Mr SHORTEN (Maribyrnong—Leader of the Opposition) (12:20): Well, Mr Speaker, the Prime Minister summoned us all in here, and, as those 18 minutes ticked by, as we all moved further onto the edge of our seats, as he talked at length about the government's bold new plan to study a review into an inquiry strategy, I found myself thinking, 'I miss Warren Truss.' I can assure you that five minutes into that presentation was not the most exciting time to be an Australian. Of course we recognise that infrastructure is fundamental to the future of our nation, but it has taken this government nine months to respond to one report. And all they are offering is a review, a discussion paper and a study. This Prime Minister is fast becoming the mirror man of Australian politics—he is always looking into it. On this side of the House we know that to grow the economy Australia needs to invest both in our people and our infrastructure—and Labor has a plan for both. We know that backing good projects creates good jobs. We understand that infrastructure makes our cities more productive, our suburbs more liveable and our regions better connected. It is why the previous Labor government created Infrastructure Australia. It is why we doubled the roads budget, increased the rail budget more than tenfold and invested more in public transport than every previous government in the history of the Commonwealth. It is why we developed a national port strategy, a national freight strategy, a national urban policy for our cities. It is why I have a shadow minister who knows every inch of his portfolio, and who lives and breathes every aspect of infrastructure policy. But the government has three different spokesmen who would struggle to cut a ribbon. You see the Instagrams of the minister for transport, the minister for cities and the minister for major projects all together in those hi-vis, staged, awkward moments. They are like the world's most tragic boy band—'No Direction'. At the last election we presented Australians with our comprehensive plan to invest in key projects right around the nation: better ferry and bus transport in Tasmania; in Western Australia, the Perth METRONET; in South Australia, AdeLINK and the Gawler light rail; in Queensland, Brisbane's Cross River Rail; in New South Wales, the Western Sydney rail line; and, in Victoria, the Melbourne Metro. Public transport is not a hobby for us. Riding a tram is not an item on a bucket list. We do not look at a train carriage and see a selfie studio. We know that public transport is about quality of life, particularly for Australians who live and work in our growing suburbs. It is about making it easier for people to get to work quicker and get home sooner. I want to make this point very clear: charging Australians more to drive their car without investing in public transport as an alternative inevitably means punishing those who can least afford it. Any proposal to change the funding arrangements for Australian roads should be based on equity and investing in public transport in the outer suburbs. Labor believes in local content. We believe in maximising the use of Australian steel in infrastructure. Because we believe in training and skills and local jobs, at the last election we guaranteed that one out of every 10 people employed on nation-building projects would be an Australian apprentice. That is our approach—buy Australian first, build Australian first and employ Australians first. We are focused on action, on tangible projects, on amenities which make a difference to the daily lives of Australians. All this government offers is a glossy pamphlet. No amount of photos and graphics can pretty up this government's dismal record on infrastructure. As soon as the government came to office, they set about cutting money from public transport and putting it into toll roads. They have cut money from important programs like Black Spot, heavy vehicles and Bridges Renewal. They have slowed down much needed upgrades to the Bruce and Pacific highways. They have made a mess of the process of Badgerys Creek by ignoring the locals instead of including them. They have marginalised the experts at Infrastructure Australia, treating it like an adjunct to the department. And they have ripped nearly $1 billion out of local governments around the country, hitting regional towns the hardest. But that is the Nationals for you; they always want the infrastructure portfolio—they love the title but they never use it to deliver. It is the same way the Nationals treat their electorates generally—taking them for granted, treating them as a monopoly, as a sinecure. The Nationals preside over nine out of 10 of the poorest electorates in Australia but they never vote for anything to lift people out of poverty. If you want a measure of their disinterest, look at the Northern Australia Infrastructure Fund: $5 billion in concessional loans announced with great bombast, great fanfare a year and half ago. But how many projects have received funding? Not two, not one but none, zero—not a single dollar on a single project. There is nothing for Darwin, for Cairns, for Rocky or for Mackay. That is the out-of-touch attitude that this government displays for people in communities in Australia's north. And it beggars belief that today the Prime Minister spruiked his government's credentials on water when his own Deputy Prime Minister is preparing to trash the bipartisan agreement on the Murray-Darling Basin and dud South Australians. Now we keep hearing the Liberals talk about a $50 billion infrastructure spend by 2019-20. That is just a big fat lie. It is the opposite of the truth. The facts are there in black and white. In their 2014 budget, the coalition promised to invest $8 billion in infrastructure last financial year but only delivered $5.5 billion. That included a one-off $490 million for beleaguered Premier Barnett in Western Australia for a project that was already fully funded, so the real underspend was nearly $3 billion. The year before, the on-paper underspend was $900 million. But when you factor in another $500 million for a project that was fully funded, the real underspend was $1.4 billion. Consistently this government takes funds out of value-for-money initiatives and funnels cash into its own pet ideas that are not even ready to go. At the last election, this infrastructure-lazy government did not pledge a single new major infrastructure