Tuesday, 21 March 2023

Motions

Suburban Rail Loop

Jacinta ALLAN (Bendigo East – Minister for Transport and Infrastructure, Minister for the Suburban Rail Loop, Minister for Commonwealth Games Delivery) (14:56): I move:

That this house notes that Victorians resoundingly supported, for a second time, the state-shaping Suburban Rail Loop, including SRL Airport, described by the Shadow Minister for Education on social media as ‘a mangy dog’ of a project.

We will come back. I promise my colleagues – it is a promise – I am coming back to that.

Colin Brooks: Really?

Jacinta ALLAN: Oh, yes. I am coming back to that comment. I know props are not appropriate, but I even have a copy of the tweet in which that comment was made. But I will come back to that in a moment.

As the Victorian community have seen over the past eight years, the Andrews Labor government has built up the strongest construction pipeline in the country. We have done this for a couple of reasons. First and foremost, we have done this because quite simply we needed to get moving. After a period of indolence, a former Liberal–National government that promised all sorts of projects to the people of Victoria and delivered none of them and a construction industry that was crying out for a pipeline of projects, we literally got this state moving in terms of the jobs and investments that we made in the construction pipelines but also, importantly, actually getting on and building the road and rail projects in the city, in the suburbs and in country communities that the community needs. If you look at where we are – just a quick snapshot of where we are today – we have already removed 67 dangerous and congested level crossings on our way to getting rid of 110 in total, which, when you look at the difference that makes, makes our suburban roads safer. It makes them less congested and also, importantly, it means we can run more trains because quite simply the boom gates are not down for long periods of time, which chokes up the local road network.

We have been progressively upgrading every regional rail line, and we are doing this so we can run more train services for those regional communities. A terrific example of that is the work we have done on the Ballarat line. After the completion of that project there are now something like 125 additional services a week in and out of Ballarat because of that project. We are building better suburban and regional roads, again so we can reduce travel times, but there is an important safety element in this as well.

There are also the bigger transformational projects that we have invested in and got moving, and some of these have been talked about literally for decades. A second river crossing for the western suburbs has literally been talked about for decades; an alternative to the West Gate Bridge is something that our city very much needs. That is why we are getting on and delivering the West Gate Tunnel Project, to get trucks off local roads, to provide a direct connection into the port and, most importantly, to provide that resilience our road network needs, not just for the western suburbs or people from further away like Geelong and Ballarat but because we know that when an incident happens on the West Gate Bridge or the West Gate Freeway it can cause chaos across our road network. That is why we are getting on and delivering the West Gate Tunnel Project.

Building a train line to the airport: well, that has been talked about for a very long time – almost forever. As long as there has been an airport at Tullamarine, since the mid-1970s, a train line to that place has been talked about. We are getting on and delivering it.

My ministerial colleague at the table, the Minister for Housing, knows well about the North East Link project, as does the member for Eltham. Again, it is the missing link in our suburban ring-road network – talked about for decades. There has been a line on the Melway map for longer than I have been alive to join up that part of the road network.

Colin Brooks: Trucks off the roads.

Jacinta ALLAN: We are now getting on and delivering that project. Tunnel-boring machines will be moving towards the end of this year. Importantly, as my colleague has reminded me, we are again getting trucks off local roads – roads like Rosanna Road and Greensborough Road. We are getting trucks off those local roads so we can turn those local roads back to local communities. That is going to also be vitally important for our busy and important freight network, given the importance the freight and logistics industry plays in our economy and supporting jobs in our community.

Then of course there is the Metro Tunnel. We are deep, deep into the construction of this fabulous project. Tracks are being laid, the tunnels have been completed, the underground stations have been dug out and we are now fitting out those stations with the technology, with the platform screen doors, with the signalling and with everything that is needed to run a modern train system. This is the project that is going to untangle the city loop, and by untangling the city loop it means we can run more trains more often, particularly on the Cranbourne–Pakenham–Sunbury line, which will be joined up by building the Metro Tunnel, but also it will provide capacity across the rest of the network.

At the same time, we have got the opportunity, particularly at Arden, to create new precincts by having in effect – which is unique really in terms of the work we have done around the city and the state – an entire precinct. It is not quite a greenfield site, because it was a former industrial site, but the Arden station is going to be located in an entire precinct where we have already announced we will be building new campuses of the Royal Women’s and the Royal Melbourne hospitals, putting jobs and services next to a train station where you will be able to be 4 minutes to the city and you will be able to connect directly through to Melbourne Airport as well, all by getting on and off a train at Arden station.

These are exactly the sorts of strategic transport planning and land use considerations that the Andrews Labor government are working on as we think about how our city and state grows into the future. That is why the debate on this motion is important, because we do need to get on and deliver the Suburban Rail Loop project. We literally do not have a moment to waste on getting on and delivering this project, because as our city and state continue to grow we need to make sure that we are getting on and building the transformative infrastructure that helps connect our communities. It provides equality of opportunities for jobs, for services, to get to uni and to TAFE, to access hospitals, to access those medical appointments or simply just to be an active and productive citizen of our community. Whether you want to go to the footy or go to the arts centre, it is making sure that these choices are available to you and you are not limited by a lack of good transport infrastructure.

This is particularly why the Andrews Labor government put the Suburban Rail Loop to the Victorian community at the 2018 election, and it was resoundingly endorsed at that election. We put it again to the Victorian community at the 2022 election, and indeed we had some assistance on this front. We had some who wanted to make the election all about the Suburban Rail Loop. I am looking at you, Glen Waverley. They absolutely wanted to make the debate during the 2022 election all about the Suburban Rail Loop – this notion that governments should not do more than one thing at once. Well, not only has the Victorian government, the Andrews Labor government, proven them wrong over that journey – that we can absolutely do more than one thing at once – but I think the member for Glen Waverley is an outstanding example of how that strategy failed, and we are very glad for his success. We are very glad for his success and that he has joined the government benches, along with you, Deputy Speaker, to absolutely continue that powerful advocacy for not just why we need the better transport infrastructure that the Suburban Rail Loop delivers but the reasons why we are making this intervention. Why are we building the Suburban Rail Loop? Why are we building this orbital rail loop that connects all of our metropolitan train lines, that makes sure that we can have that orbital link that other cities around the world build and that also makes sure that there are jobs and housing and services around those particular train station locations? It is because quite simply we must make this intervention.

To not do so would see the challenges of a growing city and state simply overwhelm us. Let me share with you some information that goes to this. Even with some of the challenges that we experienced during the course of the pandemic, Melbourne is still on track to be a city of 9 million people by the late 2050s. That is actually not that far away. It might seem like a long way away, but it is actually not that far away in terms of making the decisions and investments now to plan for the sorts of projects that a city of that size and scale needs. Having a city of 9 million people means that in order for people to move around a city of that size, there will need to be an extra 11.8 million trips on our public transport network every single day. Contemplate that for a moment. On the existing public transport network, even with the addition of the Metro Tunnel, the duplication of the Cranbourne line, the airport rail – even with all these additions we are making to the public transport network – with that sort of growth, that is the demand that comes on the network when you are a city of 9 million people.

In addition to that, the road network would also be under significant pressure. The road network would need to cope with something like an 80 per cent increase in private vehicle trips per weekday. So think about your challenges now as you move around the city and state – and again, this is even when we have added significant capacity to our road network, with the West Gate Tunnel, with the North East Link; with those suburban and regional road connections that we are building right now, our city and state would have to cope with that extra traffic on our road network. So to do nothing, to turn our back on this challenge that is before us, is saying to the people of Victoria, ‘We’re not worried about your future. We’re not worried about the fact that it would take you longer to be able to get to work, that you’d have to live further away from your place of work, that you’d have to make that battle on congested roads and crowded trains.’ That is what is behind the government’s push to deliver the Suburban Rail Loop.

Victorians have voted for this now, you could say, at three elections. There were the two state elections and then of course there was a federal election, where we very much appreciated the support from the then federal Labor opposition of a $2.2 billion commitment to this project, because they understood that we needed to make this investment not just in city-shaping infrastructure but in nation-shaping infrastructure, because it is going to deliver significant economic, social and environmental benefits to the state.

We have done a comprehensive business and investment case, and I am confident that those opposite will say, ‘Where’s the detail? Where’s the information? You’re hiding it from the Victorian community.’ Nothing could be further from the truth. I know I have been here a while, but I think I can see a scare campaign when it is coming. Let me tell you, all of this information was released in August of 2021. The Andrews Labor government released a business and investment case in August of 2021 that provided the details in terms of how the Suburban Rail Loop would be built, how the investment case stacked up, the way the city would shape and grow and most importantly the case for why we just had to get on and build this now.

It is a bit rich for those opposite to complain about a lack of detail when there are literally thousands of pages available to them, and I think I might have even made a few briefings available along the way for those opposite. But no, they want to ignore the evidence. Just as we have seen in the last few days that there are members of the Liberal Party who are anti almost everything, it appears that when it comes to the Suburban Rail Loop they are anti that as well. They are anti the evidence. They are anti wanting to invest in the sorts of projects that our city and state need, and they are also saying to Victorians, ‘We don’t care too much about the challenges that you’re facing with being able to access affordable and available housing’ – because that is also what the Suburban Rail Loop is about, and we have seen this from examples. Go to Sydney, go around the world: we see that where you have good public transport links, where you build stations and you do the appropriate land use planning around it, then you can provide more access to jobs, houses and services for growing communities. That is exactly what the Suburban Rail Loop is. It is bringing together that land use planning, it is bringing together delivery of transport infrastructure and it is looking at how we can continue to support our growing city and state, because otherwise quite simply, as I said, we will be saying to the Victorian community, ‘We don’t want you to be able to access those jobs. We will exclude people from being able to access health services and education services.’

Let me give you an example of what education opportunities will open up with the Suburban Rail Loop. The Suburban Rail Loop will deliver a train line to Monash University at the Clayton campus. Just as I said before, there are a few projects that have been talked about for decades and not delivered, and a rail line to Monash University has been talked about for a really, really long time. Indeed I remember a promise made by the Liberal Party in the 2010 election to deliver rail lines out to that part of the world – they did not do a thing on that front. The Suburban Rail Loop will deliberately connect up our universities, like Monash University and like Deakin University Burwood, and it will connect up Box Hill TAFE, quite deliberately connecting these existing activity centres to the orbital train line, because we understand that is going to open up access. Monash University is the country’s largest university. There is also that enormous activity that sits around the university campus – the heart hospital at Clayton, the Monash Hospital, the synchrotron, the growing research, university, health community around Monash University – and that is before we even start talking about the manufacturing hub that it is for the south-eastern suburbs. Putting a train line into the heart of this precinct provides more opportunities for people to connect to jobs, to university education, and similarly too I could say the same thing about Box Hill, where at Box Hill you have got the TAFE, you have got Box Hill Hospital, you have got access there for people from around the state.

I reckon there might be a National Party MP who might pop up along the journey this afternoon and say ‘But what about regional Victoria?’ This is a train line that is also deliberately designed in a way to connect to regional communities, and I remember well when we released that business and investment case, which those opposite obviously have not read, I had the opportunity to brief representatives from the Gippsland community. I remember well the representatives from the Gippsland community understanding how, by building the Suburban Rail Loop and by deliberately connecting it through Clayton, you could jump on a train at Traralgon, you could come through to Clayton and you could keep going through to the city as you currently do now on that train line or you could get off at Clayton, and all of a sudden Monash University, Box Hill TAFE, Box Hill Hospital, Deakin University Burwood are all so much closer, because the Suburban Rail Loop will slash travel times as well. That journey from Gippsland into, say, Box Hill will save something like 30 minutes one way off that trip. It will make it easier, it will make it more accessible, and if you achieve those outcomes when you deliver better transport infrastructure, you are achieving a better, more equal community and society because you are providing for fairer and more equal access to jobs and services.

That is one of the many reasons, and there are so many more, why we are passionately committed to delivering the Suburban Rail Loop, and most importantly there is construction happening right now. Indeed it has been underway since June of last year, with early works happening around Clayton. We had to work hard to get this away because it is a big program of works. Yes, the Suburban Rail Loop east is projected to be concluded in 2035, but projects of this size and scale do take a long time – you have got to get the planning right, you have got to get the detail right because of the difference it makes.

We are starting on two sections of the project at once. Suburban Rail Loop east between Cheltenham and Box Hill is 26 kilometres of twin tunnels and six underground stations that are going to provide for that access. It also means that that journey time from Cheltenham to Box Hill will come down to something like 22 minutes on the train. You just cannot do that in a vehicle, even on a quiet – well there are no quiet days really now; weekends are busy, the weekdays are busy. A 22-minute journey between Cheltenham and Box Hill gives you a sense of the travel time savings that you will get with the Suburban Rail Loop. And of course we are also underway on the Suburban Rail Loop airport section, where we are getting on and delivering that connection because we had the opportunity to make sure that as we are working in the east we are working in the west and we are working on how we connect the northern section as well, because this is a multigenerational project, and that is why the planning that is being done is being undertaken in many parts of the city and the state at the same time.

I have mentioned jobs a couple of times. I just wanted to come back and speak on that in a bit more detail. There are the construction jobs that the Suburban Rail Loop project will support; the Suburban Rail Loop east will support 8000 construction jobs and another 24,000 jobs across the economy. Let us just unpack the construction jobs for a moment. We are already seeing the first of those jobs out there in Clayton that are working on the project. At the heart of these jobs will also be our commitment to supporting apprentices, trainees and cadets, as we do across all of our projects. This means that you can be a young person starting on this project, you can finish your training, finish your apprenticeship, and keep going on the Suburban Rail Loop project, because it is a multigenerational project that provides an important pipeline for the construction industry.

For every 100 jobs you see in people on construction sites in hi-vis, and they are important jobs for our community and our economy, there is another 200 jobs in the supply chain. And that is a big and diverse supply chain. It is in the manufacturing sector, professional services, cleaning, hospitality and landscaping. It is a big and diverse supply chain that supports our construction projects. These are the jobs and these are the industries that can look to the future with confidence, because we are investing in the Suburban Rail Loop and not only investing in it but out there right now delivering on it.

Also, I have mentioned there are other jobs that will be supported. The growth in job opportunities that we will see, that you get from the work that will be done around each of the station precincts, will see further economic activity. I mentioned before the work around Monash, Deakin University Burwood, Box Hill, Glen Waverley, Cheltenham, Clayton. We will all see additional job opportunities come because we know businesses want to invest in their private operations where there are good transport connections, because quite simply that is where you get a great rate of return. It is how you can attract a strong workforce: make it easier for people to access those jobs.

Now I want to talk for a minute because I reckon there will be another criticism that will come this afternoon, asking, ‘What about consultation with the community? You have not talked to the community’. Well, I reckon we have talked to the –

A member interjected.

Jacinta ALLAN: I know your lines. I reckon we have already spoken to the community on three occasions in an election sense. The Victorian community has had an opportunity to have its say on three different occasions, and it has said yes each and every time to the Suburban Rail Loop. But we are doing more than that.

