Pandemic Management bill. Health and well-being Act 2021.

[LP]

True, but why have they never brought any project into reality without going way over budget.  And I say that about BOTH parties.  If you ran a household like that, you'd be living in a tent

I suppose, households don't normally have projects that span decades and cost billion$.

The figure we are feed via announcements at the time a project is launch is not the figure they expect on the last day of a multi-decade project, it's the current market value if started and completed on the day of the announcement relative to today's costs. The real figure is typically 2x to 3x that price in dollar terms at the expected completion date's relative costs. It's a bureaucratic thing, nothing really to do with the politicians, although the politicians could talk in terms of dollars at the end date rather than dollars at the start date, but then everything would be judged as way too expensive relative to today's costs.

Even so, across this pandemic affected period events are extraordinary. Nobody would have thought basic building supplies and costs would rise 2x or 3x in a just the space of a year or so. Everything from cement to silicone has risen ridiculous amounts courtesy of our trade war with China. Such variations will be written into contracts, there is little governments can do other than pause projects and even then they probably have to pay penalties for pausing.