NSW Opposition Leader Mark Speakman says the Coalition will build new metros if elected, making it a key plank of the Liberal Party’s election platform.<\/p>\n
While Mr Speakman has previously flagged the opposition’s “ambition” to expand Sydney’s metro network, he has not declaratively made a commitment to do so.<\/p>\n
“Well before the next election, we will say what our metro policy is, what we’ll build,” Mr Speakman said on Tuesday.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Despite the potential blowout, Premier Chris Minns says his government has ruled out cutting a station to rein the budget in. (ABC News: Abbey Haberecht)<\/p>\n
“But I’d be very clear now we will build metros, where the government is saying that won’t build anything.”<\/p>\n
The commitment was made during a Western Sydney housing conference and goes further than his previous comments.<\/p>\n
In August, the NSW Liberal leader said: “We, as a coalition, will have metro ambition as part of our election platform in 2027.”<\/p>\n
Mr Speakman has not said how it would be paid for or where the Coalition proposed expanding the network.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Mr Speakman made a key election promise after the NSW premier announced a major budget blowout.\u00a0 (ABC News)<\/p>\n
The comments signal that the next election, due in 2027, will be fought on the issue.<\/p>\n
Premier Chris Minns has insisted the state government was focused on the need to invest in heavy rail infrastructure as a priority ahead of metros.<\/p>\n
“My sense is the voters of New South Wales want us to make major inroads and real progress on the challenges they’re facing in their community,” Mr Minns said earlier this month.<\/p>\n
“And if we don’t make real progress, then we will not win the 2027 election campaign.<\/p>\n
“Frankly, we can’t have a situation as great as these new projects are, where we’re robbing Peter to pay Paul. The majority of people in Sydney still use the existing heavy rail infrastructure.”<\/p>\n
The Metro City & Southwest line opened to passengers in 2024 and the Metro West project, from the city to Parramatta, is scheduled for completion by 2032.<\/p>\n
Mr Minns had conceded the cost for Metro West, which is Sydney’s largest rail line, was expected to overrun significantly.<\/p>\n
Nine Newspapers reported on Tuesday there was a cost blowout of at least $2 billion that would take the total projected cost to more than $30 billion.<\/p>\n
Mr Minns said the reported figure was at the “upper end of a potential cost overrun estimate” but admitted it would cost more than the government had planned.<\/p>\n
“We’ve worked really hard to keep costs down,” he said.<\/p>\n
Premier considered abandoning metro plans\u00a0<\/p>\n
The premier said the government even considered cancelling stations on the 24-kilometre line to keep it within budget, but ultimately decided that was a “bridge too far”.<\/p>\n
“Some of the ways that we’ve looked at\u2026 keeping within its original envelope\u2026 is to cancel a station, cancel a station that we’d already announced,” he said.<\/p>\n
“That’s what it would take to reduce the cost of that metro. We considered all different proposals, that [cancelling stations] was a bridge too far us.”<\/p>\n
Mr Speakman seized on the premier’s comments, claiming the government is opposed to the metro network.<\/p>\n
“This government never seems to like metros\u2026 Chris Minns flirted with the idea of cancelling Sydney Metro,” he said.<\/p>\n
“The premier was complaining earlier about a lack of stations. Now he’s flirting with the idea of cancelling stations.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"NSW Opposition Leader Mark Speakman says the Coalition will build new metros if elected, making it a key…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":180638,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[64,63,26295,26298,44,16862,116137,38238,116136,16861],"class_list":{"0":"post-180637","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-australia","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-chris-minns","11":"tag-mark-speakman","12":"tag-news","13":"tag-nsw-government","14":"tag-nsw-transport","15":"tag-public-transport","16":"tag-sydney-metro","17":"tag-transport"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/180637","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=180637"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/180637\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/180638"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=180637"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=180637"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=180637"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}