The Australian National Audit Office has released its report into Commonwealth funding of the WestConnex project. The report looks into whether appropriate steps were taken to protect the Commonwealth's interests and obtain value for money in relation to the $3.5 billion in Commonwealth funding committed to WestConnex.

NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklin announced her new cabinet today, with the extraordinary announcement that a stand-alone ministry has been created for WestConnex.

Greens spokesperson for WestConnex and Member for Newtown Jenny Leong MP says that a special ministry won’t solve the WestConnex debacle.

Now that Baird is opting out of politics, his centerpiece project needs to be stopped.  Since he and Tony Abbott turned the first sod of this toxic project back in March 2015, community opposition has continued to grow.

Public criticism of WestConnex, billion dollar budget blowouts, shonky, secretive planning and huge contracts to companies under federal police investigation, have all played a significant role in the declining popularity of Premier Baird, according to Greens Member for Newtown Jenny Leong MP.

More community members have been aggressively handled and violently arrested at Sydney Park as peaceful protests against WestConnex continue. The use of force and the subsequent charges laid show that the police are using the powers of the Baird Government’s new draconian anti-protest laws.

NSW Greens spokesperson on WestConnex and Member for Newtown, Jenny Leong MP, says:

“I have serious concerns about the level of police aggression and violence that’s occurred in recent days at Sydney Park.

“Local police, the riot squad and plainclothes police - some wearing leather gloves and refusing to display their name badge - have used disproportionate force against peaceful community members showing their opposition to WestConnex.

Contractors have begun cutting down trees in Sydney Park, as part of the WestConnex project.

Greens Member for Newtown Jenny Leong MP joined community members at the Save Sydney Park Camp, where one resident is stationed in a tree in an act on nonviolent direct action.

At the last Inner West Council meeting of 2016, the Administrator Richard Pearson committed to spending half a million dollars toward modelling the impact of WestConnex on local streets and neighbourhoods. 

“This is a welcome initiative and shows that local government shares the community’s concerns about how badly WestConnex will impact our neighbourhoods, said Jenny Leong MP, Member for Newtown and NSW Greens spokesperson on WestConnex.

“The RMS only plan to look at the impact of WestConnex 12 months after each stage has been opened - well after the traffic chaos and air quality impacts have occurred.  Premier Baird’s appointed Administrator has called this wait-and-see approach, ‘totally unacceptable and inconsistent with the principles of modern environmental impact assessments’ and he should know, as he has come directly from the NSW Planning Dept. 

RMS has announced plans to radically alter key local roads between Alexandria to Moore Park and they have put these plans forward without indicating that they are obviously the result of the impact that WestConnex will have on traffic in this area. 

Jenny Leong MP, Member for Newtown and NSW Greens spokesperson on WestConnex has condemned this announcement .

"It’s obvious that this work is directly related to WestConnex and the St Peters interchange - attempting to provide a stop gap solution to the widely discredited plan that would put 70,000 more cars into the area.

"The pathetic attempt by RMS to try to pretend these works are stand alone so the true impact of WestConnex is hidden, will not fool anyone.

With renewed focus on corruption in NSW politics this week, with amendments to the ICAC rushed through Parliament, the NSW Greens WestConnex spokesperson and Member for Newtown Jenny Leong MP, is calling on Roads Minister Duncan Gay to assure the public that the construction company CIMIC (formerly Leighton Holdings), which has huge WestConnex contracts, is free of corruption.

Today we asked the Premier if he will meet residents impacted by Westconnex construction to hear about their experiences and respond to their concerns. 

Member for Newtown and NSW Greens spokesperson on WestConnex Jenny Leong MP, is again calling on the Premier to immediately step in to halt all WestConnex works until an independent inquiry can be undertaken, as the Roads Minister announces further changes to the $16.8 billion dollar project on the run.

"With this latest announcement of WestConnex changes there's some good news and some bad news, but one thing is very clear - the Roads Minister is making it up as he goes", she said.

"The good news for Camperdown – and for the Royal Prince Alfred Hospital and the University of Sydney - is that the exit/entry ramps have been scrapped with the M4/M5 tunnel link being moved further west.