I mentioned before, we released a strategic assessment in 2018 and took it to the Victorian community. We have undertaken the most comprehensive planning and that included the independent environment effects statement process that had a huge amount of consultation across the community. There are the project precinct reference groups that have been set up in each of the six locations as well as at Heatherton. There have already been something like 605 meetings with stakeholders. There have been thousands and thousands of inquiries come through the Suburban Rail Loop Authority, and there is also the opportunity that is happening right now where we are going out and actively working with councils and communities in each of those areas. We are not saying we know what is best. We are saying we want to hear from you about how we can grab each and every opportunity that comes from having a train station come through your community – the Suburban Rail Loop come through your community. For some, it is a brand new station, like at Monash University, like at Deakin University Burwood; for others, like the other four stations, it is connecting, it is providing additional connections. Well, we want to make sure we are hearing from those local communities about how we can best achieve those outcomes both through the delivery of the rail infrastructure, but also those really great economic and community opportunities. Some of the opportunities will be in looking at how we can support more open space, some of it will be in supporting more access to more housing choices, and some of it will be additional employment and educational opportunities. This is the work we are doing right now with local communities.

All this work, all of this opportunity, all of the challenges that come with addressing how we support a growing city and suburbs – all of this is what the Liberal Party opposes. They opposed it in 2018, they opposed it at the state election in 2022 and they opposed it at the federal election in May of last year as well. They are turning their back on future generations – and on existing generations – in terms of what we need to do to address the challenges of a growing city and state.

They are turning their back too on the job opportunities that come. If you are a young person considering, ‘What sort of job do I want to do in the future? Do I want to go and study, go to TAFE, go and work in the construction sector?’ or if you want one of those jobs in the supply chain that I mentioned before, under a Labor government you can have the confidence to go and train in those areas, because you can see the pipeline. What we saw at the last election from the Liberal Party was that not only was the Suburban Rail Loop on the ballot paper, those jobs, those construction and supply chain jobs, were also on the ballot paper. The Liberal Party were saying to the Victorian community – and indeed they have not changed their tune to this day on this project – that they would continue to oppose those jobs that this project supports. They would oppose those opportunities that a kid going to TAFE today might have down the track. They would oppose the support that those families who rely on these pay packets get each and every week from these projects. And they are also opposed to those businesses who partner with us – the private sector who partner with us – in terms of making business decisions with confidence now because they can see that pipeline. All of this is opposed and not supported by the Liberal Party.

Indeed not only did the Liberal Party opposition to this project go to terms like ‘We oppose this project’ – and they used every opportunity almost every day to talk about the project – they actually went so far as to call this project ‘a mangy dog’. The then Shadow Minister for Transport Infrastructure – he is now the Shadow Minister for Education and a member of the opposition’s leadership team, but we are not seeing a lot of leadership from this mob, not a lot of leadership at all – called it ‘a mangy dog, to be dealt with in customary fashion’. That was something that member for Eastern Victoria Matthew Bach tweeted on 30 October last year. This is the sort of attitude that the Liberal Party have towards investing in transport infrastructure, investing in jobs and the people who work on these projects and investing in the sorts of projects our city and state need. To call them ‘a mangy dog’ simply speaks to their values, and we are seeing those values on display in the last few days. It absolutely speaks to the absence of values from those opposite. The Andrews Labor government is absolutely determined in its efforts to deliver this project, because quite simply this is a project we cannot afford not to build for the reasons that I have outlined to you today.

When you look back, it was about 40 years ago that the city loop opened. In 1985 it opened to great fanfare. When we do our openings these days, we do them in a slightly different fashion to how they did them back then, but certainly there was a lot of fanfare with the opening of the city loop – as there should have been, because to look at Melbourne today without the city loop is almost unthinkable when you look at the way the city loop opened up those connections around Southbank and into St Kilda Road and how it spurred not just the businesses down there, the housing down there, but the opportunities that are on the doorstep of the CBD. Well, the city loop was first considered in 1929. It literally took decades to get this project underway because there were decades of inaction, decades of indecision, decades of opposition and decades of politicians not having the confidence and the courage to stand up and say, ‘You know what, we need to build this project. Yes, it’s a project that will take many years, yes, it’s a project that needs significant government investment to get away, but yes, it’s a project a city and a state like Melbourne and Victoria need.’ That is why today we have the city loop and that is why the Andrews Labor government is determined to get on and deliver the Suburban Rail Loop, because we do not want to waste decades talking, debating, walking away from those challenges of making these sorts of decisions. We know we do not have that time to waste, and quite frankly, nor should we. We are not elected to sit around and not take action. That is definitely not the style of the Andrews Labor government. That is why we will continue every step of the way to prosecute the case for why the Suburban Rail Loop is important.

We simply have to get on and build the Suburban Rail Loop for the jobs, the opportunities it supports. That is why we will absolutely every step of the way stand up to the inevitable scare campaigns. They have already tried to do it. We have seen it a bit, haven’t we, member for Glen Waverley? We are seeing it already – these scare campaigns – because they are fundamentally opposed to this project. They want us to spend decades not getting on and delivering the Suburban Rail Loop. They want to scrap it – scrap the jobs, scrap this most important public transport project that will also support housing and access to services for people in the city and in the country. That is why we will continue to support this project. I can promise the Liberal Party this: we will continue to absolutely vigorously prosecute the case for why this project is important and run a very clear case for why your anti-Victorian, anti-housing, anti-jobs, anti-construction workers, anti-public transport approach is simply the wrong one for this growing city and state.

David SOUTHWICK (Caulfield) (15:26): I rise to speak on the motion presented by the Deputy Premier and ask, at the outset, that my amendment to the motion be circulated. My amendment reads:

That all the words after ‘house’ be omitted and replaced with the words –

‘(1) acknowledges that Victorians expect integrity, transparency, and good governance in the implementation of the Suburban Rail Loop; and

(2) calls on the government to release the full business case to the Victorian Auditor-General’s Office, have the project independently assessed by Infrastructure Victoria, and release accurate costings to Victorians’.

We have just heard a tirade from the Deputy Premier about how wonderful the Labor government is in delivering infrastructure. If we have ever seen a government that puts politics and spin first and people last, we have seen that in the Andrews Labor government. The only thing that I will agree with the Deputy Premier on is that infrastructure is vital. Jobs and infrastructure are vital to the future of this state. When we look at public transport, we have got to have a public transport system for everyone – not located where marginal seats lie, not located to win votes at the expense of people in the north and people in the west. We have got to have a public transport system that connects Victorians, that is reliable, that is on time and that works. Unfortunately, that is not what we have seen from the Andrews Labor government.

I would have thought that the Premier in his press release of 7 October 2015 would have actually put people before politics in his idea to create what was and now is Infrastructure Victoria. In that press release, the Andrews government announced the make-up of Infrastructure Victoria as an independent body that would take the politics out of infrastructure planning. It said that infrastructure expert Jim Miller had been appointed as the inaugural chair to do that. In this press release the quote from the Premier at the time was that:

Governments come and go, but our long-term infrastructure priorities always remain.

That’s why we’ve appointed a board to give us clear, expert advice that is independent of politics and focussed on our state’s priorities.

This is absolutely crucial to this motion, because when you put people first and when you have an independent board, as Infrastructure Victoria is, and when you fund that board, as the government has done, you would expect the government to then actually use them, and you would expect the government to say, ‘Right. Instead of just going about our business of deciding what marginal seats we need to shore up coming into an election, we’re going to take the advice of Infrastructure Victoria and have a planning system that actually works.’

The Deputy Premier alluded to other states and the way that they run their public transport systems. States like New South Wales over many years have looked at the overall connectivity of their system and how they can ensure that it is connected, that it is fair and that people can get from A to B no matter where they live, no matter where they reside, no matter what margin their seat is held by and no matter who, whether it is Labor or Liberal or Greens, holds the seat.

Unfortunately that has not been the case with this government. It has not been the case with this government when it comes to level crossing removals – that has been clear. We saw what were originally the top 50 level crossing removals in VicRoads’ most dangerous level crossings list, which was released back in 2010 – that ‘most dangerous’ list – when the government went out and said, ‘Here are the 50 that are going to go’. Within the top 10 Glenhuntly, which is one in my electorate, was not even considered. After a lot of lobbying, a lot of fighting and a lot of noise from residents around Glen Huntly, we finally got that onto the list. But if you look at the Sandringham line and if you look at Richmond or Malvern, there are so many level crossings that are dangerous that have been forgotten. So if you ever want an example of a government that just says, ‘We’re going to put politics over people when it comes to infrastructure’, just have a look at the level crossing removal program. We on this side agree that level crossing removal is important, but let us do it properly, let us do it sensibly, let us do it fairly and let us remove the most dangerous level crossings first. That is what the public would expect, but unfortunately that is not what the public have received.

Let us get back to the Suburban Rail Loop (SRL) or link with an airport rail – whatever we are up to at the moment. I note that the government have used the opportunity of this motion to have a smack at the opposition – to say, ‘Well, your former spokesperson on infrastructure described it as not very favourable, therefore you’re wrong, we’re right.’ But the core element that the government has missed out on in this is that actually nobody lined up with the government and said how fantastic this project is. In fact it was quite the opposite, and I will talk about this in a moment. Infrastructure Victoria, the government’s own independent agency, which the Premier set up, has hardly mentioned it, certainly not reviewed it and never advocated for it as a major project that the government should be doing. So the government ignored its very own body to get on and deliver a project.

Let us go further. Forget about what the Liberals have described the SRL as only as far back as a week or so ago – in fact, to be specific, only as recently as 15 March – Professor Buxton, an environmental planning expert at RMIT, lashed the SRL as a ‘$200 billion thought bubble’. If the government has an issue with the way that the Liberals describe the SRL, why aren’t we debating what Professor Buxton, an expert, has to say about this particular project? It is very interesting that the government is quite selective, again playing politics over these issues. If they were really serious, they would listen to Professor Buxton and what he has to say – but that is not all – and they would listen to the Institute of Transportation Engineers, including Michael Buxton, including Graham Currie and including John Stanley, who all took aim at the 90 kilometre loop, which they doubted would be kept within the $125 billion price tag that had been estimated.

Again, no-one knows how much this thing is going to cost. The Deputy Premier did not even know when it was announced. I mean, every single time in the lead-up to the election we had an initial figure, the figure changed – it was $50 billion, it was $100 billion – and then finally when push came to shove it was ‘I’ll get back to you’ and we never got a number. We never got a number, and that was the problem. We do not have the details.

The Deputy Premier today has said, ‘We’ve done the consultation. We’ve spoken to the people. We’ve done the consultation from an election’ – from an election! ‘We’ve had an election we’ve won – that’s our consultation.’ Well, that is arrogance – that is what it is. That is arrogance, because where the SRL is being developed, in the 15 precincts where it is being done, what consultation has the government done in those areas? I doubt the 15 precincts in places like Box Hill and in places like Cheltenham, which the transport engineers, Buxton and co all talk about – only a week ago they all said that to get this done and to jam in a million people as part of the plan you are going to have to build sky towers as part of this to 15 to 20 storeys. That is what you are going to do. Do the people that live around these 15 precincts know what they are going to get as part of this SRL project? 1.6 kilometres of sky towers. Do they know what that means in terms of congestion, in terms of movement, in terms of planning, in terms of environmental footprint, in terms of parking, in terms of overdevelopment? Do they know that? I doubt it. You cannot go to an election and say, ‘You know what, we’re going to build something and not give people the detail’ and say you have consulted. That is what the government has done. They have gone to an election and said, ‘We’re building the SRL’ – and who wouldn’t want to have a transport system that connects you? Who wouldn’t want to do that? But you have got to give them the facts. You have got to tell them that along with this SRL come 15 to 20 storeys and these precincts. And as Professor Buxton says:

Is it going to be 20 storeys? Or is it four or six storeys?

In a sense the people are being treated as an enemy.

That is not consultation when Professor Buxton says, ‘In a sense the people are being treated as an enemy.’ And that is what the Deputy Premier calls consultation – I do not think so.

Further to that, after Professor Currie, who is the chair of public transport at Monash University – again, the Deputy Premier has talked about Monash University and what they are going to get as benefit from the SRL – Professor Stanley said very clearly:

It is economics without a budget constraint …

And that is why our amendment to this motion is so important, because we need to understand what this is going to cost, we need to ensure people are getting fair value and we need to ensure that the business case covers all of this. What we heard from Professor Currie was:

“Can we really afford this massively expensive project? Well I don’t think we can and there are much better ways to go.”

This included investigating putting more money into transforming existing National Employment and Innovation Clusters, and alternative transport links within precincts …

And that is an alternative proposition from somebody that knows – an expert. Do not take a politician’s word for it, take an expert’s, and that is what we are hearing here. The Victorian Auditor-General in terms of the analysis of the SRL business case found that its content did not meet a single one of the Auditor-General’s five benchmarks for expected processes and relevant guidance. Instead the Auditor-General’s own summary of the SRL’s business case speaks volumes. It says:

the high-level problems and benefits articulated in the SRL business case lacked necessary and sufficient supporting evidence –

no detail –

a narrow set of options were considered and analysed both before and as part of the business case development

the economic analysis does not cover the entire SRL program and lacks consistency with the guidance in key areas.

But here is the kicker when it comes to the economics. The independent Auditor-General’s finding is stark – that this government has pulled the wool over our eyes and has cooked the books. The government tell us – and again the Deputy Premier was talking about their business case – that the expected benefit of the SRL is $1.70 for every dollar spent. But when calculated using the objective guidelines laid down by the Department of Treasury and Finance, the business case return is just 51 cents, so the SRL will lose 49 cents for every single dollar. It is the complete opposite, but the government will have you believe that this is a winner and delivers economic benefit.

The Deputy Premier went to absolute lengths to say, ‘Yeah, well, when the opposition get up, they’ll talk about the business case – which we’ve got. Go to the website.’ In the Victorian Auditor-General’s Office’s report the recommendation for the business case is to:

… provide … a full business case for the entire Suburban Rail Loop program of investments that includes economic analysis results for all stages of the proposed investment program …

That is what the Auditor-General said; it is not what the opposition said. The government can make stuff up as much as they like, but at the end of the day this is from the Auditor-General and this is what they have said.

The Deputy Premier in 2018 told Victorians that the entire Suburban Rail Loop would cost just $50 billion. Then in August last year the independent parliamentary office, again which the government has ignored, costed the project at $200 billion – four times what the government promised. After the Parliamentary Budget Office released the report, the Premier said he did not have the cost figures on hand but told the media to ask the Minister for Transport and Infrastructure. Again, nice handball. Then the following week the minister was asked about the cost not once, not twice, not three times but five separate times at press conferences, and as reported in the Age, the minister refused to repeat the government’s previous estimate and only gave estimates for stage 1.

That is the problem with the government’s infrastructure. You cannot do infrastructure with a blank cheque. We are heading for very serious economic times. We have seen the budget blowouts. Our government continues to throw money like it is confetti. We have got $30 billion of budget blowouts on infrastructure without a ribbon cut. Yes, we have cut some ribbons on level crossings, but in terms of some of these major infrastructure projects that we are talking about we are already up to $30 billion of overruns – and counting. Imagine trying to build your house like that and realising that you literally cannot afford to finish it because you have run out of money. That is where Victoria is going at the moment. We are running out of money, and we do not have the necessary money to finish these projects. We saw that again with the transport infrastructure minister and Deputy Premier’s own Commonwealth Games running out of money and going to the government for help. We have seen that with this project for the SRL. They are going to the federal government and asking them for help. They are doing that because they talk a big game, but they do not deliver when it comes to detail, and you have to be able to deliver otherwise you are going to end up with nothing.

