Thanks, Anna, what a privilege to be here, following the Prime Minister with so many distinguished speakers and guests. Thanks, Simon and your team from this beautiful airport.
Can I also acknowledge the traditional owners, the Dharug people, and thank the Telegraph for hosting such an important discussion about the future of Western Sydney.
I’m very proud to stand here in Western Sydney and see a sea change in this community, both in the built environment and in how Western Sydney is perceived by Australia, Australians and people from around the world.
And that is, as a thriving, energetic and optimistic community of hard working families and entrepreneurs with the belief that whatever life throws up at them, no matter how hard and how difficult, they’ll beat it and be stronger for the experience.
For the first time in generations, we’re seeing new developments, housing developments and opportunities in Western Sydney communities that perhaps would never have been contemplated 30 or 40 years ago.
The numbers are staggering. For example, my government is spending in Western Sydney on infrastructure a whopping $30 billion over our forward estimates.
I’ve got no doubt that this would not have happened without a concerted and persistent campaign from The Daily Telegraph focusing, in particular, on Western Sydney, that began with their landmark ‘Fair Go for the West’ campaign, which I think was launched in 2014.
That focus and repeated follow ups in the paper and online has seen governments of both political persuasions have their feet held to the fire when it comes to making sure that communities are both liveable and have access to world class infrastructure.
Not a second class set of a future for this beautiful part of the world.
Because these suburbs are not just places where families travel from but live in. With access to jobs, schools, hospitals and amenities like parks, all while being able to access the rest of our beautiful city.
I’m proud to say that our government has been able to write the next chapter in this book, and I’d humbly say, it’s a long read.
Where we meet today, a magnificent new international airport.
Three brand new metro lines that feed into Western Sydney communities, with an additional 25 metro stations, connecting Parramatta to the City, the Northwest to the Southwest, and opening up this brand new airport to the rest of Sydney.
$7 billion for better roads at 15th avenue to this airport at Mamre Road, Henry Lawson Drive, Home Bush Bay Drive, Richmond Road and Garfield Road.
A new Riverside theatre and a new arts centre for Campbelltown, and as of today, a fully completed Powerhouse Museum, one of the biggest museums in the entire world, ready to welcome 2 million visitors to Parramatta.
I have to say, though, that sleek infrastructure, which looks amazing on a pamphlet, spectacular on a digital artist’s impression and eye catching on a media release, is only part of the infrastructure story for Western Sydney, and it’s the glossy part.
What’s been neglected in Western Sydney communities for too long is the elementary infrastructure that provides the must have services every community needs.
The schools, the hospitals, the essential suburban roads that make life bearable and provide the services that a suburb of families desperately need.
If you get on the Sydney Metro heading northwest, and you ride it to the end of the line, you hit the suburb called Tallawong.
Tallawong is a Dharug word, and it means apple gum tree. And until recently, when you were there, that’s all you saw apple gum trees.
Now that’s all about to change, and a decade on, when the area has been rezoned for thousands of residential homes, it’s a completely transformed community.
Now I’m not going to knock that decision, we needed to do it.
And in a city like Sydney, the second most expensive city on Earth, young families jumped at the prospect of moving into these beautiful new communities.
When they paid their deposit, Tallawong was still a paddock on the edge of town.
A school was promised, but unfortunately, never delivered.
And when the change of government occurred in 2023 the kids of Tallawong were learning into mountains that were located in playgrounds of the neighbouring school in Riverstone.
But I’m happy to say, thanks to the tenacity of the Parents and Friends Committee at the school and the enterprising persistence of the Deputy Premier and the Minister for Education – and can I also say, a proud Westie, Prue Car – Tallawong Public School finally opened its gates last week.
I was there on the first day with Prue, the first day on a new term. And let me tell you, I’ve never seen kids so happy to turn up to school on the first day after a holiday.
And I think the reason for that was that a permanent school facility had finally taken place.
Tallawong is not just a housing development, it’s a community.
And now they’re going to be the first generation to build in that community.
We believe that should have happened far sooner.
Last week, many of you may have seen that the ICAC published a report into school infrastructure, and it found that public servants have been directed to change population data with the effect, and I quote, “of diverting funds away from the northwest and southwest of Sydney and those educational corridors.”
It wasn’t just Tallawong. It was Gregory Hills, Melonba, Nirimba Fields, new suburbs all across the southwest and the northwest of Sydney, where the population has grown – get this – by 500%.
But the truth is, the infrastructure didn’t follow. Now we’re talking about the must haves, the basic expectations of life in a civilised, wealthy society like ours in Australia.
In 2021, 6000 people lived in Box Hill. When the new housing developments are complete, there will be 42,000.
Recently, a young woman who lived in Box Hill named Mikayla told me her story.
As many young people do, Mikayla had moved into the suburb after happily falling pregnant.
One night, at four o’clock in the morning, she began giving birth. And because she lived in Box Hill, and because there was no maternity ward nearby, she had to drive to Westmead, along old Windsor Road, which could take up to an hour even early in the morning.