project—nothing, no vision. Instead they made 78 separate local commitments. And although they claim to be a government for all Australians, miraculously, 76 of the local commitments were in seats held by the Liberal Party—or at least in seats that they held on 1 July. It was classic pork-barrelling, coalition style—visionless, vote grabbing tactics without Australia's national interest at its heart. Wherever you live, the Liberal-National story is the same—overpromise, underfund and do not deliver. What you will not find in this report is the shocking injustice being dealt to the people of Victoria. It may amuse Victorian Liberal representatives here but it does not amuse Victorians. Twenty-five per cent of Australia's population receives nine per cent of this government's infrastructure funding. One in four Australians are learning that when the Liberals represent you in Canberra, you will get ripped off. One in four Australians are getting nine cents in the dollar from this government. Prime Minister, stop catching our tourist trams and start investing in Victoria. What you will not find in this report is the $18 million that the government spent on taxpayer funded infrastructure advertising in the lead-up to the last election. What you will not find in this report is the brilliant, innovative, exciting and agile $1 million put aside for a road in Gresford to host an annual billycart race. Australia needs jobs and investment, and all the Prime Minister offers is a $1 million billycart track. What you will not find in this report is any sense of contrition, humility or honesty for the biggest infrastructure stuff-up in Australian history: the Turnbull government's administration of the NBN. It hurts, doesn't it, Prime Minister? The truth hurts, Prime Minister. The most important—and I promise the Prime Minister I will give more than two paragraphs to talk about the NBN; touched a nerve there, haven't we, my friend—piece of infrastructure for a 21st century economy is a first-rate fibre national broadband network and, yet, on this Prime Minister's watch, the cost of the NBN has doubled, Australia has fallen from 30th to 60th on global internet speed rankings and consumer complaints have soared to record highs. Just last week, we saw another broken promise: after insisting that the government's funding contribution was capped, the Liberals have been forced to step in with a $19.5 billion loan to complete the rollout— Mr Turnbull interjecting— Mr SHORTEN: and the Prime Minister is reduced to interjecting like a cheer squad member of a failing football club. The Prime Minister should listen to what an alternative government sounds like. He thinks that what he has done to the NBN is his signature achievement—you just have to ask him—and, in a way, he is right: the Turnbull NBN summarises everything about this flailing, failing Prime Minister. It promotes itself as a new and modern 21st century experience, so you wait and you wait. You keep telling people it will come good eventually, and what do you get? Buffering and copper—the Prime Minister's waffle and the member for Warringah's idea of cutting-edge technology; the worst of both worlds. The Prime Minister promised every premise in Australia would have access to very-fast broadband by the end of the year—how is that tracking? There are 37 days left in 2016, and only 7.8 million premises to go. I have done the calculations: 210,000 per day, over 8,000 per hour, 140 per minute. The member for Greenway nailed it the other day: the Liberals should not be hanging around in the chamber; they should be out there with a pair of pliers getting a move on. Now the government's incompetence and inaction on infrastructure extends to rail. They announce yet another review but refuse to engage in a real debate about high-speed rail, which would revolutionise interstate travel in this country. High-speed rail is a proven technology. Millions of people in more than 20 nations around the world travel on it every day. Labor has pushed to advance this visionary project for more than three years. We want to establish a high-speed rail authority to start detailed planning work on a line between Brisbane and Melbourne via Sydney and Canberra. This marvellous project would allow travel between our capital cities in as little as three hours, linking up the eastern seaboard in a way never seen before, freeing up one of the world's busiest air corridors, cutting down the oldest enemy of prosperity in Australia—the tyranny of distance—and the high-speed rail will drive jobs and economic development in regional centres all along the route. Laying 1,600 kilometres of new track and upgrading old is not a project that will be finished in the life of one parliament or one government—or several Liberal prime ministers within the life of one government. But that is no reason to hold back; it is no excuse to wait. Delay is not an economic strategy or an infrastructure plan. High-speed rail is a test of this parliament's vision. It is a challenge for all of us to look beyond the political cycle and think of the future of this nation. It is time in infrastructure to think big. It is time to be ambitious. It is time to nation-build. It is time to rekindle the spirit of the snowy hydro-electricity scheme. Even if we will not be the ones who finish, let us be the ones who begin. My shadow minister for infrastructure recently introduced legislation into this House to establish a high-speed rail authority. The government should ditch the reviews, ditch the rhetoric, ditch the pessimism. They should stop dithering and just get on board this Labor idea. When it comes to infrastructure, we are up for being constructive. We are up for bipartisanship. But, in order to be bipartisan, you actually have to have a government that does something to begin with. If you want us to support one of your ideas, put forward an idea. This whole statement from the Prime Minister, this whole empty exercise, reeks of a Prime Minister confusing motion with action, mistaking vagueness for vision and long sentences for the big picture. Australia needs something more. Australia deserves better. We deserve a real plan for infrastructure to grow the economy, to create the jobs, to ease the traffic in our growing suburbs and to bring new life to regional towns. Labor has a real plan for nation-building. When we get the chance, we will deliver for all Australians.