The Chaser Report - Sh*tkansen 2.0

Episode Date: November 6, 2025

Finally! The very slow to arrive very fast train has been re-re-re-re-reannounced and it’s not going anywhere you want to go. Does that mean an election is imminent? Or is it just Newcastle trying to get some attention? Charles and Dom explore the never-dying transport announcement that won’t arrive until they’re dead themselves.Order the 2025 CHASER ANNUAL: https://chasershop.com/products/the-chaser-and-the-shovel-annual-2025-preorderListen AD FREE: https://thechaserreport.supercast.com/ Follow us on Instagram: @chaserwarSpam Dom's socials: @dom_knightSend Charles voicemails: @charlesfirthEmail us: [e-mail] CEO’s Super-yacht upgrade Fund: https://chaser.com.au/support/ Send complaints to: [e-mail] Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The Chaser Report is recorded on Gadigal Land. Striving for mediocrity in a world of excellence, this is The Chaser Report. Hello and welcome to The Chaser Report with Dom and Charles. Charles, you look worried. You're normally happy and upbeat and frankly slightly diluted demeanour is absent today. There are furrows of concern on your brow, Charles. Yes, because Dom, do you believe in a rules-based order? The international rules-based order is something... Well, not just the international, like in Australia, the rule of law.

Do you believe that we should follow the rule? We should, that government should be run according to a set of laws and constitutions that cannot be breached by said government. I'm really torn, Charles, because it does sound like a fairly fundamental rule of our society, but the term international rules-based order I first heard from Kevin Rudd and having terrible flashbacks to that time where he talked about

what was it, detailed programmatic specificity and things like that. Yes, okay. So, I mean, but as an idea, that is one of the fundamental It's under threat. Bedrock elements of our system. Yes, but it's under threat.

It's under threat globally, the rules-based order. And in Australia, like, the UN came out with a report just the other day, which said that Australia's only one of 24 democracies, left in the world.

There's as many as 24. I know. Wow. There's some shortcomings with the definition of that? I think maybe a lot of the sort of... The Korean Democratic Republic is that on board? But like the Pacific Islands make up for about half of them. Oh, okay.

Sure. You know, there's, you know, a whole lot of democracies. But yes, we're sort of part of a dwindling set of countries that actually follow the rules, right? I mean, this is the question. But does the US count as a democracy under those rules? No, I don't think they do. But, Dom, today, we got the most devastating news, which suggests to me that the Australian federal government

has decided to just jettison our constitution and just start breaking the rules. You think it's all over for Australia? I think it's all over. As a sovereign state, as a rules-based society, a place where we're all equal before the law, Charles. Yes. It's finished.

Because the announcement today is that they're going to build a very fast train between Newcastle and Sydney. Now, I know you've heard that all before, right? You've heard that at least for the last six or seven elections. I think every election campaign, yes. Like literally dating back to the 1990s, there has been that exact announcement.

Like radio carbon dating. But I put it to you, Dom, that that means that it is now a constitutional requirement that you're only ever allowed to announce a very fast. train in the context of an election campaign period, right? And the government has announced a very fast train outside of the election campaign thing. They've jettisoned a fundamental constitutional aspect of Australia's governance. Are you, dear listener, like me, were you wondering where Charles was going off the long run

with this point and waiting to find out? And his point, as I take it, well, let's have some ads in and then I'll summarise it. Charles, your point as I take it is that you've largely ignored the substance of the announcement and your point is just that it isn't cool or done to announce a very fast train other than during election campaign. But it's an announcement I don't understand. I don't understand how anyone in this country could even talk about or countenance a very fast train outside of an election cycle.

That's what very fast trains are for. They're for election campaigning. They're not for building, which is actually lucky because this announcement is that they're going to start building it. I think if I read it right, they're going to start building it in 12 years time. Okay. Is that right? So let's just take a little moment before we start talking about the timing and the fairly hilarious. So there's even a render of this train.

There's like a graphical render of this train. I will be in my 70s before I can hop on it. So the City of Morning Herald had like a little jiff of it sort of a beautifully sunny yellow train. Yes, which is perfect during election campaigns. But it's not perfect. You can't make a gif of your very fast train. But what's the point?

So let me tell you what the plan is briefly. There's no point. And also why would you call it a very fast train if it's going to take 12 years? That's a very slow train. It is. It's a very slow rollout. Okay. So just to summarize Mattos-Hullivan's article here,

there's a three-stage rollout. The first services will start by... You're confusing me already. This sounds exactly like an election campaign announcement. And one key element is that the timing of this is so incredibly absent that there would be at least seven changes of government between now and then. Now, they've ticked that box. So where it goes, just to briefly summarize, Newcastle to Sydney in 2037, put a pin in Newcastle as a concept there. In fact, hilariously, the first step is Newcastle to the central coast.

That's it. And then it goes to Sydney. That's by 2037. And then Sydney CBD by 2039, Paramatter and West Sydney Airport by 2042. Yes. And then it keeps going. And just to note, Dom is not talking in 24-hour time. He's not saying that by 842 tonight, you'll be able to catch a train.

