One would think that something like a Territory Plan would cover something like infrastructure.
But that would be to ignore the pressing need for planners to have something to do when not fouling up the things that accidentally work.
On that note Mr Stanhope has announced a ten year infrastructure plan.
New schools in Molonglo and Eastlake, more CIT campuses, dedicated bus lanes, the redevelopment of ageing high-rise public housing developments, a new Supreme Court and a transformed public health system are among the infrastructure priorities contained in the ACT Government’s first ever Infrastructure Plan, released today.
Released by Chief Minister Jon Stanhope, the 10-year document will be updated annually and includes not just short- and medium-term infrastructure priorities, but visionary long-term projects such as the VFT, and discusses the potential for new funding models for major infrastructure.
I guess it’s good to have a wish list all written down.
UPDATE: Liberal Leader Zed Seselja is making merry with typos in the document and the lack of new announcements:
“We did not expect such a thin, slap-dash document so full of mistakes. Normally, typos are just unfortunate and not worth comment, but I would hope the Chief Minister, in his infrastructure master plan, could at least spell ‘Gungahlin’, ‘Belconnen’ and ‘Tuggeranong’ correctly (pages 19 & 20), let alone ‘infrastructure’ (cover and contents page), ‘influential’ (p3), ‘health’, ‘Aboriginal’ and ‘rehabilitation’ (all p13), ‘transport’ (p19), ‘construction’ (p20), ‘condition’ (p21), ‘preparation’ (p26), ‘indicative’ (p27), ‘harvesting’ (p29), ‘facilities’ (p31), ‘government’ (p30) and ‘consultation’ (p34). This document even includes ‘into’ spelled incorrectly (p30), as well as duplicated expressions such as ‘the the’ (p16) and ‘through through’ (p14).
“What must really gall the Chief Minister, who evidently did not read this document carefully or at all, are the incorrect spellings of ‘Maconochie’ (twice, p23) and ‘Arboretum’ (p25). This whole document is an embarrassment to the Chief Minister and his government,” Zed concluded.
FURTHER UPDATE: The Canberra Times has a report on the chaos and confusion in the palpably incompetent Chief Minister’s Department following the shambles:
Bureaucrats in the Chief Minister’s Department were dumping copies of an infrastructure plan last night after the discovery of a series of embarrassing grammatical mistakes and spelling errors…
A statement from the Chief Minister’s Department late last night said the 10-year infrastructure plan was ”temporarily withdrawn as an incorrect version was sent for printing and uploading”.
Apparently a spokesperson has said it is “unclear” when they will be able to find their arses with both hands and a map when the corrected plan will be available.
Which is odd considering they’re saying the problem was just sending the wrong version…
