MELBOURNE: Australia’s biggest container port is on the block and it seems almost everyone has a problem with the sale.
The sale of Melbourne’s port lease could unlock more than $6 billion but regional businesses say price rises could force them to Sydney.
The opposition worries the sale legislation will force the state to pay compensation if a second port is built in the next 50 years. And the Greens say the port’s owners will sting exporters and importers for the kind of gold-plating that drove up power prices in the energy sector.
Victoria’s government is trying to mollify the worries. Morgan Stanley managing director Julian Peck, who is advising the government, says the state aims to lock down prices so returns are stable. “Infrastructure investors prize predictability,” Mr Peck told AAP. For starters, the state can build a second port without paying compensation once Melbourne reaches an agreed capacity limit.
That limit will be negotiated, but estimates range from 6.5 million to eight million containers a year. Melbourne now handles 2.6 million containers a year, and Treasury’s growth predictions say a second port is 35 to 50-plus years away. The port is Australia’s busiest thanks to 300,000 Tasmanian containers a year.
The Tasmanian government believes a private operator could sting businesses with excessive monopoly rents and the state’s farmers are worried they will be hit with charges for port access.
Shipping activity at Port Qasim on February 11
KARACHI: Three ships namely, Glen Canyon, Al-Salam- II and TSM Pollux carrying Containers, Gas oil and Palm oil were arranged...
