Third Way Love for Public-Private Partnerships Turns Deadly
Since Labor PM Paul Keating’s early ’90s privatization spree, Australian governments have been obsessed with public-private partnerships. It’s a model that spends public money to subsidize private profits — often with disastrous outcomes.
An asbestos warning sign is seen along the foreshore at Bicentennial Park on February 29, 2024 in Sydney, Australia. (Jenny Evans / Getty Images)
When the Rozelle Interchange opened to traffic in November 2023, it cemented the status of Sydney’s WestConnex as one of the most extensive underground road networks on the planet. As cars poured into the tunnel, the general manager of one company involved in its construction predicted “a sustainable and joyful future for the people of Sydney.”
Instead, the good people of Sydney received two scandals: interminable daily gridlock, and one of the largest environmental pollution crises the state has ever seen.
City councils bore the brunt of residents’ anger at the new traffic congestion. Then, in January this year, parents noticed asbestos mixed in with the tanbark covering their children’s playgrounds in Rozelle Parklands. They reported it to the authorities and, after a week’s delay that the New South Wales (NSW) transport authority blamed on the Christmas holidays, an investigation began.
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