Now it was close, but she got there. And in the end of a terrifying drive, she arrived at Westmead, and Mikayla had a little baby daughter.
A nearby hospital at Rouse Hill had been promised – get this – for 12 years.
And I’m pleased to announce that we’ve cut the red tape, allocated the money, and Rouse Hill Hospital is finally under construction.
And with the support of the federal government, the Albanese government, it will include a full maternity ward so that new mums don’t have the same experiences as Mikayla on that traumatising drive for what is essential care for every community.
I think it’s important that we remember these stories when we talk about the future of Western Sydney.
If you don’t have a school to send your kids to, if you’re worried about giving birth on the side of a road, if you’re sitting in traffic all morning along Fifteenth Avenue, then those plans, the plans for a city like this, have a massive hole in them.
We’re currently delivering the biggest infrastructure program over a four-year period in the history of New South Wales for Western Sydney.
It means eight brand new high schools and seven brand new public primary schools built from scratch just in those growth corridors alone.
That includes a new high school in Jordan Springs, which topped out just yesterday.
It includes 49 new public preschools, six of which will be in Campbelltown, five in Liverpool, five in Leppington. 90% of them are currently under construction.
And I’ve met a lot of the builders, most of whom are from Western Sydney, that are hard at work building those new public preschools, and they’re doing an incredible job.
When it comes to healthcare, it’s a new hospital in Rouse Hill, a new hospital in Bankstown, 10 other major hospital upgrades, including big developments in Canterbury and Fairfield.
Plus, 1100 nurses, 300 doctors and 73 paramedics to staff these beautiful new hospitals.
These are the essentials, but you need to provide the funds, and they need to be done just right.
We’re battling difficult times for families right now, the Middle East conflict, rising inflation, rising interest rates, increases to the family budget as a result of fuel escalating, all put massive pressure on Western Sydney families.
And that’s particularly tough for what is statistically a young community with lots of families in there.
I think it’s important to inject a note of reality or caution when it comes to spending also.
Governments, both here and around the world, are battling higher borrowing costs alongside eye watering debt accumulated partly through the pandemic and partly in the run up to the last state election.
As a result, we need to be somewhat wary of undoubtedly well meaning, but sometimes naive promises made about new projects without identifying how they’ll be built and how they’ll be paid for.
You’ve probably heard that familiar refrain, you can’t afford not to do it, or sure, it’s a large sum, but in the end, it’ll actually save you money.
Now that’s all well and good, and sometimes those arguments do make sense, but we do need to ask the question, is this code for bending accounting rules and worrying about the costs later on?
Because that’s how your state, your budget, your government gets into serious trouble.
Money borrowed must be paid back, and whilst everyone wants to hand over life changing infrastructure to the next generation, we can’t, at the same time, hand over a mortgage that cannot be paid off by young Australians who live in Western Sydney and other parts of the state.
It would be the worst inheritance of all.
So where does that leave us. Not with blanket opposition to new builds, or an end to the infrastructure pipeline that’s critical for Sydney’s growth and the enabling infrastructure that enables new houses to be built.
What it means is that when a new infrastructure idea is advocated, the question on everybody’s lips should be, look, it sounds great, but tell me how we’re going to pay for it.
You’re not being a killjoy or a party pooper when you ask these fundamental questions.
It’s essential in ensuring that infrastructure is sustainable and that there is a long term plan for deliverable projects that will continue to drive not just Western Sydney’s economy, but Australia’s economy.
For me, I’m determined to lead a government that has a reputation for delivering what it promises.
To be frank, that’s particularly important for a state Labor government and a Labor Premier with many having memories, particularly in Western Sydney, of phantom projects that were announced but never delivered.
The public’s entitled to know that if it’s promised, it is coming, and the truth is, we don’t have a choice.
We have to deliver.
Because if we break our promises, if we encourage people to move to new suburbs, if we ask them to make the biggest investment in their lives on a town or a suburb or a community and then yank the rug out from underneath them, they’ll lose faith in a growing city.
And they’ll lose faith in governments of all political persuasions.
You’d have also seen that we’ve consciously made a decision to build more houses closer to the city, so all that wasn’t being piled in the Western Sydney suburbs.
Now that’s obviously annoyed some people, often they live closer to the city.
But we did it to give these communities, particularly in Western Sydney, a chance to breathe. A chance to establish themselves, and most importantly, a chance to catch up on much needed infrastructure.
We need to go beyond the idea that these suburbs are just places to commute from, to leave, as if they’re satellites orbiting around a much bigger central city.
Today, we’ve seen the Powerhouse Museum at Parramatta officially finished construction.
For young kids growing up, that museum will say you can live in Parramatta, you can live in Western Sydney, and you don’t have to travel into the city or to other cities to see amazing exhibitions.
Last week, on the first day of Tallawong primary, one of the parents said that his child was so excited she’d started dreaming about the new school.
It’s hard to dream about a demountable classroom on a basketball court, and the truth is we need to do better.
We can help our kids dream big, particularly kids here in Western Sydney.
We can give them the best start in life.
We can give them a chance to write their own chapter in the history of the best city on Earth.
Thanks so much.
