By Paul Hemsley
City of Perth Mayor Lisa Scaffidi has demanded that Colin Barnett’s the newly re-elected state government and the major political parties all lift their game on planning for big future projects now that the election is over.
The Mayor resumed pressuring the state government to take-up key demands the City made in its submission to the government following the release of the draft State Planning Strategy by the Western Australian Planning Commission (WAPC) in December 2012.
A key planning document for the West, the strategy is a blueprint for how the WA government will execute the construction and maintenance of regional and urban infrastructure. The document is intended to replace the State Planning Strategy published in 1997.
While the WA government has said it will take a “collaborative approach” in planning for the state’s infrastructure, environment, food security, land availability, economic development, education and training by working with local government, the private sector Ms Scaffidi wants a “more bi-partisan” and “long-term” approach.
To do this, the Perth Mayor has called for the major political parties to reach agreement beyond the four-year political cycle when considering big future projects.
“The state government needs to put its long-term vision clearly on the table and, given its mandate, be aggressively visionary and think well beyond the four-year term in order to build a resilient, prosperous community and one of the world's great capital cities,” Ms Scaffidi said.
Although the City of Perth welcomed the state government’s draft strategy, Ms Scaffidi has argued that the strategy needs to expand on how it will be implemented through the state planning hierarchy.
“Unless there is agreement between the major parties that important projects will continue beyond the next election, then we may not achieve our full potential,” she said.
She said government agencies, industry sectors and the two tiers of government will need to communicate effectively if the goals set out in the draft strategy are to be achieved.
“It is also crucial for the government to provide further detail on how projects that work towards the goals in the strategy will be funded,” Ms Scaffidi said.
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