He's saying 2042, the year, which is, I will be dead by then. Yeah, so you probably will. So I will get to Charles's funeral by a very fast train. So, okay, there's so many things to say about this, the timing, the election thing. But my main point is that the full extent of the ambitions of this project, which conducted by Infrastructure Australia, by 2042, is going no further, Charles, no further than, Sydney to Newcastle. There's an arrow on the map saying to Brisbane, and then another arrow saying to Canberra. But in, what is it, 17 years, the furthest we would go is new.

Newcastle, Charles. And this is in the context of, don't China make like a thousand kilometers of fast rail every five seconds or something? Isn't that there? Let's just say it's quite a lot faster than this. Yeah. So I think I've worked out what's going on. Right.

Which is Anthony Albanese must be about to announce an election. Oh, is that what's going on? that because the announcement, as you point out, the announcement makes no sense. It's a stupid announcement announcing very little will happen over the course of many, many years, right? It'll be seven governments time and there's not even a proper schedule or anything like that, right? I mean, the last... So we can't go, this is, like, that's the whole point about train announcements is they're

not about trains, they're about something else. So maybe there's something else going on. Like, is there some other, maybe he's going to hold a reference. Maybe he's going to resign. Maybe this is his legacy project. Yes. Is that it's going to pass the laws for this and it's like my work here is done. Because you know how as every Prime Minister is just leaving, they suddenly...

Think about the legacy. Yeah, think about their legacy and suddenly decide to do something. Yeah, exactly. Or I think Gillard decided she wanted to do a whole lot of things to Aboriginal communities and stuff like that. You mean four rather than two. I think government's doing things to our original communities is part of the problem. No, but I think I did mean too. Can I just briefly take a moment to tell you about the Beijing to Shanghai high-speed railway?

See, their railways don't make sense either because they don't have a lexions. They don't even build them. So this high-speed rail line, 1,318 kilometres. In other words, further than Sydney to Melbourne, the world's longest high-speed rail line ever constructed in a single phase. Guess how long it took for them to build it? Between beginning of construction to opening. Well, I presume going by the Australian rollout, it took 120 years to build. You're only out by 117 years.

It took them. It took three years. April 2008, it began, and it was running by June 2011. And also, it went to Shanghai, which is actually somewhere you'd want to go. Our one goes to Newcastle, which is somewhere you would not want to go. It takes four hours to do that trip. And the other thing is, if I recall correctly, the engineering challenges were absolutely bananas.

The thing, it's built on the soft soil of the Yankti Delta. There are some incredibly huge bridges, I think, as part of it. Some of the world's longest rail bridges, I believe, are part of this thing. So, yeah, it is some of the longest bridges in the world. We've talked about this before, including the Dunyang to Kunshan Grand Bridge, which is just to make a clear what an engineering project.

This is in three years, it is 164 kilometres long rail viaduct. It is an elevated rail line, 164 kilometres of long. Which is about roughly the same distance as the Newcastle, the Sydney Castle. So this is where, because we actually solved this whole problem a few months ago. Yeah, yeah. Which was saying, what we should do is just because the whole problem in Australia is you can't build through people's homes because they get too annoyed because we've got this whole demand. democracy thing. Sydney to Newcastle is 120 kilometres from Sydney.

But via sea. They built a rail viaduct longer than the distance we're building in 40 years. If we just did it along the coast, like out to sea, you'd go out at Bondi or something like that. Because no one's going to care if you'd get rid of Bondi for a sort of nice little passenger terminal. It would just be that, you know, 10 metres off shore or something. It'd be a roller. And you'd have lovely beach views. It would have great beach views.

And it would be a lovely, you could put a little shark net underneath. Yes, exactly. We're kind of giving up on shark nets. But you don't even need to do that. If you can build a viaduct like this, you can have it inland. Yes. You can just build over the top of people's houses. So if it's high enough, it could just go over the top of the little suburban cottages along the way, couldn't it?

It looks like a giant pylon and then suddenly there's a high-speed train running above your house. There's nothing of worth or value between Sydney and Newcastle anyway. It's the Central Coast But if you're building it What you do is you just say To everyone on the Central Coast Hey, there's some ice over there And then they'll run over there

They're looking for the ice And then you build the railway Well they're not looking If you're going to build it as a railway viaduct You can even build it over the top of the freeway Just build it in the middle of the F3 Or whatever we're calling it now The M1 Pacific Motorway

And then every time There's a crash on the F3 Oh no the M1 Daily And it stops all the traffic All the smug people who are on the rail You would need windows that opened To allow people to go

To gloat Yeah So I mean It could be powered by gloating I just think we may have rejected I think we may have rejected the idea of A Chinese invasion a little prematurely Like

The whole of our Orca stance And partnership with the US and the UK and all these things on these submarines, which again, I'm not sure which will arrive first, the Orchus submarines or the high-speed rail line. Yeah, you're right.

They're kind of scheduled to deliver at the same time. Does. Do you think that in some ways, high-speed rail is Labor's version of Orcus? Of Orcus. Yes. It might be. Oh, Charles.

