Business Council of Australia says infrastructure spending needs to be less of a popularity contest

On Tuesday, Business Council of Australia flagged firms are wanting greater certainty on longer term developments, claiming nation building projects need to be objective and be less based on a popularity contest.

BCA's response was relation to questions from Liberal MP John Alexander who asked if infrastructure projects had been blighted by short-term political goals.

The parliamentary inquiry into infrastructure procurement is in light of the federal government committing $110 billion over the next decade as part of its economic recovery plan.

BCA chief executive Jennifer Westacott said a lack of continuity of longer-term projects is a major disruption and the incremental approach to procurement was resulting in expensive retro-fitting.

"We have had a very incremental approach to infrastructure delivery across Australia and that has resulted in very expensive retro-fitting," she said.

"The idea that things are on a program then they are suddenly off a program, that's what causes the big disruption to business."

Submissions provided to the committee have called for greater transparency over infrastructure decision making, which includes the public disclosure of the business case.

The Grattan Institute in its response recommended projects in excess of $250 million should have a transparent business case which supports the procurement.

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Its recommendation comes in light of a Coalition pork barreling scandal, which saw commuter car park grants awarded to blue ribbon Liberal and marginal seats, before the 2019 election.

The money was sapped from the Urban Congestion Fund which housed $4 billion in total.

BCA major projects chair Guy Templeton said office bearers need to be held accountable and political objectivity is needed for long-term nation building projects.

"Often infrastructure projects can be approved on the basis of popularity rather than hard and fast science and the costs versus the benefits," Mr Templeton said.

"Having that transparency ... holds all office bearers to account."

Ms Westacott lamented nation-building projects need to include emission reduction targets, in order to ensure new developments are compliant in a decarbonising economy.

She also noted it is vital state and federal targets are filtered down through every facet of development and construction, claiming it has to be "no regret decision making".

"If we are going to spend billions and billions of dollars over the next decade then we should be building that to be future-proof as much as possible," she said.

The BCA also called for federal governments to look at corridor preservation for future projects such as high speed rail.

"If we don't ensure the corridors it will be less economically viable," Ms Westacott said.

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