Queensland’s peak infrastructure body, the Infrastructure Association of Queensland (IAQ), will draw on its members’ experience in delivering world leading transport, water and energy infrastructure to the University of Melbourne’s Next Generation Engagement Project.
CEO, Steve Abson, said the Next Generation Engagement Project is sorely needed given the community and social challenges that have emerged for infrastructure delivery in recent years.
“We’ve had some tremendous infrastructure achievements in infrastructure in Queensland. We’ve won global awards, created a new coal seam gas export industry and we’ve delivered an enviable tunnel network that has streamlined the way that commuters connect across our capital city.
“On the flip-side, we’ve seen multi-billion dollar projects completed and mothballed, significant delays and legal challenges to job-creating projects and significant international contracts cancelled after being let.
“All of this has been due, in part at least, to community opposition eroding political goodwill.”
“IAQ sees the Next Generation Engagement Project as a significant opportunity to help identify the top social and community challenges for infrastructure delivery and for industry and the research sector to then address these challenges,” Mr Abson said.
Social license expert, Dr Sara Bice, is leading the project on behalf of the Melbourne School of Government.
“Almost $20 billion in largely taxpayer-funded projects have been delayed, cancelled or completed and then mothballed over the past decade in Australia. This research aims to identify the key engagement challenges gaps in delivering new infrastructure and to then address them through applied research with industry.”
“Partners such as the IAQ will play a vital role in helping us to understand the problem and will bring an important interdisciplinary perspective to this research. The experience of their members at the coal face of major global projects will allow us to create a clear picture of the core social challenges facing Australia’s infrastructure delivery,” Dr Bice said.
Over the coming six months the University of Melbourne and its partners will conduct the largest national consultation on engagement to date. This will include:
- a national survey on engagement and social license challenges for Australia’s infrastructure sector
- workshops in each capital city with leading Australian practitioners and international infrastructure experts
- a gap analysis that details the most critical knowledge gaps for the community engagement profession
- testing the gap analysis with infrastructure professionals across Australia.
Dr Bice said, “Through this work we aim to identify the biggest roadblocks around engagement, social risk management and social license for infrastructure delivery together with an analysis of emerging trends and challenges.”
“Our aim is to get this information onto the desk of key decision makers in Australia’s infrastructure sector to really inform the discussion. Our intention is that this work will seed longer-term research partnerships that will help industry to make meaningful progress on these issues.”
For the latest news on the Next Generation Research Project visit
www.blogs.unimelb.edu.au/nextgenengagement