February 2008

Government still can’t say how much channel deepening will cost

Greens MLC Sue Pennicuik asked the state treasurer today whether the
government had a final cost estimate and financing strategy for channel
deepening. In response, the treasurer described the costs of channel
deepening as ‘a moving feast’, saying that the government will 'monitor the
costs'.

"It seems that the standard answer to both the environmental and economic
problems with the channel deepening is to 'monitor' them", said Ms
Pennicuik.

 "With the giant dredger the Queen of the Netherlands, sitting in the Port
with its meter ticking over at $250,000 dollars a day, and new costs
associated with the latest environmental management plan, the cost of
channel deepening is already exceeding $969 million. The bill for the
project will tick over $1 billion any day now and it won’t stop there", she
said.

"The best the government can come up with is a mere $2 billion return over
20 years, although just who will receive any such return is unclear."

"With the bill likely to blow out to more than $1 billion before too long,
the question is 'at what stage does this project become economically
unviable, if it’s not already?' " Ms Pennicuik asked.

"It’s appalling that dredging is about to begin and we still don’t know how
much it will cost or who will pay for it. The government has never put
forward anything more than bald assertions to justify channel deepening.
That’s why I have moved to have the economic case for channel deepening
assessed by the new upper house Committee on Finance and Public
Administration", she said.

The cost of channel deepening has been rising exponentially.In 2001, the
cost was estimated at around $230m, in 2004, it rose from $337m in June to
$545 m in September, in March 2007 the Port said it would cost $763 million
and the latest cost estimate – made before the latest version of the
Environmental Management Plan was released, is now estimated by the
government to be $969 million.

"The government has always maintained that its support for channel
deepening is dependent on a sound financing strategy, which has never been
sighted", she added.

Further information: Sue Pennicuik 0407 000 270

Parliament of Victoria Notice: 

The information contained in this email  including any attachments, may be confidential and/or privileged. If you are not the intended recipient, please notify the sender and delete it from your system. Any unauthorised disclosure, copying or dissemination of all or part of this email, including any attachments, is not permitted. This email, including any attachments, should be dealt with in accordance with copyright and  privacy legislation. Except where otherwise stated, views expressed are those of the individual sender.