You can look at the figures to be able to see this. Look where we have been. One of the best examples of this again was where the Victorian Auditor-General scored the state’s delivery of key transport projects as a fail – not the opposition. An article states:

… Auditor General … scores state’s delivery of key transport projects ‘a fail’

This is back in 2021.

… an analysis of publicly available information on projects costed at $100m or more … warned on Monday the government’s tendency to underquote “can have consequences for Victorians, such as delays in obtaining needed infrastructure or increased costs”.

And it goes on to talk about each and every one of these projects:

While the government has confirmed the completion of 46 of its … 75 level crossing removals, it has not said how much money has been spent to date.

The first 50 level crossings were initially expected to cost $5bn to $6bn to remove, but a 2017 Auditor-General’s report found it had blown out to $8.3bn.

There you go – from $5 billion to $8.3 billion. Following the government’s promise to do an additional 25 level crossings, the full estimated costings were costed at $14.8 billion, and the last cost an average of $260 million compared to an average of $160 million. So it goes up and up and up.

We start with a figure, the figure blows out, and that is where we have got to a $30 billion blowout, where we have got level crossings; North East Link, initial cost $10 billion, we are up at a revised cost of $15.8 billion, with the clock ticking; and Metro rail, $11 billion – again, a $2.7 billion blowout. These are the Auditor-General’s numbers, and they have gone up since then. But these are, as stipulated, not our numbers but the Auditor-General’s numbers. Melbourne Airport rail, with an initial cost of $10 billion, with each government meant to pay $5 billion, is up to $13 billion. West Gate Tunnel – again, blowouts. Suburban Rail Loop – who knows where we are going to get to. That is effectively where this stuff is at. So we have got blowouts. We are not able to deliver this stuff on time. Even as recently as last week we had again the Auditor-General report looking at our Metro contracts actually delivering current projects, and what it says is that the government has no idea when it comes to delivering value. They have no idea whether we are getting value or not, and we are not meeting targets in terms of reliability. We are down to 50 per cent on reliability, and punctuality only meets its targets two-thirds of the time. So we are down when it comes to actually meeting our targets. We are literally writing cheques to an agency and have no idea what we are getting as far as those cheques are concerned, and the Auditor-General has said that the government needs to sit down and work out the detail of what we are looking for and has suggested a whole lot of changes when it comes to that.

We have had a huge amount of criticism when it comes to the SRL. We have heard urban policy professor Jago Dodson say:

It looks almost like a complete failure in metropolitan planning that a project of this financial magnitude could be decided to proceed with almost no … planning whatsoever …

Grattan Institute cities program director Marion Terrill said:

… the project needs a rethink – not just stations, but lock, stock and barrel.

Stephen Anthony, former chief economist at Industry Super Australia, said the Suburban Rail Loop is the ‘worst infrastructure project of all time’. These are not Liberals. These are experts. The government today has put a notice of motion that attacks a Liberal transport spokesperson but ignores what experts have actually had to say on this, because they have not consulted. There has been no consultation on this. It has just been an election commitment with no detail, and that is the issue with this particular project.

But I suppose the biggest, most interesting thing of all time – it just shows you where we have gone on this project – is we had back on 31 October 2022, so less than a month out from the election, ‘The rail loop rebrand is no accident as spin over substances reaches a peak’:

Premier Daniel Andrews stood with a straight face and rebranded the bipartisan Melbourne Airport Rail Link as part of Labor’s Suburban Rail Loop.

This was “SRL Airport”, Andrews and his chosen successor … said.

They said it is significant, it is now an extension, it is now an additional one with the lot. Public Transport Users Association Daniel Bowen got this absolutely right. Described as ‘the human antithesis of spin’, he called it an attempt to piggyback on a popular project, sharing a satirical meme saying, ‘Did you know if you combine wine and dinner you get winner?’ It is a bit of a chicken dinner here, because what we have got is a Suburban Rail Loop, and they were having trouble trying to sell it, so they called it the suburban airport rail loop and whacked in ‘airport rail’, then away we went. That is what Daniel Bowen said. That is what he gets, because with a project that was really finding it hard to actually get traction, they threw the Melbourne Airport rail in and then we got one with the lot.

We got not the suburban rail but the suburban airport rail loop. Because then that makes it exciting. Then it makes it something that we on this side of the house have been talking about and have supported, but certainly that detail got left out. Then there is a whole lot of detail when you add the airport rail into it – because it was literally just a thought bubble, it was a last-minute bit of a show to try and sell something in the election with no detail, no consultation.

Then you start to get things like people going to Broadmeadows heading to Werribee. How do we get there? Via the SRL North link in a couple of decades. At this stage the SRL Airport would also be built with an elevated station on the south side of the airport, but the elevated structure prohibits outer lines, such as SRL North, coming in and connecting to the station. This means that Broadmeadows passengers would need to go between stations – board toward Sunshine and then cross over. So by the time you get there, you might as well walk, because it is going to take you that time. Same with Sunshine – same deal. By the time you actually start getting this going, it is going to take you so long. There is no direct link. Again, the west was left out. The west was last.

If I come back to where I started, if the government actually took politics out of this and did what the people wanted, they would start the Suburban Rail Loop in the west. They would start getting the west connected up first. They would give the basic transport systems to the west so they have got accessibility, but the west is forgotten. The west is completely forgotten. Even the Premier himself after the election came in here and said, ‘Oh, you know what? I better actually start thinking about the west, because I’ve forgotten them for a while and the huge swings that we got in the west show that maybe I haven’t done the work in the west.’ I would say to the Premier, I would say to the government –

A member interjected.

David SOUTHWICK: I take up the interjection in terms of whether I would know where the west is. I spend a lot of time in Werribee, a lot of time in Laverton. You know that. Have a look at that Laverton pool, which the government will not put any money into. You know, you can see that very, very proudly –

Members interjecting.

The ACTING SPEAKER (Michaela Settle): Order! There is too much audible noise.

David SOUTHWICK: Very, very good. I have upset the government, because we know that we care about everybody. We do not care where you live. We do not care if they are Labor-held seats. We take politics out and we are focused on people.

Infrastructure Victoria was a program. It was an authority that was established by the Premier, and we accept that. But what I would say to you is: where was the SRL in Infrastructure Victoria’s recommendations? I am still looking for it. I cannot find it. I would be very happy if the government would turn their attention and give me some detail, because again it was ignored.

Infrastructure Victoria talks about 24 other transport projects. They are mentioned in this document – 24 other projects. Metro 2 was mentioned, transforming Melbourne, Ballarat and Bendigo cycling was mentioned, a new rail network and technology was mentioned. A whole range of projects in terms of regional Victoria are mentioned in here: fund and plan for ongoing regional rail freight network development in Victoria and redesign regional public transport to meet local needs. There are so many projects: reallocate road space to priority transport modes, redesign tram routes, activate urban renewal with new tram links, plan for and fund public transport accessibility and tram stop updates. Adopt permanent off-peak discounts for public transport fares – that would be a good idea. Reduce bus and tram fares, remove the free tram zone, appoint an independent transport pricing adviser – it goes on.

I am still looking at all of these: ‘deliver a new intermodal freight terminal for inland rail’, ‘construct an outer metropolitan road and rail corridor’, ‘trial congestion pricing in inner Melbourne’, ‘incorporate congestion pricing for all new metropolitan freeways’. It continues: ‘extend rail services in Melbourne’s western and northern growth areas’ – there you go, mentioned again. ‘Extend rail services’ – that would be a good start, wouldn’t it?

In the next two years, develop business cases to extend electrified metropolitan train services from Sunshine to Rockbank, from Craigieburn to Beveridge, and on the Wyndham Vale corridor, to be delivered by 2031. Deliver extra services to south-east Melbourne by running Rockbank services to Pakenham via the Melbourne Metro Tunnel. Consider adding extra stations on the Wyndham Vale and Melton corridors …

to secure remaining land required on those stations. I would expect government members that are going to talk on this motion from these areas would say, ‘I tell you what, Infrastructure Victoria’s got some good ideas here – great ideas. We should take them up.’

In the next year, introduce ‘next generation’ bus services towards Clyde, Mornington Peninsula, Wollert and Armstrong Creek …

Expand Melbourne’s outer suburban road – again, the arterial road congestion; there are so many ideas. But do you know what is not in here? The Suburban Rail Loop is not in here as one of the key projects to deliver. Do you know why? Because it has been a politically motivated project to try and win marginal seats, to shore up marginal seats with no detail. What I can assure you is we will be consulting with the 15 high-rises in the areas, in the Labor-held seats, to make sure they get the detail and they know exactly what this government will be delivering – high-rise and skyscrapers.

Nick STAIKOS (Bentleigh) (15:56): Thank goodness that drivel is over. Can I just say to my neighbour the member for Caulfield – I get on okay with the member for Caulfield: we get on well, member for Caulfield, but that was probably the worst contribution I have heard in eight years in this house, the absolute worst contribution. It had it all. You know how he started his contribution? I listened to most of it in my office, and then I came here and he was still going. He went for the full half an hour. He even took credit for the Glen Huntly level crossing removal. Well, can I say, my electorate was first cab off the rank with the Andrews government’s Level Crossing Removal Project – Centre Road, McKinnon Road and North Road – and throughout that construction period members of the opposition were petitioning against those projects. Those opposite have never supported the Level Crossing Removal Project. They do not support the Suburban Rail Loop (SRL). In fact they do not support building anything. The only thing they still want to build, even after three election losses, is that dead dog of a project, the east–west link. They are still trying to dig that up. They do not want to build the projects that Victorians voted for, they want to build projects that Victorians did not vote for, and that is why they sit on the opposition benches in such low numbers – and may that continue to be the case for a long time yet. They did not want to do anything when they were in government, and they oppose every aspect of this government’s Big Build. We think it is disgraceful.

We also think – and we are unanimous on this side of the house – that Melbourne is one of the world’s great cities, and a great city of the world like Melbourne needs a transport system that is befitting a great city of the world. By the 2050s, by the time the Suburban Rail Loop is fully complete, Melbourne will be the size of London. Can anybody imagine London without the Tube? Could any of us who have visited that majestic city imagine that city without the Tube? You could not possibly imagine London without the tube, and when the SRL is built, just like we say in relation to the city loop, we will be saying we could not imagine Melbourne without the Suburban Rail Loop.

I am going to focus on the first stage of the Suburban Rail Loop, SRL East, which is from Cheltenham to Box Hill. As a consequence of the redistribution from the last election, Cheltenham has come into the Bentleigh electorate, and I feel very privileged and honoured to represent the good people of Cheltenham – and the Suburban Rail Loop is starting in Cheltenham. I think one of the greatest benefits of this first stage of the Suburban Rail Loop is that finally Australia’s largest university, Monash University, will be connected to rail. Monash University of course was opened in 1961, a long time ago.

It was one of a number of megaprojects of the 1960s – Monash University was one, Waverley Park or VFL Park was also built during that time, and there was Tullamarine airport. But what were not constructed with those projects were the rail services needed to connect them. It has just been talked about ever since. In 1969, I think it was, the Bolte government released a transportation plan for Melbourne. It actually included a rail line to Doncaster via Monash University, but it has just been talked about since. This government is getting on and building this railway line, which will include Monash University. Monash University of course, when you combine students and staff, is a community of around 100,000 people. Again, there is no rail line, but we are addressing that.

If you take the community of Cheltenham as an example, if you are a resident of Cheltenham and you are a student at Monash University enrolled at the Clayton campus, your transport options to get there if you do not drive are very, very limited indeed. I will take you through the two main options at the moment. First, if you just want to take buses from Cheltenham to Monash University, you would walk to a bus stop for the 822 bus service, you would get off at the intersection of East Boundary Road and Centre Road in East Bentleigh and then you would wait for the 703 to pick you up and take you to Monash University. That is 1 hour and 9 minutes; that is how long it takes. And Cheltenham is not in the middle of nowhere. Cheltenham is part of the middle ring of Melbourne. Just going to another part of the south-eastern suburbs – an hour and 9 minutes by bus. If you were to take bus and train, you would walk to Cheltenham station, catch the train to Ormond station and then take the 630 bus service to Monash University. That is an hour and 3 minutes. When the Suburban Rail Loop is built, from Cheltenham to Monash University will be an 11-minute journey. That is how city shaping this project is – 11 minutes as opposed to an hour and 9 minutes or an hour and 3 minutes. That is the practical, tangible difference that the Victorian community will enjoy once the Suburban Rail Loop is built.

That is what you would expect in a great city of the world, and Melbourne is a great city of the world. Those opposite do not believe that Melbourne is a great city of the world. That is why they have not built anything. When they were in government and the member for Murray Plains at the table was a cabinet minister, they did not build a single thing. They talked about building all sorts of things, like the east–west link; they even for a split second talked about a rail connection to Doncaster that might have included Monash University. They did not actually do anything. They even talked about airport rail. You know, I remember at the 2014 election campaign they were handing out these fake train tickets to Tullamarine airport. They did not actually get on and build it. They did not do any of that. But they come in here and try to stop this government’s proud infrastructure agenda, and of course they will not succeed.

Melbourne is changing and Melbourne is growing, and the Suburban Rail Loop is the project that is needed to facilitate that growth and to facilitate that change, because it is not merely a transport project, it is something that I think will change Melbourne. It will indeed decentralise Melbourne, because it will mean that you have this orbital rail network that goes through all of these different precincts around middle suburban Melbourne, and it will mean that we will co-locate jobs with housing and with transport. And that is the future. That is the way that we are going to manage Melbourne’s enormous growth going into the 2050s, going into that time when Melbourne will become the size of London, but also ensure that we are creating jobs and opportunities for the future. That is a big part of it.

I am really, really privileged to be able to chair the Suburban Rail Loop East Cheltenham precinct reference group, and that is a group of a number of different representatives of our local community. On that group we have got local government, we have got residents associations and we have got transport groups. I can tell you there is a lot of enthusiasm in our local communities for the Suburban Rail Loop.

I remember last year when those opposite made the announcement that they opposed the Suburban Rail Loop that certainly my opponent in Bentleigh thought she was on a winner pushing that particular policy. I did find it curious that she was telling the voters in Cheltenham, ‘I’m not going to build that new train station that is coming to Cheltenham.’ In that regard she did strike me as a bit of a rookie: vote for me and I won’t build your train station – genius! But obviously she did not succeed, and I am still here for a third term and really happy about that. I do not think I will be the member for Bentleigh in 2056 when the Suburban Rail Loop –

Members interjecting.

Nick STAIKOS: I could be, you never know – I would be as old as Methuselah by then. But I am very enthusiastic about this. As the Premier says, this is a project that we will not open but that we need to start, because it is not about politics, it is about Melbourne’s future and Victoria’s future.

Peter WALSH (Murray Plains) (16:06): I rise to support the amendment moved by the member for Caulfield, the Deputy Leader of the Liberal Party:

That all the words after ‘house’ be omitted and replaced with the words –

‘(1) acknowledges that Victorians expect integrity, transparency, and good governance in the implementation of the Suburban Rail Loop; and

(2) calls on the government to release the full business case to the Victorian Auditor-General’s Office, have the project independently assessed by Infrastructure Victoria, and release accurate costings to Victorians’.

