Page 2240 - Week 08 - Wednesday, 5 June 2013
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temperatures will require us to adapt our infrastructure planning. We need to use water more efficiently and we must become more prepared for, and resilient to, the increasing threat of bushfire.
The fourth challenge is planning for population growth so that the ACT avoids the experience of other cities, such as traffic congestion and air pollution and long journey times. An integrated, flexible approach to urban planning and infrastructure development will help us mitigate these problems and ensure that the built environment serves the needs of the community and supports productivity.
The territory’s population is expected to reach over 500,000 in the next few decades. By consciously planning for this growth, we will ensure that the needs of our growing population are actually met. We will embrace diversity and provide a fair go, opportunities that will ensure individual and community prosperity and wellbeing.
Fifth and finally, we need to plan for demographic and social change as many of us become older, as we achieve greater gender equality in the workplace and as we redefine traditional roles in work and family. Ultimately, meeting these challenges through major infrastructure investment requires the same thing: good governance, by which I mean transparent, accountable, evidence-based decision making undertaken in collaboration with industry, the community, our regional neighbours and the commonwealth. At the end of all of these challenges is the need to support liveability and the outstanding quality of life we enjoy in the territory.
Collectively, the government’s major infrastructure commitments and plans will ensure that our city remains vibrant and liveable. They will do this by meeting the abovementioned challenges, through supporting our productivity and our health and wellbeing, enabling the accumulation of knowledge and skills in our community, making us more mobile and connected and increasing our sustainability and protecting the aspects of the environment that we value.
The infrastructure constructed in Canberra over the last hundred years has been extraordinary. The accomplishments of Canberra’s past and present planners, engineers, builders and others cannot sustain us indefinitely, though. This government will continue to seek to make infrastructure decisions to support the best possible future achievable.
The ACT budget will ensure that Canberra continues to enjoy a world-class health system, with $129 million over four years for growth and new initiatives and $72.3 million in capital funding. The government remains committed to ensuring investment in health care, both in new initiatives and in key health infrastructure, with a total spend of around $1.3 billion. The government is building better infrastructure and delivering more health services to meet the needs of patients. We are delivering $45.5 million for an additional 31 inpatient beds across Canberra and Calvary hospitals to meet increasing demand and six hospital in the home places.
The 2013-14 budget also includes $33 million for elective surgery to continue to reduce the number of people waiting beyond standard time frames for care, $12 million to expand access to emergency medicine and rapid assessment services at
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