ASSET RECYCLING FUND SELLS US SHORT The Federal Member for Blair Shayne Neumann last night spoke in the Federal Parliament on two Bills before the chamber: the Asset Recycling Fund Bill 2014 and the Asset Recycling Fund (Consequential Amendments) Bill 2014. Mr Neumann said that the Bills together would create the Asset Recycling Fund (ARF) and are designed to provide financial assistance and incentives to the states and territories to invest in infrastructure. “When states and territories privatise their assets and recycle the proceeds into new infrastructure, the Commonwealth will provide an additional 15% of the reinvested sale proceeds to the cost of the new infrastructure. “The problem with this is that there is no new funding here. “The money is being recycled from funds put aside from the former Federal Labor Government’s Building Australia Fund (BAF - $2.4 billion) and uncommitted funds from the Education Investment Fund (EIF - $3.5 billion). Mr Neumann told the Parliament that he does not believe that these Bills in their current form adequately maintain the governance standards that Labor introduced for the BAF and the EIF. “Concerns about this legislation were raised in the Senate Finance and Public Administration Committee inquiry by the Australian Technology Network of Universities: Curtin University, University of South Australia, RMIT, University of Technology Sydney and Queensland University of Technology. “Between them, these Universities teach about a quarter of a million students. The Universities concerns were about the winding up of the BAF and the EIF – especially as 59% of the initial funding for the AFR comes from the EIF, which these Universities have benefited from in the past,” Mr Neumann said. In late 2007 when Labor was elected to the Federal Parliament, Australia ranked 20th in the world for infrastructure spend. By the time Labor left office in September last year, Australia ranked at the top. “That’s an increase in dollar spend from $132 per Australian to $225. “The best examples of this were seen in Ipswich and the Somerset region when $3 billion was spent to upgrade the most important road project west of Brisbane – the Ipswich Motorway and $54 million was spent to upgrade the Blacksoil Intersection. “Federal Labor partnered with the then State Labor government and these projects, in addition to providing relief from congestion for up to 100,000 vehicles per day, created and sustained up to 10,000 jobs and created more than 300 jobs during the global financial crisis,” Mr Neumann said. Mr Neumann said that the legislation in these Bills is really about a right-wing privatisation binge typical of coalition conservative governments. “In Queensland we’ve seen the most despicable, disgraceful propaganda by the LNP and Campbell Newman on a $33 billion privatisation binge they’re about to undertake. “Queenslanders don’t want public assets sold. “It’s as simple as that. “This Bill has real flaws. The whole privatisation commitment of both the Coalition Federal Government and the LNP Queensland Government is about an ideological right-wing, free-marketeer, buccaneering system and I don’t believe Australians will cop it,” Mr Neumann said.
Posted on: Thu, 19 Jun 2014 07:10:03 +0000
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