The previous speaker the member for Bentleigh spoke about this being not about politics but about building things. Can I say this project is all about politics. It is all about politics; it was designed about politics. As I understand it, when this project was being designed the secretary of the department, Richard Bolt, was actually excluded from any discussions about how this project might be put together. Those that were working on this in the Premier’s office and the departmental office had to sign confidentiality clauses so they did not talk to other people within the department. So this is all about politics, it is not actually about doing the right things by Victorians. It was a secret deal that was done without the department secretary knowing. I know he was very, very miffed about the fact that he was excluded from all discussions around this particular project before it was released, and those that were involved had to sign secrecy documents not to tell others in the department that this project was going ahead.

Victorians do expect transparency. They do actually want the truth, and they are not getting the truth about this project and they are not getting the truth around a whole range of other projects. I think Professor Buxton put it very well – he is an environmental planning expert at RMIT – when he lashed the Suburban Rail Loop as a $900 billion thought bubble. We do not know what the cost will be. The cost for the first stage was estimated at $50 billion. It could blow out to $125 billion. The whole lot was supposed to be $100 billion. It is not going to be finished until 2056. With the way that this government does major projects, it is probably going to be $300 billion, $400 billion or $500 billion. If you actually put that on top of the record state debt we have here, we will be a banana republic. We will go back to Paul Keating’s banana republic in this state, because we will just have so much debt.

As everyone knows with their own personal budgets at the moment, the cost of living and interest rates are really biting for people in their own household budgets. Government is no different: the cost of interest is going up for Victoria all the time. We are spending $10 million a day now on the interest bill, and over the next three to four years that will double to $20 million a day. That is when Victorians are going to wake up to the fact that this government has blown so much money. And it is not the Big Build, it is actually the big bill that we are going to see here in this state into the future.

The member for Bentleigh talked about the great city that Melbourne is. Melbourne used to be a great city before the Andrews government, through COVID lockdowns and through continual driving of business out of this area, took away our status as the most livable city in the world. For year after year after year Melbourne was voted as one of the most livable cities in the world. Not anymore. That is because of what the Andrews government has done to it.

If you think about this project, the Minister for the Suburban Rail Loop, the member for Bendigo East, has a track record of running major projects into the ground. You talk about the other transport projects across Melbourne – $28 billion over budget and adding. If I look at the other country MPs in this place, think about what $28 billion would do to fix the roads we have. Instead of having speed restriction signs of 60 or 40 kilometres on major arterial roads because they are so bad, we might actually have fixed that with that $28 billion in cost overruns on projects. Think about the health system in Victoria, what we might need for a new hospital in the seat of Narracan, what we might need for a new hospital in my electorate or in Bairnsdale in the member for Gippsland East’s seat. They are the sorts of projects that could be done without any additional cost if we did not have that $28 billion in cost overruns in the major transport infrastructure projects here. So how can Victorians have any faith that there will be transparency, that there will actually be good value out of a project that is being run by the member for Bendigo East over that particular time?

One thing I would like to touch on about the member for Bendigo East and the projects that she has been managing over this time – I have not spoken about this in the house for a while: the Murray Basin rail project. It was a project that was going to be a once-in-a-generation, probably once-in-two-generations opportunity to actually upgrade and standardise the freight rail lines of north-west Victoria. When we were in government, in partnership with the Commonwealth, there was over $400 million invested into that project. After the member for Bendigo East has managed that project through her time on the government benches of this house, that project is only half finished and the rail speed on those lines is actually worse than when it started.

Wayne Farnham: Couldn’t believe it. Seriously?

Peter WALSH: Very seriously, very seriously. Yes, the line from Mildura to Maryborough has been standardised and the line from Maryborough to Ararat has been reopened and standardised, but what did they do with that line? They actually went and got hundred-year-old railway line from the old Maryborough to Castlemaine railway line – surprise, surprise, hundred-year-old steel with today’s steel does not weld properly; it cracked. There is still, as I understand it, a 25-kilometre speed limit on that line from Maryborough to Ararat, and instead of the trains going through from Maryborough to Ballarat to Gheringhap up to the port and doing what the aspiration was for those freight forwarders from Mildura, having a 24-hour train turnaround, by the time they go from Mildura to Maryborough to Ararat to Maroona to Gheringhap and back to the port – most places running at 25 to 30 kilometres an hour because the line is not good enough – they cannot get the turnaround time to get the freight efficiencies they need for that particular project.

So I do not believe Victorians should have any faith in the minister delivering the Suburban Rail Loop. The histories of other projects have seen huge cost blowouts, as I have said. The history of the Murray Basin rail project has been an absolute disaster for those people of north-west Victoria. And dare I start on what is going to happen with the Commonwealth Games. The Minister for Commonwealth Games Delivery – I think it might be the same person – is now saying, ‘We actually don’t have $2.6 billion to do this project; we want the federal government to kick money in to do this particular project,’ and going to Canberra and going to local government. If you think about what is going on with the Geelong council at the moment, the appointment of the CEO is being called off because the person may not be the best person for the government’s intent. As I understand it, the issues there are about: how much is Geelong going to kick in to make up for the shortfall that the Andrews government has to provide the infrastructure for the Commonwealth Games in Geelong? The same thing is going to happen to the Latrobe Valley, the same thing no doubt will happen in Bendigo and the same thing no doubt will happen in Ballarat – big promises, $2.6 billion, great boom for regional Victoria. The Big Build, as it is called, will be the big bill again for ratepayers in those particular council areas, because they will end up picking up the tab for the Commonwealth Games. So I support the member for Caulfield in what he is saying Victorians need.

The last thing I want to touch on is the fact that if you are going to spend $100 billion, $200 billion, $300 billion on a project, wouldn’t you actually send it to Infrastructure Victoria, your own independent body that assesses these sorts of projects? Wouldn’t you actually send it to Infrastructure Australia to have it assessed? But no, hang on a minute – Infrastructure Victoria is being starved of funds, IBAC is being starved of funds, the Ombudsman is being starved of funds, the independent Parliamentary Budget Office is being starved of funds, because the Andrews Labor government does not actually want anyone to know what is going on in this state.

What we will see when history is written – and the Premier may get his statue in front of 1 Treasury Place; he may get his statue. As he says, that is up to a future Premier. He may get his statue, but what the rest of Victoria will get is a huge debt, a debt that you will not be able to jump over for two or three generations. For those that were around to remember the end of the Cain-Kirner government and what that did to the Victorian economy, we were the laughing-stock of the rest of Australia. We were the rust bucket state, where people were moving out. We have actually seen that with COVID – the number of people that have left this state, that have taken their skills, their employment elsewhere because they are just sick of doing business in Victoria.

I have many examples of people right across Australia who will no longer do business in Victoria because of this government, because of the restrictive practices in this place, because of the red tape, because of the green tape, because of the cultural heritage tape in this state. We are going backwards at a huge rate of knots, and the Suburban Rail Loop will probably be the millstone around our neck that will sink us in the future.

Luba GRIGOROVITCH (Kororoit) (16:16): I rise to speak in support of the motion by my colleague the Deputy Premier and to put on the record the benefits of the Suburban Rail Loop (SRL) despite what those opposite us have to say about it. It is the biggest infrastructure project ever undertaken in Victoria, and it is going to do great things for our state. The Suburban Rail Loop plan was praised for its long-term vision and ambition as well as for being an innovative solution to the difficulties faced by Melbourne’s transport network. The Suburban Rail Loop will do more to transform our public transport network with the new transport connections and investments in station precincts, which will influence where people choose to live and where businesses choose to locate, helping Melbourne grow in a planned and sustainable way.

The Suburban Rail Loop will connect every major railway line, from the Frankston line to the Werribee line – even though some of those opposite us seem to think we are forgetting about the west – easing demand on the existing public transport network and encouraging people to leave their cars at home. The Suburban Rail Loop is a project that our city and state needs and will move 600,000 car trips off our roads every day, reducing congestion across the entire transport network. It will slash travel times to and from key destinations, including universities, hospitals and key employment centres, and we can simply not afford to not build it.

Three transport superhubs, at Clayton, Broadmeadows and Sunshine, will connect regional services so that passengers outside of Melbourne will not have to travel through the CBD to get employment, visit world-class hospitals or attend the universities. Two of the Suburban Rail Loop’s four stages are already under construction. Work is underway from Melbourne Airport through to Sunshine, with an expected completion date of 2029. The Sunshine hub is literally on the doorstep for my constituents in Kororoit, so this has major benefits in delivering better transport connections and cutting congestion for travellers.

But not only will this project improve cross-suburb transport, it will increase economic activity around the station precincts, which will drive business opportunities and clusters of new jobs, with the Suburban Rail Loop precinct set to become home to more than half a million jobs by 2056. For the people in Kororoit, that will enable more people to work closer to where they live and give them greater access to more diverse employment opportunities. This long pipeline of construction activity will be supporting up to 24,000 jobs across the Victorian economy to deliver the Suburban Rail Loop both north and east. Up to 8000 direct jobs will be created as part of delivering SRL East. More than 5000 additional direct jobs will be created as part of the delivery of SRL North from Box Hill to Melbourne Airport. Delivered in stages and over several decades, the construction and the delivery of the Suburban Rail Loop will provide opportunities for up to 10 per cent of the workforce to be the next generation of apprentices, trainees and cadets. I would like to note that 32 apprentices and cadets are already working on delivering these initial works.

Last sitting week, as some of you would remember, we celebrated International Women’s Day. I want to make mention that currently in Australia females make up just 16 per cent of engineering graduates and 13 per cent of the engineering workforce. The Suburban Rail Loop will ensure that in training the next generation of skilled workers, there will be more training and job opportunities for women in science, technology, engineering and maths. Already more than 40 per cent of the Suburban Rail Loop Authority, the SRLA, employees are women, including 50 per cent in senior management roles, and they are actively recruiting women into graduate programs and supporting experienced women to thrive through development and leadership programs.

This project also has an emphasis on ensuring that Indigenous businesses can benefit from the major economic activity which is being generated through the SRL. Ten Aboriginal businesses have already been employed on the project, including Indigenous construction firm Wamarra, which established the Clayton site where construction kicked off in June, and Panku Safety Solutions, which supplies site workers with prescription safety glasses. First Nations business Djurwa is providing waste management services to SRL East worksites during early construction, joining the 8000-strong workforce that will deliver SRL East. SRL East is providing fantastic opportunities for both Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples to be involved in this city-shaping project, with a 3 per cent workforce target for the first phase of construction. With my background at the Rail, Tram and Bus Union, I know that the workforce that will deliver, engineer and regulate this project during construction and when it is completed are highly professional, skilled and proud to be delivering transport options to people in this state.

The Suburban Rail Loop is much more than a transport project. As well as building much-needed transport infrastructure and improved connectivity, it will change public transport in the state and support vibrant precincts like Sunshine, which is close to my electorate of Kororoit, with more diversity in jobs, something we will all very much look forward to. More than 20,000 people were engaged in stakeholder and community engagement through online and face-to-face consultation activities. The feedback played an important role in helping to define what was valued in terms of infrastructure and the development of precincts, and what improvement opportunities could be considered during all stages of the project’s planning, development and delivery. I must say I was out with Brimbank City Council last week discussing this very matter and they are quite excited about the SRL being on their doorstep.

As the Deputy Premier mentioned earlier, back in October 2021 the then Minister for Transport Infrastructure introduced legislation to establish the Suburban Rail Loop Authority as a statutory government body, but of course we all remember that during the state election campaign last year the opposition announced that they would cancel – I did say cancel – the Suburban Rail Loop if they won –

Members interjecting.

Luba GRIGOROVITCH: That is correct – only to then backflip slightly when they realised that they needed the support of people they were asking to vote for them in the very suburbs that would benefit greatly from it. They quickly did a backflip.

The opposition have made it clear that they will ignore the message that the Victorian people sent to them in the last two elections and that they will continue to oppose every aspect of the SRL every step of the way, and that is what this amendment today is doing. Victorians knew that this project would make travel easier. It would make travel faster and it would make travel more convenient to access Melbourne’s fastest growing precincts. It will provide access to employment, to health, to education and to retail for more future generations and that is why the Labor government, my government, which I am proud to be part of, won a third term at the election – yes, a third term – with an increased majority. Premier Daniel Andrews said that the result was a clear endorsement of the project by Victorian voters, and I think many of us in the chamber in agree. The outcome simply speaks for itself. This project is part of Melbourne’s 2050 vision of a well-connected city and it is what Labor does: we connect people.

It aligns transport investments with precinct plans and potential precinct development projects. Labor has always been the party of vision, innovation and investment in the future. Labor’s plan, as we all know, is to build a state that has infrastructure for the future. As was said last year, we are getting on with delivering it and we will continue to do what matters, because we know that the SRL does matter. We know that it is important to our constituents around the state to make sure that this project is delivered. It is a project that we cannot afford to not build, and that is why I support the motion as it stands.

Chris CREWTHER (Mornington) (16:25): I rise to speak against this motion moved by the Leader of the House, the member for Macedon. This motion states:

That this house notes that Victorians resoundingly supported, for a second time, the state-shaping Suburban Rail Loop, including SRL Airport, described by the Shadow Minister for Education on social media as ‘a mangy dog’ of a project.

The state Labor government has committed $11.8 billion towards this project and the federal government has committed $2.2 billion, but the Parliamentary Budget Office estimates a cost of potentially up to $200.3 billion for SRL East and SRL North, if not more. That is four times what the government has promised for the full project at the original $50 billion. Instead of expanding services to places that already have rail services, why don’t we look at other places that do not have rail access, such as Baxter right near my electorate of Mornington or a station for Mornington itself? If you look around the state, there are places like Mildura, Horsham and Koo Wee Rup; these places are not getting a service at all. But instead we are in a situation where we have SRL West being subject to further investigation, planning and development.

Professor Michael Buxton, who is an emeritus professor of environment and planning at RMIT University, has described the Suburban Rail Loop (SRL) as a ‘$200 billion thought bubble’ and said that people are being treated like the enemy as real consultation has not occurred. He wrote:

… design problems are the inevitable outcome of the secretive decision-making around this project. Instead of using public sector and other expertise, the government outsourced the planning and design to a consulting firm and then established a nominally public body which operates essentially outside government and has only one task, to build transport infrastructure.

The Rail Loop Authority continues the Victorian tradition of regarding public open space as free land for development. Moorabbin’s William Fry reserve will be plundered and used for development to raise funds and the Heatherton Chain of Parks concept destroyed as 35 hectares is used for train stabling.

Victorians want to know the truth about the costings for this project. With the way the Andrews Labor government manage major projects, costs could, and I suspect will, blow out to be much more – hundreds of billions of dollars potentially, as my colleagues rightly note. No-one knows how much this project will cost or how long it will take, and we do not have any full costing details. We need to know how much this project will cost and if it will deliver true economic, social and further benefits. The subsequent stages of this will be for governments in the very late 2030s, 40s and 50s.

On cost blowouts, building the first two stages of the Suburban Rail Loop project is expected to cost up to $125 billion – more than double the government’s initial estimate for the entire project. According to the Parliamentary Budget Office, the north and east sections of the rail loop could blow out to more than $125 billion before their completion in 2085. An opinion poll found that only 20 per cent of people in the Suburban Rail Loop area think that it will provide value for money, so perhaps the state Labor government should start listening to the people who will be affected by the Suburban Rail Loop.

The Auditor-General found the business case for the Suburban Rail Loop does not:

clearly identify how the proposed benefits flow from the problems identified

adequately demonstrate how some of the benefits are a direct consequence of the SRL project

immediately point to the need for a transport-related intervention

Meanwhile, as I mentioned before, we are failing to invest in projects that will deliver rail services altogether – for example, Metro rail services where there are currently regional rail services to places like along the Frankston to Baxter railway line. This would greatly benefit residents in the electorate of Mornington as well as residents right down the Mornington Peninsula.

