The 2012-13 NSW Budget includes $16.1 million in funding to commence work on the Blacktown-Mount Druitt Hospital expansion.
The funding will go towards Stage 1 of the project, which is estimated to cost a total cost of $270 million.
Blacktown Hospital will also benefit from part of a $34.7 million funding allocation for NSW hospital car parks.
The budget also includes funding for a new high school for The Ponds a new school for specific purposes in The Ponds.
It also includes spending on western Sydney's roads including more than $70 million to continue upgrades of the Great Western Highway.
The O'Farrell government is also planning to increase speeding fines cut the equivalent of 10,000 public sector jobs to help bring the state budget back to surplus from a forecast deficit of more than $800 million next financial year.
The Treasurer, Mike Baird, today announced major changes to stamp duty and other property concessions designed to boost the purchase of newly constructed homes in NSW alongside measures to fast-track the approval of major housing developments.
BUDGET FORECASTS FOR 2012-13
- State economic growth: 2.25 per cent.
- Unemployment rate: 5.5 per cent.
- Budget deficit: $824 million.
- Budget expenditure: $60.5 billion.
- Infrastructure investment: $15 billion (General government sector and Public Trading Enterprise sector).
PROPERTY
- The First Home Owner Grant will more than double to $15,000 for first-time buyers of new property. From 2014, the grant will drop to $10,000.
- The $7000 First Home Owner Grant will be abolished for existing properties.
- First home buyers will continue to be exempt from stamp duty if buying new property. The threshold lifts from $600,000 to $650,000.
- Non-first home buyers will be eligible for a $5000 grant if buying new property.
TRANSPORT
- $3.3 billion over four years allocated for the North West Rail Link.
- $941 million to go towards duplicating the Pacific Highway.
- $116 million to begin construction of the light rail extension in the inner west.
- $127 million to buy 269 new buses for Sydney.
LAW AND ORDER
- $178 million for an extra 400 police officers, taking numbers to 16,356 by June 2014.
- $34 million to build new courts, including $6.9 million to complete the new Armidale courthouse. It will also include $16 million towards the construction of the $94 million Newcastle Justice Precinct and $11 million for the development of the $54 million Coffs Harbour precinct.
- $32 million for renovation and expansion of court houses at 40 locations including Wagga Wagga, Wollongong, Liverpool, Manly and the Downing Centre and relocation of Coroner's Court from Glebe to the city.
- $4.2 million for programs to rehabilitate prisoners and reduce reoffending.
- $24 million to complete redevelopments of Cobham and Riverina Juvenile Justice centres.
- $1 million to clean up graffiti.
PORTS
- Long-term lease of Port Kembla with $100 million from the estimated $500 million in proceeds to be spent on infrastructure in the Illawarra.
HEALTH
- A 5.4 per cent increase in health funding, with the biggest growth in hospital in-patient spending.
- $64 million for 500 new nurses.
- $55 million to rebuild the research facility of the Westmead Millennium Institute.
- $16 million to start construction of expanded Blacktown and Mount Druitt hospitals.
ENVIRONMENT
- NSW Environment Protection Authority gains a slight funding increase to about $120 million, reflecting the intention to pursue polluters more aggressively and focus on assessing and cleaning up major polluted sites around NSW.
- A new levy on electricity retailers will help pay for the Solar Bonus Scheme, though $220 million will still be taken from the state's Climate Change Fund to support the scheme.
- No new plans to cut greenhouse emissions, signalling that the NSW government will rely heavily on the federal carbon price plan, which it opposes, to meet the state's target of a 5 per cent cut by 2020.
EDUCATION
- The government has limited the increase in education funding to 3 per cent, which is only half the long-term average.
- Capital investment in schools is falling sharply as the federal government's Building the Education Revolution program runs out.
- Six new schools will be built.
PLANNING
- $481 million allocated to a Housing Acceleration Fund to build infrastructure in areas of housing growth in an effort to assist the supply of new housing. Ten projects costing $181 million have already been identified in eight areas of housing growth, which will together support 76,000 new homes. The areas are Camden/Liverpool, Blacktown, The Hills, Hornsby/Parramatta, City of Sydney, Wollongong, Wyong, Port Macquarie-Hastings.
- Assessment of the backlog of approvals of state significant projects (those formerly assessed under Part 3A) will be fast-tracked, processed at up to twice the rate as they are being processed now.
- Financial incentives for councils to process development applications more quickly.