The idea would be to create a more sustainable framework for future development without Canberra dictating how to build communities, Infrastructure Minister Catherine King told her audience at Tuesday’s Bradfield Oration in Sydney.

She was delivering the annual speech on behalf of Albanese, who is isolating after testing positive for COVID-19.

“When you grow up in public housing … when you rely on public transport … you realise the difference between good infrastructure and the difference it makes to people’s lives,” King said.

The government’s Cities and Suburbs Unit will be revived to restore national leadership on sustainable development across the country and a report will be commissioned on the state of Australia’s cities.

The Urban Policy Forum will guide the government on how to develop an urban policy framework, something it has been without for more than a decade.

“The way people live and work has dramatically changed in the last two years. The next two decades present an opportunity,” King said.

“Modern Australia is more than capable of building smart infrastructure that builds a sense of civic pride and considers climate change.

“The magnificent precinct we’re gathered in … proves this,” she said of Barangaroo on Sydney Harbour.

Not all projects have to be on a grand scale to be successful, King said.

She cited the Mirvac redevelopment in Marrickville, in Albanese’s electorate of Grayndler, which includes housing and a new library, and was built with recycled materials.

NSW Premier Dominic Perrottet and Labor Opposition Leader Chris Minns also spoke at the event, outlining visions for growing the country’s biggest state over the coming decades.

Announcing a new primary school and selective high school, which will be built within Sydney’s Westmead Health District, the premier declared education the key.

“I want kids in our west to be educated and learn from world-leading doctors, nurses and medical researchers,” he said.

The $300 million required for the schools’ construction will come from the government’s $5 billion WestInvest fund.

Perrottet said John Bradfield, who spent years designing the Sydney Harbour Bridge following his appointment to the project in 1914, was innovative and took risks.

“Our government has applied this lesson to the ways we have funded and built city-shaping projects,” the premier said.

He cited his successful reform agenda this year which included stamp duty changes for first home buyers, health reform projects including giving pharmacists the ability to prescribe some drugs and introducing a universal pre-kindergarten year.

Labor Leader Chris Minns warned against walling off parts of Sydney, saying the government had targeted areas of the west for major expansion while in the north there would be little change.

“There are some who insist on virtually no increase in the number of people in their communities – while accepting billions of public funds to build new transport infrastructure,” he said.

“Quarantining one part of Sydney from growth comes at the expense of communities in Sydney’s west who are struggling.”

According to projections, Canterbury Bankstown LGA will expand by 65,000 people, more than seven times that in North Sydney over the same period.

Minns said in some suburbs, anger was growing as communities went without vital infrastructure, including schools.

– AAP