A number of years ago, in 2016, I secured, when I was a member of the federal Parliament, $3 million for the business case for this project. Subsequently, in 2018, I secured $225 million towards building this project to extend the Metro rail line from Frankston through to Baxter, which involves electrification and duplication of that line, the upgrade of Baxter station, a new station at Langwarrin and an upgraded station at Frankston East as well. Now, that $225 million is still on the table from the federal government and remains there unless the Albanese federal government decides to remove it, which is a real risk in the upcoming federal budget. Even Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and the member for Dunkley Peta Murphy had pledged before the 2019 federal election that an elected federal Labor government would not only deliver this Frankston to Baxter rail project, but they would do it ahead of schedule.

But since they were elected to government last year we have not heard much at all about this project, and I suspect they are looking to work with the state Labor government to drop this project altogether, particularly when you look at some of the words expressed by the member for Frankston. I was very proud, with the Liberals and Nationals leading up to the state election, to be part of a commitment that we would commit to building the full $971 million Frankston to Baxter Metro rail extension if we were to win government. Unfortunately this was not matched by the Labor government, and unfortunately we did not win, so at this point in time this project cannot go ahead. This project, as I mentioned, has in the past received support from the state Liberals, the federal Liberals as well as federal Labor, who are now in government, of course. The only people who have actually not supported this project are the state Labor government, but it is a state Labor government that is needed to allow this project to go ahead. This project would mean Metro rail services, as I mentioned, to Frankston East, Langwarrin and Baxter stations, also benefiting Monash University Peninsula campus and Frankston Hospital; closer Metro rail services for Peninsula residents; less parking issues at Frankston, Kananook, Seaford and Carrum; opening the way for returning Metro rail services to Mornington East in my electorate of Mornington; as well as enabling the potential for the historical rail service that currently operates between Moorooduc railway station in Mount Eliza and Mornington to be extended to run from Baxter through to Mornington. That would then link into the potential for a Mornington to Hastings bus service, which I believe the member for Hastings is personally supportive of, but during the election campaign Liberals, again, committed to that project but we got no commitment from the state Labor government. So these are projects that I think should be invested in instead of this potential massive cost blowout through the Suburban Rail Loop.

One of my colleagues before mentioned the Murray Basin rail project as well. When I was the CEO of Mildura development corporation in the past, I advocated very strongly with many others for the funding that was given, initially by the then state Liberal government but also the federal Liberal government and then the state Labor government when they were elected in 2014. I was very glad to see a bipartisan commitment for that project of more than $440 million. I continued to advocate for that project when I was the spokesperson for the NorthWest Rail Alliance; however, that project has been delivered extremely poorly. It has been cut back. It has been cut back when it comes to the Sea Lake and Manangatang lines, which would see mass agricultural produce and mineral sands move through our ports. It has been cut back so there is not true competition between our ports of Portland, Geelong and Melbourne. We have seen rail speeds worsen, and we have seen massive cost blowouts. So effectively within the funding that was given we have seen less delivered and an enormous amount more needed to actually deliver the project that was initially envisioned. That is what I really worry about when it comes to the Suburban Rail Loop – that a similar situation would occur.

I also note that many other things could benefit from this funding, whether it is the Rosebud Hospital, which will benefit residents in the south of my electorate, or the Mornington Community Health centre or, as I mentioned, local roads, which in many cases are suffering from potholes and mismanagement and more. We need a lot more investment in both existing and new infrastructure, in particular for those residents in my electorate and across Victoria who may not even have rail or bus services to start with, instead of expanding more and more metro infrastructure to places that are already serviced.

Matt FREGON (Ashwood) (16:35): I rise with delight to speak on the motion about our Suburban Rail Loop (SRL). It is probably no surprise to the house that I do not think it is a mangy dog of a project – although mangy dogs can be cute. Presumably you would want to get rid of the mange, but little mutts can be very cute. I do not see it is a dog but more of a puppy of a project, a very cute puppy – a very big and expensive puppy with very large feet. It is a very big puppy, but it is a very good puppy. The people of Ashwood are very happy with this puppy, I have got to tell you.

There has been some talk about it in the media and in the opposition, and I think the Manager of Opposition Business said this morning in government business that he thought this would be an opportunity for the government to have a go at the opposition. Usually we do not need an opportunity – it just sort of happens – but no, I am not going to do that. I am going to talk about how great this is and let the other side do what they want to do.

To be fair – I will throw this in with a bit of indulgence, Speaker – in my address-in-reply, because it was all very hurried, I did not get a chance to thank the other candidates in the Ashwood election in November. I will just name some, because what we do in this place is put ourselves up for election, and it is a big job and worthy of respect. Asher Judah was the Liberal candidate; Peter Morgan was the Greens candidate; we had a couple of independents, Michael Doyle and Lynnette Saloumi; and there were some others. We had a very robust campaign, and the Suburban Rail Loop, as you can imagine in Ashwood, was something of note. The Liberal Party did a lot of work in telling people what they thought about this project. They spent a lot of time, handed out a lot of DLs and did a lot of walking around, and they worked hard – credit where it is due. So they took their views to the people, and I and we took our views to the same people. The SRL was a key part of that message, and I am here, and I was here in 2018. A large part of me being here, I think – credit to the Premier, cabinet and the minister at the table, the Minister for Education, who were a very big part of that – is the SRL. It is another very big part of that as well. It is one of those projects that is generational, as others have said. I can remember standing at Mount Waverley train station in 2018 when I got a call in the morning saying there was going to be a bit of an announcement, and when I heard what it was my jaw dropped and hit the floor, because I just would not have thought that we would be taking on something this big – and it is big. It is a big puppy.

I have had this conversation with my constituents previous to elections and after elections – I can talk about the SRL all day long – but I want us to think about the Belgrave-Lilydale line, which I grew up near. That was built, from memory – I am not a gunzel and I am sure others would probably know more –in the early part of the 20th century, the 1920s, 1910s; some of it was probably earlier, from the 19th century. Back then a lot of that area – Ringwood, Ferntree Gully – was orchards and farms. Population density was, to be fair, very low. Even on the Glen Waverley line, with Glen Waverley station established in the 1950s, population density was very low. It is not now. If the arguments that we get from some about the size of this project and it therefore being a reason not to build it were to come from similar voices a hundred years ago for the Belgrave–Lilydale line, I put it to you that the arguments against the cost to build that today, should it not be there, would be the same arguments. It would be huge. You would not build it above ground, because you would not be buying that much. We have got some properties being acquired as part of the SRL, but nowhere near the amount if you were going to build something like this above ground. It would not get done. It takes not only the vision to join up the spokes of a train line but the commitment to see it through and then commitment to explain that to the people, which we have done now for two consecutive elections and the 4½ years in between.

The environment effects statement process I think was 30,000-odd pages online of information about everything from noise to cracks to soil distribution to traffic. I have been a part of precinct reference groups in the Glen Waverley area in my previous seat and now happily in the Burwood area, and there is a lot of change that is going to happen because of the Suburban Rail Loop. That precinct planning process that starts this year is crucial to involve our communities in. But again and again when I have conversations with people in my electorate about the Suburban Rail Loop, they get it. They understand that we are a city that is growing to effectively 9 million people in 2050. But that is only 27 years away, so you start to think about what our city looks like in not just 27 years but 57 and 107 years.

I have a hunch – time will tell us all if I am right, and I will not be here for it – that a hundred years from now my great-great-grandchildren or whatever it is will take the Suburban Rail Loop for granted just like I take the Belgrave and Lilydale lines for granted. All of these conversations about ‘It should be here; it should be there’ are great. We need experts to have the debate. The debate is healthy, and we are not all going to agree, obviously. That is why we are here. But at the end of the day if you put it to the people and the people choose it, we should have a level of respect for what that means, and if you put it to them twice and they say, ‘Yes, we weren’t just guessing last time and we agreed then, but we agree now too,’ it is very hard to go against the whole thing as an absolute, which is what – and it was not just the SRL, but in effect – the Liberal Party found out in November.

I am very excited about the future of my patch, of my community. Back in the old days I went to uni. I went to Swinburne for two years before they told me to go somewhere else.

Tim Richardson: It was a loose goose era.

Matt FREGON: It was a bit of a loose goose era, member for Mordialloc. When I was going to Swinburne, growing up in Ferntree Gully, I caught the train every day. Then after two years, when they said, ‘Matt, you might want to try something else’, I went to Deakin Uni to do business, and I got that one right eventually. But I did not take the train to Deakin Uni, obviously. There is no train. I drove my car every day up Burwood Highway. To add to that, my sister also lived in Ferntree Gully. She went to La Trobe Uni, so she drove to La Trobe every day from Ferntree Gully. I am looking forward to the North East Link because that is going to make car traffic from our part of town up to the north so much easier. I just cannot wait for that. But to think that in – and let us hope future governments keep pushing this through – 30 or 40 years that could be a train visit. That would mean that another person who is in Ferntree Gully going to La Trobe Uni does not drive all the way back every day and have to worry about the rego and have to worry about the petrol and have to worry about the occasional bingle and all the other costs that go along. They will get the train.

That is what we are doing. The SRL is not just a very big puppy of a project that is going to cost us a lot of money – and yes, it is – it is the future of this state. I know our government will back it in, but I hope future governments will back it in too and see the benefit of what our state could be in a hundred years. I would ask the experts out there – and I am sure they are very learned – who for whatever reason do not like it to think about what can be and think about the future of this state.

Cindy McLEISH (Eildon) (16:45): We have before us a motion and an amendment to the motion. The motion allows the government to do two things. It is a filler because they do not have a strong legislative agenda. They have not got enough business and we have seen them have to pad it out today. They have put this notice on the notice paper as a means of being able to do that. They got caught out a little bit when they realised on Wednesday of the last sitting week, after they introduced the second-read bills, that they had adjourned them for 14 days, which meant they could not debate today the Drugs, Poisons and Controlled Substances Amendment (Medically Supervised Injecting Centre) Bill 2023. That is what they had hoped to do, but they had not realised that there are mechanisms in place so that if you put it aside for 14 days, then that 14 days stands. So we have got a filler here, but we have also got an opportunity that the government would like to take to attack a member of the opposition, to attack the opposition and to make some statements that I certainly do not agree with.

We have got the alternative – the amendment motion put by the member for Caulfield – which I will certainly support because we need to have integrity, transparency and good governance around the Suburban Rail Loop project. We would like to see the full business case released to the Auditor-General and have that project assessed by Infrastructure Victoria and for them to release accurate costings to Victorians, because we know the government are not at all strong in this area. It is something that they will avoid at all costs.

I am just going to begin with the member for Bentleigh, who was banging on and said that when the coalition was in power we had really not done anything in this space. We absolutely kicked off the level crossing removals. We had a number of level crossings removed – Mitcham Road and Rooks Road – and the one at North Road in Ormond was all but done by the time the government changed. It was only a month or two later that they actually cut the ribbon; you cannot deliver a project like that in 5 minutes.

The minister in charge of these projects we know does not have the Midas touch – far from it. She is well known for her projects going to mud. There are blowouts, waste and overruns all the time. At the moment we have got some $28 billion of blowouts in her portfolio already, and they are rising. What the minister does – and I heard her in her contribution spruik the project, but it is not her money – in the way that she spends is allow budget blowouts to just keep rolling along. She is putting this state in a pretty scary state, financially. We note also that the government have never really been committed to and have never loved airport rail. They have had to be dragged into thinking of doing something about that. They had to start to incorporate airport rail into this project, so they have called it the suburban airport rail loop. I know they have never been committed; members on the other side have told me that personally previously. Some of the members who are new, even though they have been there for four years, think they know everything, but they really do not.

What has local government had to say about this? I spent a bit of time out in the western suburbs prior to the election, and Moonee Valley in particular were outraged to think that so much money was going to be spent between Cheltenham and Box Hill on this one leg of the project. I also had a lot to do with the Kingston City Council, and the Kingston council made a statement on the Suburban Rail Loop. They are not big fans of it by any means. They were led at the time by the mayor, Cr Staikos – certainly not a Liberal, I would say, and he would know that. Kingston council, and this is a direct quote:

… joins with our community in disappointment that the train stabling yard will proceed next to Heatherton homes at the Delta Site in Kingston’s Green Wedge.

We have a government here that constantly put the scare campaign out there about the Liberals and the green wedge. We are committed to the green wedge, but we see pretty quickly that the government have thrown their commitment towards the green wedge out the window. They have absolutely opposed the use of the Delta site for a train stabling yard. It had been identified through a public acquisition overlay for decades as part of the Sandbelt Open Space Chain of Parks project. And if anyone has invested time in having a look at the chain of parks project, I think it is particularly worthy, and I commend the Kingston council for that, because they have a big shortfall. Not just Kingston council but many councils in the area have a shortfall for sporting infrastructure. Nearby Glen Eira have virtually no land. They flogged that all off years ago. The only real land that is left is in the Kingston area, and this chain of parks would allow them to do so much. The acting mayor at the time Jenna Davey-Burns said:

Council is keen to now see the significant promise of the chain of parks delivered. This means a fit-for-purpose replacement for the 34 hectares of planned regional sporting facilities, which will be lost to the train stabling ...

We know that kids were absolutely hard done by during COVID. They went backwards in terms of attendance or they could not go to sport, and that had implications for not just their physical wellbeing but also their development and coordination. We need kids to get out to play more sport, and it is pretty difficult if we do not have the sporting facilities. We had a great packet of land there that was designated for sporting facilities, and it is gone. So we know Kingston are not a fan of this. They were a bit reluctant to have too much of a go at the government because they do like to have the government in their back pocket as well.

We also have the debt. We have got $10 million a day at the moment that is required –

A member: How much?

Cindy McLEISH: $10 million a day to pay the interest bill. Add that up for 365 days and in four years it is expected that that is going to be $20 million a day. We see the government being absolutely cash-strapped. They do not have the money to do this, but they are pushing on regardless. We had the Treasurer talking about borrowing. He was carrying on about how easy it is to borrow and that the cost of borrowing is really low. The cost of borrowing was really low, and it changed. To have the philosophy that you can just keep borrowing to your heart’s content and there is never going to be any impact on the budget – well, he is living in fairyland.

They lifted the ceiling on the debt borrowing, and we see at the moment for some of their big projects – the SEC, the Commonwealth Games – that they are going begging, cap in hand. They have gone begging to the federal government. The Albanese government needs to put money in. The councils need to put money in – money that they do not have. I know for Geelong city council this is something that is extremely distressing for them. Their legacy projects are looking less and less likely. They are pop-up and remove, not long-term legacy.

How much is this going to cost? Well, we really do not have a handle on exactly how much this is going to cost. We saw in 2018 the minister told Victorians that the Suburban Rail Loop would cost up to $50 billion. In August last year, not much further down the track, the independent Parliamentary Budget Office put the cost at $200 billion – that is four times what the government had promised. So either the government have done those initial costings on the back of an envelope, which it sounds very much like they have, or they have not considered everything that they need to do on this. After the PBO’s report the minister was asked about the cost five separate times in a press conference. As reported in the Age the minister refused to repeat the government’s previous estimate and only gave an estimate for stage 1. So how much is this going to cost? We do not know. $50 billion? Certainly not, but the PBO says up to $200 billion. The north and east sections could blow out considerably.