What if? We combine the two. What if we combine the two? What if we get, you know how you go to the aquarium and you walk through those tubes underneath the, Yes, with the sharks going over the top of you. What if we did it the other way around

and we had a tube with water in it? Yeah. And then you could go between Sydney, Newcastle. On a submarine. On a nuclear submarine. Yes. And then it would be of use. So instead of using it to kill people,

which I assume is what the orchard submarines are going to be used for. If they arrive, yes. You're using it to transport people. Because the other thing is, if you actually made Newcast... So this is, just for people who don't know the job, If you're living in New South Wales, so like if you're living in Melbourne, you might think, is there an analogue to Newcastle? And I suppose the answer is Geelong, although Geelong is...

It's more like the... It's really trendy now, does. Geelong is more like Newtown or something of... Typical Melbourne. Typical Melbourne, they actually have come up with a trendy satellite city that's even trendy. Like, how did they achieve that? That's just so Melbourne.

Because Andrew Hanson lives in Geelong now. Can we say that? I think we can say it, but also I went and performed there at the end of last year for the first time and their arts centre there, like the theatre is just, it's one of the best theatres in the world. Do you think it's time for Gosford to happen? Is this project going to make Gosford happen? Gosford's the main city in the central coast. I feel like, I think there's a reason why the Gosford bypass was popular with everyone.

All right. Okay, so this is the big Anthony Almanesey legacy project. high-speed rail, not during your or my lifetime. And this is one of the first things where we can actually reasonably say probably won't be around to see the opening of this. Both based on our poor health, the likelihood of delays and the fact that, frankly, is the major Australian infrastructure project. What are the odds?

The other thing, just thinking about it, is because I was going to suggest the way we fund this is to buy a whole lot of property in Newcastle, Yeah, and then... It will go up, actually. Yeah, and it will, because it'll become... Should we relocate to Newcastle? If you can get to Newcastle in half an hour, that's better than most Sydney suburbs. That's true.

And Newcastle's quite nice, actually. But the point is that it'll take until the time that we die for it to happen. But that is the dream, isn't it? It's the dream, isn't it? I mean, that's the Sydney dream, is to buy a house that you can't afford. Maybe we should be the first ones in Newcastle. Because Newcastle, it's actually very chumper. It's that the CBD is right next to the oceans.

One of the few places in the world. Maybe that's where we set up the antisocial social club. Yes. Newcastle would love that. And then dot dot, dot, profit because like our ancestors, like in 25 years time. Our descendants. Our descendants, you know, we'll inherit this social club that's like the best thing in the world. We can become the merry veil of Newcastle.

We can. Or as opposed to the merry weather of Newcastle, which is something that you don't want to be. Newcastle joke. Yeah, that's a genuinely good idea. Let's see how much you can buy a three-bedroom house in Newcastle for. I don't even think you need money. They just have like seashells.

They just go to the beach there. What is it? Knobbies. Yeah, that's one. And you pick up some seashells and you say, hey, can I have that three-bedroom beach house? And they go, yeah, sure, I'm not using it. There's a lot of properties here where we could put the social club for like a million dollars

can we pass the hat around there's like a beautiful building in this Newcastle CBD it's the only thing is we would have to go to Newcastle in order to go to our club oh yeah we wouldn't be able to get there because there's no train well the train is lovely it just takes

forever it takes like four hours of it has the best nickname of any train in the world the Stabby Express the shit cancer it's like the shin can't said but it's shit I mean that's the Newcastle sense of humor that's going to make it such a cool place.

Newcastle will be so annoyed how Sydney side is talking about it, making it happen. They'll hate us, all the more. But they won't be able to get to us and beat us up because there's no train. We'll see them coming.

This train is... Really slow train. The other thing Novocastrian's like saying is that it takes more time to get to Sydney by train now than it did in the age of steam, apparently. I can't fact check that,

but I've heard that a lot. So there you go. I mean, the last we heard of this, they were just doing kind of, drilling into the soil. That was as far as they were getting. So I wouldn't set your clock for 2042. Could run a bit late.

Unless we become part of China. Couldn't we do this under the Belt and Road program? I mean, it involves giving up a little bit of sovereignty. That's right. But how precious is sovereignty looking? Oh, it's not looking. If it's 30 years to build. I mean, we aren't even talking about building the train to Melbourne.

Like the city in Melbourne train is the thing that people actually want. Yes. I know, yeah. Look at that. It's such a sort of like, well, you can't have Coca-Cola, but here's some L.A. cola. You're like, no, no, what's the, what's it like no-fiel? Do they have no brand? What's the color?

Aldi-Cola. Aldi-Cola, yeah, okay, yeah. It's probably called Kowloo. We don't have any Coke, but here, have some. Some kook. Cooke. All right, there you go. It's on the way.

Set your clocks for 20. 2042, people. Okay, you can't have NutraGrain, but you can have power grain. NotraGrain. Our podcast is part of the Iconoclast Network. No one knows what that means yet, but they will. They will.