The Hon Mark Birrell Infrastructure Australia Chairman the Hon Mark Birrell provides his observations on the outlook for Australia’s infrastructure market, and how the reformed Infrastructure Australia will bring a much stronger focus to the principal constraint facing infrastructure in Australia: funding. Key points: •
Infrastructure Australia’s new structure better provides the resources and independence needed. • The national infrastructure audit will be released by year’s end, providing the first robust top-down assessment of national requirement. • The audit will be used to develop a robust 15-year national infrastructure plan. • Beyond the audit and plan, Infrastructure Australia will bring a stronger focus on process, regulatory and structural reform to infrastructure markets.
Our nation needs a period of good policymaking and substantial reform if Australians are to secure the real benefits they seek from the infrastructure of today and tomorrow. Infrastructure is fundamental to the national economy, and it underpins both economic and social wellbeing. It helps to define our national identity, because our infrastructure aspirations are a reflection of our ambition as a country. Australia is already acknowledged as having one of the world’s most sophisticated infrastructure and construction sectors. Correctly so, given our national legacy of past reforms to the procurement and regulation of infrastructure assets, and especially the creation of infrastructure markets. But it is increasingly obvious to users, providers and policymakers that infrastructure reform must go further. There is now something of a national consensus that infrastructure is an economic and social policy opportunity that Australia has to seize during this decade. 16
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Volume 5 Number 1
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