The Auditor-General has concerns about this, as do a number of experts. The member for Caulfield in his opening comments went into some detail about these. The business case content – the Auditor-General feels like the government has actually cooked the books here because the government tells us the expected benefit is $1.70 for every dollar spent, but when calculated using the objective guidelines laid down by the Department of Treasury and Finance, it is just 51 cents. So far from a profit, the Suburban Rail Loop will lose 49 cents for every dollar. There are so many experts that have come out and said the government have just failed on so many accounts here.

Nina TAYLOR (Albert Park) (16:56): I am very happy to rise and speak on the Suburban Rail Loop (SRL). I was thinking and reflecting about something you actually said yourself, Deputy Speaker, about what this means for community, because that is what this is really all about – time. That is it – time, because people do not want to spend hours and hours commuting in their cars. So we are thinking about quality of life, of people actually being able to spend time with their children, being able to get them to and from school, or getting to and from university or to hospitals or otherwise saving them that time which they can spend very constructively – maybe going out and getting some more exercise at the end of the workday. I do not know, maybe they can visit and chat to their neighbours. There are so many other community benefits. Maybe they can get involved in their local RSL – I do not know. They can buy time literally through having these kinds of major visionary infrastructure projects, because as you say, it is not just about building tunnels, is it? It is what it translates to for those communities who directly benefit as a result of this historic but critical investment for the future of our state.

We know that a radial train line will slash travel times to and from key destinations, including universities, hospitals and key employment centres. This is a great thing. And when we are saying about how this will literally shape and change the way our city functions for the better, it is because it means that people – now it depends obviously where you choose to work and live, but you can actually make choices about being closer to where you live in terms of your job – are not necessarily having to commute from one side to the other side of the city. This is also great because it is reducing that terrible congestion that nobody likes and is not good for anybody. So we can see that time is actually one of the key benefits that this major infrastructure project will deliver.

Jobs – the SRL will create 8000 construction jobs and support another 24,000 jobs across the economy, and I think that is something that can actually get lost in these debates when we just reduce it down to the minutiae and we do not think about the global benefits, because with Labor we always think in a holistic sense. It is not just about people saving time, it is also about generating jobs not just for today, not just for tomorrow but for years to come. People need this, because actually small businesses, which those opposite spruik loudly about so often, rely on people having jobs so they can afford to buy and purchase products from those small businesses. So I think you know where I am going with this: this is a holistic project in terms of what it delivers for our state.

It will take more than 600,000 daily car trips off our roads, slashing congestion across the entire transport network. Now we can see that that will take an enormous amount of frustration away from people who do not generally – I mean, I do not know about you, but I do not particularly like being stuck in traffic myself. So that certainly is going to be very helpful in terms of managing the road network, but it is terrific for the environment, because we are not only, as I say, making the roads flow better – bearing in mind that the population is increasing – but we are also reducing emissions at the same time. So this is absolutely necessary –vital – because we cannot just sit on our hands. It is all very well to nitpick over this and that, about the project and why we should not do it and this, that and the other, but at the end of the day what solutions are they putting forward? How are they going to get 600,000 daily car trips off the road? They have got nothing; they have got absolutely nothing. That is all fair and well, but we are actually doing it. We are making it happen, and the project is underway.

I know there were some important points raised – you know, concerns; I get this – about how the project has been compiled. I should say that the business and investment case is complete; I hope that allays some of the concerns.

A member interjected.

Nina TAYLOR: No, the business and investment case is complete. The legislation has passed, the environment effects statement hearings have been completed and construction is underway. You can actually see it happening. I mean, feel free; go and have a look. You can see it in action. There we are. We are not hiding the works. You can go for yourself. I mean, do it safely of course. Make sure you wear the proper hard hat et cetera. But, you know, it is happening. It is happening before our eyes.

On that note, early works are underway on SRL East, between Cheltenham and Box Hill, and SRL Airport, between Melbourne Airport and Sunshine. Planning is underway for SRL North, between Box Hill and the airport, and SRL West, between Sunshine and Werribee. The Commonwealth government is on board with an initial contribution of $2.2 billion.

Victorians have clearly endorsed the SRL. We will build it. We are already cracking into it, let me tell you. And we know we were very up-front at the election about this. Nobody held back, nobody concealed it, and yes, it was endorsed by the electorate overwhelmingly. You might say, ‘Well, you live in the seat of Albert Park. Do people really care about this?’ Well actually they do, because even people in the seat of Albert Park have to travel to other parts of Melbourne as well. Let me tell you, I know the member for Caulfield raised the issue of level crossings. He was whingeing about them, and I was thinking, ‘But hang on a minute – there are level crossing removals at Glen Huntly and Neerim roads that directly benefit his electorate, so what is he complaining about?’ I do not get it because where those level crossing removals have taken place, nobody is complaining. Nobody, not one single person, has complained about the level crossings being removed, because on the one hand it is reducing the dangerous elements of travel, but it is also helping with flow. It is helping reduce congestion. And there are also the add-on benefits, which I wanted to say, because we know that the Suburban Rail Loop will deliver $58.7 billion in economic, social and – get this – environmental benefits to the state, because with these new precincts it opens up so many terrific opportunities for new bike paths and new walking paths. So we are looking at low-carbon transport – fantastic – and it is also great for health.

There is so much more to this Suburban Rail Loop project. It is not just about building the tunnels – which are obviously vital, because obviously the trains have to go somewhere. They have to get people to and from these critical destinations – universities, hospitals and employment centres. But it is also about facilitating and creating great opportunities for people to travel around our great state in a way that is so much healthier – and maybe they can do it as a family too, a family bike ride. Why not? It is all because of the Suburban Rail Loop. Who knew? Who knew of the wonderful opportunities that can come? You know, there are so many benefits.

There is another thing I was going to say, because I think those opposite sort of query our form in terms of delivering. Well, let me tell you – you opened that door; you want us to talk about delivering – there is no end. I mean, we could be here for hours – literally we will – because we have delivered so much, and we will continue to do so. Look at Metro Tunnel. Oh my God, that is on track; that is bowling along.

A member: Case in point: it’s not delivered. It’s not finished.

Nina TAYLOR: It is on track. Look at the St Kilda Road bike lanes. People are already riding on those bike lanes. They are absolutely fantastic. People are loving them. People are absolutely loving them; they are raving. If you talk to the cyclists, they think they are absolutely fantastic.

A member interjected.

Nina TAYLOR: Well, you should ride on them. I mean, take the opportunity.

A member interjected.

Nina TAYLOR: Good. I am glad to hear it. See? People are loving it. You can see it.

And what about all those level crossings removed – removed, removed, removed. Is that not fantastic? People love them, and we will talk about them any day of the week. In fact I do not know why the member for Caulfield raised them – but thank you so much, because we love the opportunity to talk about fantastic projects that have delivered so much for our wonderful Victorian community.

A member: They paid for it.

Nina TAYLOR: Yes, they paid for it, but it delivers in spades, doesn’t it? Not one person, on that note, has complained. Has anyone complained about a level crossing being removed? Anyone? Anywhere? Can you find them? You would have to work really, really hard. You could go high and low, you could send out hundreds of surveys, and I guarantee you would not get one complaint – I guarantee you would not. No, no, no, no. They love them. They love them. I myself – you know, when you go through Carnegie or you go through Murrumbeena – you just go through. It is so smooth. It is fantastic. You do not get held up.

You know when I was doorknocking during the election in Albert Park, I had tradies say to me it is so fantastic those level crossings have been removed. I can get from here to the other side of the city so smoothly because of the level crossing removals. Who knew? That was in Albert Park.

James Newbury: What about the Sandringham line?

Nina TAYLOR: Mentone and Cheltenham – level crossing removals.

James Newbury: The Sandringham line.

Nina TAYLOR: The level crossing removals – didn’t you see the level crossing removals at Mentone and Cheltenham?

James Newbury interjected.

Nina TAYLOR: You should go down there. It is darn fantastic. I am happy to show you.

Danny O’BRIEN (Gippsland South) (17:06): I am pleased to rise to speak on this motion, and I support the amendment to the motion put forward by the member for Caulfield. I want to begin by tackling the issue that Victorians resoundingly supported for a second time the Suburban Rail Loop (SRL), because it reminds me of various governments taking a mandate on particular issues. The one that I would like to mention is the east–west link, which this government constantly says Victorians have twice rejected but fails to mention that the federal coalition government twice went to an election promising to fund an east–west link. Well, apparently that was not a mandate. So it is a mandate when it is for us, but it is not a mandate when it is for someone else. This can be very easily manipulated by anyone.

It is true, it is a fact, that the government has been elected twice now with a Suburban Rail Loop idea put forward. I use the term idea loosely, because the first term in 2018 it was not much more than a back of an envelope drawing that said we think there should be a loop. And certainly the second time around we were many millions of dollars further in and little bit more detail was provided through an alleged business case, but that does not mean that it has been supported resoundingly, particularly in places like my electorate of Gippsland South. The government has had so many positions and so many issues with this Suburban Rail Loop it is not funny.

I want to place on record what I have said in here a number of times, including on the legislation for the Suburban Rail Loop: I actually support the concept of a Suburban Rail Loop. I actually think it is a good idea. If you travel to just about any of the big major cities of the world, you will see there is an orbital link, there are cross-city links, there is not the hub and spoke model that we have here in Melbourne. And you can look at the tube in London – which everyone in London loves to bag and to complain about, but it actually works pretty well – the Metro in Paris, the subway in New York and many other cities right around the world, they do not just run hub and spoke to a city centre. Equally, they are transport infrastructure services that have evolved over, in some cases, more than a century. The tube, I think, was pre-1900, the first line, so to think that we going to build this in the next 20 or 30 years is optimistic.

So I do acknowledge that it is a good idea. I also think it is a good idea that I go and buy an island in the Caribbean. I think it is an excellent idea that I have my own private island in the Caribbean. What is consistent with both of these is that we cannot afford that. I cannot afford to buy a Caribbean island, and this state cannot afford this Suburban Rail Loop as proposed by the government. It is a little bit of a contradiction in terms to even say that we cannot afford it, because we still do not know how much it is actually going to cost. We have had estimates from the government. The Premier started with, ‘Oh, it might be about $50 billion.’ Well, as it turns out, the best they can do is just the first stage is going to be $34.5 billion. We have had the Parliamentary Budget Officer, the independent Parliamentary Budget Officer, cost the project at $125 billion – billion dollars that is, b, billion dollars. Despite the fact we have been to two elections and despite the fact they were repeatedly questioned about this at the election in November last year, this government will not tell the Victorians how much this project will cost. I suspect it is partly that they do not know, it is partly that they have got no idea what the whole project actually involves and it is partly because they continue to make it up on the run.

We saw that last year with the absolutely farcical decision by the government during the election campaign to refer to SRL Airport, as though somehow the airport rail link had always been part of this brilliant idea that the Premier had had about a suburban rail loop, and ‘Yes, we were always going to make it part of the project to go to the airport.’ I mean, the airport rail link has been around since time immemorial and was funded by the former coalition government long before the idea of the Suburban Rail Loop came along, and for the government to be now trying to claim the airport rail link has always been part of this SRL project is complete bunkum.

Michael O’Brien: You may as well call it broccoli ice cream.

Danny O’BRIEN: Yeah, it is broccoli ice cream.

We have seen significant criticism of the process and the lack of transparency around the funding of this project. We saw the Auditor-General make commentary about the Suburban Rail Loop last year that it does not:

clearly identify how the proposed benefits flow from the problems identified

adequately demonstrate how some of the benefits are a direct consequence of the SRL project

immediately point to the need for a transport-related intervention …

He also went on to say that:

The BCR for the project –

the benefit–cost ratio –

is 0.51 when calculated in line with DTF’s guidance …

Now, that is the Department of Treasury and Finance. The Department of Treasury and Finance has guidance on how to establish a –

Michael O’Brien interjected.

Danny O’BRIEN: No, 0.51.

Michael O’Brien: Under 1.

Danny O’BRIEN: Under 1.

Michael O’Brien: Oh, my goodness me!

Danny O’BRIEN: And what does ‘under 1’ mean, member for Malvern?

Michael O’Brien: It means it’s underwater. It’s in the red.

Danny O’BRIEN: It’s in the red, absolutely. It means it is a dud. It means it does not stack up. We have been told that before by this government on a different project, one they might have mentioned a bit earlier. For the government to say it stacks up is just ridiculous. In that same report the Auditor-General noted that the government:

… did not demonstrate the economic rationale for the entire project, and they have told us that they have no plans to do so.

It is not just the independent Auditor-General or the Parliamentary Budget Office that have said these sorts of things, it is some of the experts in this field, some of the academics. Urban policy professor Jago Dodson said:

It looks almost like a complete failure in metropolitan planning that a project of this financial magnitude could be decided to proceed with almost no [wider strategic] planning whatsoever …

Grattan Institute cities program director Marion Terrill said:

… the project needs a rethink – not just stations, but lock, stock and barrel.

And there are many others. The reason that I have always had a concern about this project, and I put my concerns on the record during debate on the legislation on it in 2021, is that as a country member of Parliament and as a rural and regional person, I can see exactly what will happen here. We have already seen under this government that the massive bulk of infrastructure spending goes to the city. You can tally that up from just four projects: the level crossing removals, the West Gate Tunnel, the North East Link and the Metro Tunnel. We have not had an update for a long time, but a year ago we were at $54 billion in total. Now let us throw on $125 billion over the coming decades for the Suburban Rail Loop, and how do you reckon we are going to go getting our potholes fixed, member for South-West Coast? We just cannot get a single decent single-lane road in most of regional Victoria under this government, which I might add cut $215 million from the road maintenance budget over the last two years. To think that we are going to be able to get the capital investment that we need in regional and rural Victoria to keep pace with a modern economy and to keep pace with what is going on in Melbourne if this Suburban Rail Loop goes ahead – I think you would be naive to think that that would be the case. We have multiple projects right throughout regional Victoria, in my own electorate or in Gippsland generally – things like the Traralgon bypass and things like the dedicated line for Gippsland trains.

I caught the train yesterday actually. In fact I was thinking of the Minister for Transport and Infrastructure as I came in, because she repeatedly tells us what the benefits of the Suburban Rail Loop will be for Gippslanders. For example, she says, ‘You know, if you’ve gotta go to Box Hill, it will be only one change, and you’ll be able to go around on the Suburban Rail Loop if you’re coming in on the Gippsland line.’ Well, minister, I have got a bit of advice for you: it is only one change now. You go all the way into Flinders Street or Spencer Street and you go back out again. I am not sure that they are worth $125 billion, the benefits of just that one change. But yes, I was on the train – there is still no dedicated line for Gippsland – and I had a good run in yesterday to Pakenham. Guess what – when you get to Pakenham, you get stuck behind a Metro train and you get slowed down because there is no dedicated line for Gippsland.

Our roads more broadly, I mentioned, are right across the place, whether it is the South Gippy highway, whether it is the Prom road, whether it is the Hyland Highway, whether it is the Strzelecki Highway – throughout my electorate these are all important things – or whether it is the Leongatha heavy vehicle alternative route to address what is known as ‘kamikaze corner’ in my electorate of Gippsland South. These are all things that we cannot get enough funding for now; I do not believe for a moment that if the SRL goes ahead, as the Labor government intends, we will have any chance of actually getting decent infrastructure spending in rural and regional Victoria. That is why I oppose the motion, and that is why I support the amendment moved by the member for Caulfield.

Tim RICHARDSON (Mordialloc) (17:16): This coalition crew just do not know whether they are opposed to or whether they support this Suburban Rail Loop (SRL) project. We have just heard from the member for Gippsland South – total opposition to it. We saw the Victoria community vote resoundingly in support of this project. If you wind back six months, these were the kinds of debates that were had in the chamber – the undermining of this project despite its endorsement in 2018 – and now we are here again denying such a major infrastructure project. It was the same thing that we saw with the Melbourne Metro rail tunnel – it took an Andrews Labor government to take the Brumby Labor government’s policy of building that vital tunnel for Melbourne, and for all our communities that will take substantial pressure off local roads and get more people onto our public transport network. It will make a substantial difference to the Frankston and Dandenong lines, which I have the honour of representing. The coalition were opposed to that – did not want to see that project, said that it would never happen, talked it down, undermined its value – and now we see that that project is a couple of years away from its completion and an amazing transformation that is happening 30 metres below ground. It is good to know that the coalition once again have told my community that with this project, which they resoundingly endorsed and which they want to see delivered as we plan for more Melburnians and more Victorians and how we get them to where they need to be safer and sooner, they once again reject their voice and reject their decision and their endorsement of this vital project.

I am really fascinated in the jobs that they would cut from this project – tens of thousands of workers in direct construction jobs and those ancillary industries. When we hear the opposition oppose this project, they are cutting those jobs and cutting the investment and the transformation that will come into the future, and that is a big, big hit for my community, who will be part of that jobs and investment journey. Starting from William Fry Reserve on the Frankston train line and running through to Box Hill, it is connecting train lines in the south-eastern suburbs and the really important Monash education and employment cluster precinct. That Monash employment cluster is one of the biggest in Australia. It means you can turn up some of these stations, catch a connecting service and you are at your place of employment or can get directly to this wonderful precinct. So they would cut those jobs, they would condemn us to hundreds of thousands of daily trips on our roads on the completion of this project and they would stifle an ambitious infrastructure agenda that has underpinned so many jobs in our local communities.

It goes to the point of some of the things that have been said, particularly by those opposite, around how they view how you do major infrastructure projects. A decade ago they were struggling to knock one infrastructure project out – the notion that you can only do one at a time, from some of the things that the member for Gippsland South said. I mean, remember when they went to Southern Cross with a sticker set and the big media op was: ‘The train station is coming very soon for the airport rail loop.’ Literally, tourists were going out of Southern Cross, looking at the stickers, walking to the end of a platform and going, ‘Where do I catch a train to the airport?’ That was the level of detail in their policy. That was the credibility that they brought as a government in the 57th Parliament. I mean, seriously – to be lectured about that is extraordinary.

They might talk down projects and they might talk down this vital infrastructure project, but the Victorian community has supported it resoundingly. We have seen that in the results at the election and the seats that resoundingly endorsed these community upgrades and projects. And what does it mean for our economy and our community? It means 24,000 jobs across the Victorian economy. Eight thousand direct jobs will be created just on SRL East, and more than 5000 additional direct jobs will be created as part of delivering SRL North, from Box Hill to Melbourne Airport. That is really exciting stuff for our community.

As our population goes towards 9 million by 2050, we need to be forward thinking in the infrastructure projects of tomorrow and setting up those communities for the future. It is particularly the travel savings that will be delivered as part of this project I am really excited about. As the cities of Kingston and Greater Dandenong grow, we need to get more cars off the roads. It is an environmental outcome, it is reducing our emissions and getting onto that heavy rail.

It is really exciting to think that the travel savings from Cheltenham to Box Hill will be 22 minutes. So someone in my constituency who is working in Box Hill or going across to Box Hill for Deakin University or for employment there knows that they can have that travel saving as well. Commuters from Cheltenham will save up to 40 minutes to an hour when travelling through Monash, Glen Waverley or Burwood.

Anyone looking at the growth in our outer suburbs and communities now will know, taking on the Mordialloc Freeway and taking on the Monash Freeway as well – the Mordy freeway of course delivered by an Andrews Labor government, an amazing contribution – that it is not just about roads, it is about rail and it is about public transport into the future. So this is –

Michael O’Brien interjected.

Tim RICHARDSON: The member for Malvern is up and about. He is loving this week, isn’t he? Hopefully he gets up and speaks on this motion. He is seeing the ruin that he left before, when he was tracking with a decent primary, and just saying, ‘What on earth has gone on?’ But he is interjecting and he is having a good go. Good luck to him.

So when we look at the transformations that will happen across Clayton and Cheltenham in particular, they will be substantial changes into the future. I think of the level crossing removals in the precinct that is Cheltenham now – level crossing removals at Park Road and Charman Road. Then up the road in Highett we are removing those two level crossings at Highett Road and Wickham Road as well. The Suburban Rail Loop in connection with Southland train station will be a phenomenal precinct into the future.

We are going to make sure that we get the open space outcomes right and support community in that space. That was a key determinant in the environment effects statement – input from a range of different stakeholders. Kingston council really led the way as well. We really acknowledge and thank them for their contributions. This is generational. In the business government program debate you saw the Manager of Opposition Business really say that this was a sledge at the opposition. This is not a sledge at the opposition. This is about the values that you put forward for intergenerational planning into the future. It is not just looking at political cycles and going, ‘What’s convenient in the short term?’, but going, ‘Well, someone else will open Suburban Rail Loop East in 2035, but you need to make big decisions now and bold decisions that you might not be cutting the ribbon on.’ That goes to the politics of those opposite. It is not about the photo op that you want to get, it is about making the hard decisions on how you transform for the future.

It is not smashing people into Fishermans Bend and then rezoning land and then thinking about the consequences of another government or just randomly changing planning outcomes to suit people that might lobby you or put forward their individual stakeholder views. It is about a coordinated and supported view into the future that transforms communities. This is what the Suburban Rail Loop will do. It will connect employment precincts, it will take pressure off local roads and it will give people and communities that we have not even seen come online yet so much more opportunity.

So we are really excited about this aspiration and the support of the Suburban Rail Loop from our community. Is an exciting time to think of where Melbourne has got to. We have got proof of concept of how heavy rail and those big projects transform local communities and areas. We see that with the Melbourne Metro rail tunnel. Anyone that has had the opportunity to visit some of the stations that are coming out of the ground, the tunnelling work that has gone on – this is just a marvellous project. Then there is the tunnel-boring work that is being done, and the tunnel-boring institute that is just off the road at Warrigal Road and the Monash Freeway. I think it might be in the electorate of the member for Oakleigh, the Minister for Tourism, Sport and Major Events, who is at the table. That is a pipeline of jobs and investment for the future.

We can do a number of things, and we have shown that with jobs, investment and aspiration the Andrews Labor government is delivering for all communities. We have seen that transform the Mordialloc electorate and our surrounding communities – level crossing removals on the Frankston train line, which will be level crossing free by 2029. When the Melbourne Metro rail tunnel comes online in 2025 we will need more capacity down the Frankston train line, but removing those level crossings is part of that broader vision. That will give us a chop-out for a period of years, and then we will need to look at what the next alternative is. We cannot keep sticking lanes on major arterials and roads – we are running out of space on that front – so we need to have that orbital rail loop, and this is the visionary, game-changing policy that sets my community and the broader south-east up for the future.

It is exciting to be in this Parliament and in this government at a really pivotal time when we are planning and delivering for our communities. I just wish this was a bipartisan approach. It was not for Melbourne Metro rail tunnel. That project was substantially needed, and it did not matter about the merits of the argument or the merits of the project – those opposite canned it and then put all their eggs in stickers on rail stations at Southern Cross. That is the level of detail. We are delivering major infrastructure and roads for our communities for the future.

Roma BRITNELL (South-West Coast) (17:26): I rise to oppose the motion put forward by the government:

That this house notes that Victorians resoundingly supported, for a second time, the state-shaping Suburban Rail Loop, including SRL Airport, described by the Shadow Minister for Education on social media as ‘a mangy dog’ of a project.

I support the alternative motion put forward by the Deputy Leader of the Liberal Party, which acknowledges that Victorians expect integrity, transparency and good governance and calls on the government to release the full business case. As we can see from the Auditor-General’s report, the Auditor-General’s analysis of the Suburban Rail Loop (SRL) business case found that its content did not fully meet a single one of the Victorian Auditor-General’s Office’s (VAGO) five benchmarks for expected process and relevant guidance:

In summary:

• the high-level problems and benefits articulated in the SRL business case lacked necessary and sufficient supporting evidence

• a narrow set of options were considered and analysed both before and as part of the business case development

• the economic analysis does not cover the entire SRL program and lacks consistency …

which is what we saw when Minister Jacinta Allan announced the project. It was going to cost $50 billion, and not long after that it was evidenced that it was going to be over $200 billion. What we see is a government that tells us the expected benefit of the SRL is $1.70 for every dollar spent, but when calculated using the objective guidelines laid down by the Department of Treasury and Finance the benefit–cost ratio is just 0.51. Far from profit, the SRL will lose 49 cents in every dollar. Integrity, honesty, trust – the community expect to have information that is reasonable, and the information they got was far from honest, far from integral, as has been proven with the VAGO report and the Parliamentary Budget Office information that I have quoted here.

We have got a government that does not know how to manage money proposing to spend $50 billion on a project that then blows out before it even starts to $200 billion. That just sits in line with all the other poor project results we get from this government that does not know how to manage money. The North East Link is another example. That was costed at $10 billion; it has blown out to $15 billion. There are so many examples. The 55 crossings that are only in the city have blown out from $5 billion to $8 billion. And we have the Murray Basin rail project, which the country desperately needs – $480 million was put aside, and some of the trains are going slower than before the government started the project. The grain train from Mildura is now going slower than it was before the government started the project.

You have all this spending in the city and it does not matter how much, but you ask for a country investment like the Murray Basin rail project and they have got their eyes so far off the ball the project is completely and utterly botched. The Maroona to Portland line is desperately needed to make sure our Port of Portland is as competitive as the Geelong port and the Melbourne port, but there is no way this government has even got it front of mind because they have botched the Murray Basin project so badly, affected the profitability of grain farmers right across our country and made our ports, particularly Portland, not as competitive as Geelong and Melbourne, which their own report, written some seven or eight years ago, says they were trying to achieve.

But why would I be shocked, given that seven or eight years ago we were promised new VLocity trains. The Premier flew in – and I repeat, flew in – to Warrnambool to promise that we would have VLocity trains. This was 2017. He then said they would be delivered in 2019. Well, we heard today that they are in the making, 23 of them. We do not know whether they are actually for the South-West Coast line, so maybe they will be ready in 2024 – seven years later. So we still have trains rattling on our lines from the 1980s. That is 30 to 40 years old. Now, my colleague in the upper house the Shadow Minister for Education referred to this project as a mangy dog. What does ‘mangy dog’ mean? It means having many worn or bare spots, seedy, shabby, bad condition, and the slang definition is ‘old and dirty’. Pretty much, I reckon, what those rattlers that we have got on the line that we have not had updated since the 1980s look like, so that description I think is rather fitting because that is how the government treats the regions.

I look at the state of our rail and the promises and the mistruths that are not delivered even slightly on time, let alone on a reasonable time line, and I see that they make promises like the Suburban Rail Loop, the Commonwealth Games for the regions and the SEC that we cannot even know a date on. They make these promises but then have not actually got the money, and then they go to the federal government cap in hand and say, ‘We’ve made these promises, can you give us some money to deliver on them?’ I mean, what sort of government cannot manage money? A Labor government, over and over and over again. We have seen it right throughout history. I am not surprised. If you drive in South-West Coast, you will see the respect or lack thereof that this government shows the South-West Coast and regional Victoria. I have already talked about the Murray Basin rail project and the botched effort that Labor Minister Allan has made of that.

I am really opposed to the government’s motion. I totally support the opposition’s motion, and I would like to see a proper business case so that we can get a return on investment for taxpayer money instead of this extraordinary waste that the government oversees, with project after project that they do not deliver on time and that they blow out the cost of, which is at a total of now $28 billion. That is taxpayer money that we will not ever see responsibly used by this current Labor government.

Vicki WARD (Eltham) (17:32): I reckon I might actually be able to fill in my 10 minutes talking about such an important project, something that is exciting for pretty much everyone in this state, as we saw with the last election result in November. My colleagues I know will correct me, but I reckon we must be up to 3030 days, or something like that, in government. We are in government because of the plans we have got for this state, the things that we do and the things that we are building, and as the Premier often says, because we say that we are going to do something and then we go and do it.

We were elected to continue our work in helping Victorians live better lives. We are here looking after Victorians. We are not in the business of vilifying them. We are not in the business of not standing up for them, and we are not in the business of hurting people and not moving away from Nazis. Those opposite are so out of touch if they think that these projects that connect people to where they need to go are something that they do not want. They are so out of touch if they do not think that this state and this city want these projects to go ahead. They want building, they want job opportunities and they want to be able to move around.

You need a government that has actually got a vision for this state. You need a government that actually wants to see things happen and wants to see things move, and this is exactly what we are achieving with the level crossings that we have removed, with the roads that we have built, with the things that we are repairing. What we are getting down to do is business. Those opposite would not know how to work in a paper bag. They would not be able to organise a so-called drink in a brewery. There are so many things that those opposite struggle to achieve. They struggle to achieve fairness. They struggle to embrace democracy. They also struggle to actually get anything done for this state. They fail to imagine how wonderful this state can continue to be, how we can strengthen this state, how we can make it easy for people to move around – and that is exactly what the Suburban Rail Loop does. It has an imagination. It has a capacity to transform our city, to change the way that we move around. I find it quite amazing that an earlier speaker spoke about, ‘Well, I would love to buy an island in the Caribbean.’ I am sorry, but a rail project is not a luxury island. I know the former Prime Minister liked to hang around with his lei in Hawaii while the rest of the country was burning. Those opposite might want to hang out in their boardies and their bathers and not get anything done. On this side of the house we are all about getting things done. This is not a luxury; this is a necessity. Building transport infrastructure in this state is an absolute necessity. Helping people move around is an absolute necessity. On this side of the house we care about working people. That is why we are in the Labor Party. That is why we are creating jobs with our Suburban Rail Loop. That is why we are creating it, making it easier for people to get to work, to get to the hospital appointments they need, to get to universities to get the education they need and to get to the TAFEs where they need to get training.

I will digress for a second. Of course we have got free TAFE. And why have we got free TAFE? Because we want things to be better in this state. We want to create opportunities. We want to create equality of opportunity. This is exactly what we do. So for those opposite to bellyache about this project and what this project can or cannot deliver illustrates so clearly why they were not elected last year, why they were not elected in 2018 and why they were not re-elected in 2014, because they do not have the capacity to imagine what this state can be. They do not have the respect for the people in this state to imagine what they can be, how good they can be, all of the things they can achieve. We do, because on this side of the chamber we actually care about their outcomes. We actually care about how we can make things better.

Regional Victorians know the Liberal and National parties’ record of closing regional rail lines, cutting V/Line and scrapping jobs. I love how they all come in here and they say, ‘Oh, you don’t invest anything in regional Victoria.’ I think we have actually got more regional MPs than they have got. We know what happens in regional Victoria. They only make regional rail promises in election years and promises that still leave regional Victorians behind. This time they offered up flat $2 metro fares and belatedly offered only to halve V/Line fares. But regional Victorians were not fooled. They knew they should not be singled out by having to pay more to access services and see friends and families than those in the city.

I had a great chat with my mum in the car on the way in today, and I have spoken about my mum in this place before. Of course there has been a stacks on from the National Party because my mother dared to tell me about a great regional road she had driven on. Mum was actually pretty happy about the idea that she can go and visit my aunt in Albury for $5. How good will that be? Regional rail that is working, that is helping mum get from Traralgon to Albury for five bucks. That is a pretty good deal, she reckons. She is pretty happy with that.

Those opposite are so out of touch. You are supposed to say, ‘How out of touch are they?’

Members interjecting.

Vicki WARD: They are so out of touch. I do not think there is anybody in this place that could be more out of touch than the coalition – more out of touch with what Victorians need, but most importantly, more out of touch with what Victorians actually want. They want a modern city. They want a modern state. They also want a progressive state, because that is what they have voted for time and time again. And with a progressive state you get change, because change can be good. Change can make things better. We are not afraid of change on this side of the house. We are not afraid of improving things. We are not afraid of making things better. And do you know what we are also not afraid of? We are not afraid of difference. We are not afraid to stand up for people who need it. We are not afraid to stand up for working Victorians who want a job, who want to get around better, who want an education – free education at TAFE, for example. We are also not afraid to stand up for diverse people in our community. We will stand up for every single Victorian, and we will stand up against discrimination. We will stand up against bigotry, and we will stand up against those who do not want to build a better future for this state, because this is what those opposite are offering. They are offering us as a state the chance to go backwards, like we did under their government between 2010 and 2014. They want us to go backwards again. They do not want us to build things. ‘We can’t afford it,’ they say. Do you know what? You cannot afford not to do it. You cannot afford not to build important infrastructure in this state that helps us get around.

I find it ironic that they want to bang on about the business case, which actually does stack up, unlike the east–west link, which did not stack up. It did not stack up 1 cent. Those opposite who signed dodgy side letters at the last minute to actually damage this state, rather than look after this state, should be ashamed. It is an absolute joke when those opposite try that tired old trope of economic management when it comes to the Labor Party. Economic management is an absolute joke when it is in the hands of the Liberal Party, and we have seen it with the last federal government, which actually wasted so much money – so much money. Those opposite could not even manage this state in just four years. In just four years the previous Treasurer of the coalition wasted opportunity after opportunity after opportunity. He did nothing for this state but did something as disadvantageous as signing a side letter that actually cost this state money, and it lands at his feet. That money lands at his feet.

If you want to talk about economic management, it is absolutely shameful that those opposite are prepared to rant and rave about money but not people. They are not prepared to stand up and protect vulnerable Victorians. They are not prepared to stand up and stare down bigots. They are not prepared to stand down Nazis but they are prepared to yell at me in this place about economic management, for which they have got no record in the last 25, 30 years other than four disastrous years. It is absolutely shameful – absolutely shameful – that they think they can yell down people in this place but they will not yell down bigots and they will not stand up to people in their own party who are out there vilifying young vulnerable people who deserve better. They are prepared to yell in this echo chamber but they are not prepared to be out there standing up for people. Those opposite want to talk about talking points. Where are their talking points when it comes to standing up for vulnerable, disadvantaged people – absolutely shameful. They do not have any talking points because they do not actually care, and it is an absolute disgrace that they do not care. That is why they are not in government – because the people in this state saw them for what they were: a bunch of phonies and fakes who care nothing about people. They care about themselves, and that is it, and it is a disgrace.

Annabelle CLEELAND (Euroa) (17:42): Wow! Let us take it down a notch, and I will have my right of reply. It is my great pleasure to rise to speak on this motion moved by the Leader of the House and give a right of reply to the member for the backbench. I know the Leader of the House is elected to represent the people of Macedon, and I am sure, like my constituents in Euroa, the good people of Macedon electorate would rather see greater investment in regional services than the Suburban Rail Loop (SRL) money pit at a time when families are struggling with the cost of living. It is actually worth touching on some of the words of the Auditor-General, who said:

… the high-level problems and benefits articulated in the SRL business case lacked necessary and sufficient supporting evidence …

This quote, to me, is a red flag warning of cost blowouts, something this government has become all too comfortable with. The Department of Treasury and Finance, using their objective guidelines, found the project had a benefit–cost ratio of 51 cents to every $1 invested. This is significantly less than the pie in the sky $1.70 quoted by the government.

We know numbers are not their strong point, though. What we do know is that this government has serious issues when it comes to accepting unbiased advice, as an investigation by the Ombudsman into the politicisation of the public service would suggest, as well as their continual efforts to dodge scrutiny. Not only are there serious issues with transparency and accountability across the government but also a strong record of cost blowouts and economic mismanagement, as we heard earlier. Victoria’s projected debt is set to total more than New South Wales, Tasmania and Queensland combined, and yet we are being sold the virtues of a project that is projected by the impartial Department of Treasury and Finance to lose 49 cents in every $1. Let us not talk about money without talking about the impact that has on our Victorian lives. What we were told in 2018 was this whole project would cost up to $50 billion. Now the Parliamentary Budget Office, where these sorts of projects should be costed, something which this government may have forgotten, has put the cost at $200 billion, a quadrupling of what was originally promised, and it has not even commenced.

This motion states that Victorians resoundingly supported for the second time the Suburban Rail Loop, but I beg to differ with a little thing called facts. This might come as a shock to those opposite, but not all Victorians – I am shocked myself; I cannot speak – are Melburnians. And regional Victorians certainly could not be described as resoundingly supporting the SRL. This is a great opportunity for me to talk about newly elected members in this chamber – the member for Shepparton and the member for Mildura. Across northern Victoria the vote for the coalition increased by nearly 4 per cent while shrinking by 3 per cent for the Labor Party. We have added the wonderful Gaelle Broad as a member for Northern Victoria in the upper house thanks to this strong result. In Eastern Victoria, where we have the member for Gippsland South, the member for Morwell and the member for Gippsland East as well as Melina Bath in the upper house, the change is even more stark, with the Labor Party losing 7 per cent of their vote. Not once have I been contacted by anyone in my electorate asking me to throw my support behind this project that the government does not want to admit the full costs of – or the complete lack of return on investment that will come from it. But what people in my electorate have contacted me about is the dire state of the health system, run down by the government with $2 billion cut from Department of Health outputs in the last budget. These included cuts to emergency services, aged support services, drug treatment and rehabilitation services and mental health support services. It is an incredible slap in the face to our region when $200 billion is being set aside for a rail loop regional Victorians may never use.

Right across our region we have elective surgery waitlists through the roof, remaining stubbornly high, and the Australian Medical Association doubting the accuracy of the total waitlists. For people in my region their elective surgeries are usually completed at the Northern Hospital, Goulburn Valley Health, Bendigo Health and Northeast Health. The Northern Hospital’s category 1 waitlist is now nearly double what it was a year ago, and GV Health’s waitlist has increased by 166 individuals over the last quarter. You want to talk about caring for people; this is caring for people. We have seen the amount of people waiting over a year for essential surgery blow out, and the percentage of people not being treated within clinically recommended times is concerning. Rather than making Victorian health care the number one priority of the government, they have sent $30 billion down the drain on city infrastructure cost blowouts and will continue to lose vital taxpayer money because of this government’s incompetency to accurately estimate a project. We have a 000 system where ambulances are now arriving on average more than 3 minutes later in a code 1 emergency than in 2014.

This is people’s lives. We talk about you caring for individuals; manage your money so that you can care for individuals and address the health system crisis. Fixing these issues should be the absolute number one priority of the government, and yet they continually fail to understand that people in regional Victoria just want them to get back to basics. Back to basics means caring for all Victorians, making sure our communities can get the health care they need when they need it and making sure an ambulance actually arrives and, even better, arrives on time. These are bread-and-butter issues for state governments, fundamental KPIs that this government repeatedly fails to deliver.

We have got a community-owned hospital in Euroa Health that is fighting tooth and nail to secure its future. They are asking for an incredibly small sum of public recurrent funding to secure their long-term future, keep serving the people of the Euroa region and keep taking strain off GV Health, yet rather than getting a drop in the ocean in budgetary terms the people of Euroa are expected to be content with a rail project they will unlikely ever need. But safe and adequate health services are unquestionably something we all need.

In terms of rail infrastructure, what I have been regularly contacted about is the overcrowding of trains on the Seymour and north-east lines. With changes to the V/Line fare structure I hope the Victorian government has completed some modelling on the projected patronage increase that may occur as a result of reduced fares. Given recent budget outcomes and the lack of economic credibility this government has, I hope they are able to come to terms with supply and demand and that quality of service is not sacrificed, crowding is alleviated and investment in rolling stock is made to support growth in demand.

What I will outline is some essential regional infrastructure my electorate did vote for, because this motion is about election outcomes and the important issues that drove those votes. First and foremost in the southern end of the Euroa electorate is the Kilmore bypass. This project has stalled for eight years. Only two plots of land have been acquired, no full costings have been completed and no business case has been undertaken. Yet in that same period this government has planned and has begun the West Gate Tunnel – not without significant difficulties, mind you, and poor budgeting again – and dreamed up the Suburban Rail Loop project, with farcical costings during a cost-of-living crisis for Victorians. The Kilmore bypass is essential to the future of the town, and the government have sat on their hands purely through a complete lack of willpower. The people of Kilmore are absolutely not stopping me in the street asking for an update on a Metro rail loop, they are asking me for the bare minimum in regional infrastructure to protect the livability of the town. They are asking about removing B-double trucks from the main street of their town and improving the health and safety of the community.

We have schools in our region like Broadford Secondary and Seymour College that need funding to increase capacity or finish work that should have been done years ago. In Kilmore we have one of the largest towns in the state without a public secondary school, and I note that Mooroopna in the neighbouring electorate of Shepparton is probably another one of those towns. However, the government decided to shut their secondary school as well.

The last two years have seen cuts to road asset management in the state budget. While those opposite would talk about their post-floods roads investment, this is not betterment money, this is just funding to return the network to a below-average condition. In a future where all budget considerations need to bow before the Suburban Rail Loop, there is concern our road network will continue to fail country Victorians.

What continually frustrates people in regional communities is the complete failure of this government to do the simple things. People across the regions voted for policies like the Nationals regional infrastructure guarantee, which would have doubled new capital funding in regional Victoria thanks to a 25 per cent cut of all new capital funding. If members of the government think in the current climate people are desperate for a railway line that is decades in the future rather than receiving the bare minimum to improve the lives of Victorians, they are incredibly out of touch. The government’s priorities are clear. Funding the Suburban Rail Loop means either less money for health, education and basic state services or more record debt that will burden future generations of Victorians. The Andrews government does not govern for all Victorians. Rather than building these poorly costed projects, we need to see this government leave the metro boundaries and invest money in our regions and make decisions based on logic and need. This is what people want in country Victoria. This government believes its legacy will be the Big Build, but we can see that this government’s legacy will be its severe neglect of regional Victoria.

Josh BULL (Sunbury) (17:52): I am delighted to have the opportunity to speak in support of the critically important Suburban Rail Loop (SRL). I do so as a member of a proud Andrews Labor government with a strong, bold and visionary agenda for this great state, a commitment to get on and get things done and a commitment to delivering those transformative projects that we know this state needs and deserves. There is limited time this evening for this contribution, but I do want to take the opportunity to point out just how critically important the Suburban Rail Loop is to our great state with that connection of all of the metropolitan train lines and the importance of growth as we move forward as the great state of Victoria.

We have all heard it, whether it is from a friend, whether it is from a neighbour or whether it is from a colleague or a brother or a sister, in conversations about government often people within our community say to us, ‘We really want governments that think long term,’ and there is no greater example than this project that is before the house this afternoon. It is an example of long-term thinking, a visionary project, a project that will certainly take quite some time to deliver but a critically important project to the Victorian community. We have all heard that, but we know and understand as members of the Andrews Labor government how important the Suburban Rail Loop is, and that is exactly the sort of project those people are referring to when they make that statement.

We are of course a government that builds projects for today, for tomorrow but critically importantly for our future, and that is how we know and understand that this is an incredibly important project that forms part of our Big Build agenda. Whether it is level crossing removals, whether it is the West Gate Tunnel or whether it is the North East Link, so many important projects are being delivered by this government and do require a huge amount of planning and a huge workforce, but also the creation of jobs and economic activity that comes with that are critically important.

Those opposite seem to waste their miserable days in this place tearing projects apart, and of course the thousands of workers who deliver them, but what we know is that this project has been comprehensively endorsed by the people of Victoria in not one but in two elections. Those over on the other side, rather arrogantly I must say, failed to listen to Victorians and their wish to get this project done. It is indeed the biggest infrastructure project in Victoria’s history. It is city shaping and will transform the way that people move around our growing city: a radial train line that will slash travel times from key destinations, including universities, hospitals and key employment centres, with 8000 construction jobs and more than 24,000 jobs across the economy. It will take more than 600,000 daily car trips off our roads and deliver nearly $60 billion in economic, social and environmental benefits to our state.

The business and investment case is complete, the legislation has passed, the environment effects statement hearings have been completed and of course construction is underway. Construction is underway on SRL East between Cheltenham and Box Hill and on SRL Airport between Melbourne Airport and Sunshine, and the Commonwealth government has committed to this project, with an initial contribution of $2.2 billion. This forms, as I mentioned earlier in my contribution, that massive pipeline of projects, whether it is level crossing removals, whether it is major road upgrades, whether it is Melbourne airport rail, the Metro Tunnel, the North East Link Program, the Regional Rail Revival or the West Gate Tunnel Project. This is about delivering those projects that are important for our communities going forward in a growing state.

Leadership is about doing what is right. It is about delivering what matters. It is about making the hard decisions today that benefit us tomorrow and of course beyond. If we could just imagine the future of our state with a Suburban Rail Loop that connects every metro train line and enables us to get where we need to go safer, faster and sooner, this is exactly what SRL will deliver. It is about big picture thinking from a big picture Andrews Labor government. It is a massively exciting project. Those over the other side seem to spend all of their time in here tearing these projects apart. What we know and understand is that the people of Victoria need this project. They want this project; they have endorsed this project at two elections. This is a hugely exciting project, one that is only made possible by an Andrews Labor government that will get on and deliver this project.

In the very little time that I have got remaining, I just ask members to cast their minds forward to the decades to come – to know and understand that rather than commuting from our suburbs, from places like where I live in Sunbury, into the CBD and then back out again on another metro line, we will be able to move in an east–west direction across those lines. I think that this will be a transformative project. Like the city loop, like many other projects within our community – the West Gate Bridge – that we now in many ways take for granted, this will be a project that will be looked on for generations to come. People in our future will look back and say it was the thinking, it was the planning and it was the investment of the Suburban Rail Loop that was critically important for our state. That is why this project needs to be delivered, that is why this government supports this project, that is why we took it to two elections and that is why the people of Victoria voted comprehensively in support of this project – and it is only being made possible by an Andrews Labor government.

Steve DIMOPOULOS (Oakleigh – Minister for Tourism, Sport and Major Events, Minister for Creative Industries) (17:59): I move:

That the debate be now adjourned.

Motion agreed to and debate adjourned.

Ordered that debate be adjourned until later this day.