Tuesday, 12 August 2025

 Roma BRITNELL (South-West Coast) (19:11): (1245) My adjournment matter is to the Minister for Roads and Road Safety, and the action I seek is an apology to the people of South-West Coast – people who were mocked in this Parliament by the very minister who is charged with keeping them safe on our roads. The roads in South-West Coast are riddled with potholes, and the fear in my community is real – it runs deep. Every day constituents visit my office, ring my phone or send emails, pleading for action. They are asking for safe roads, and I take their voices to this place time and time again. But what does the minister do? She stands in this chamber and ridicules me, saying that I am just stuck behind a computer typing letters. Well, Minister, those letters carry the voices of the South-West Coast residents. You did not mock me; you mocked them. You mocked the farmers, the nurses, the truck drivers, the parents and the bus drivers who take our children to school – every single person who relies on our roads. Her behaviour was disgraceful and we deserve an apology.

The minister holds the responsibility and the budget to fix the roads. She boasts about spending extraordinary amounts of money, but what do we see? More potholes, more crumbling shoulders, more treacherous conditions. If that is extraordinary spending, it is an extraordinary failure. Just look at today’s Warrnambool Standard headline, ‘Region reeling’ – another life lost on Sunday night, another family shattered. The discussion through our towns is that the state of the roads is playing a significant role in these deaths – 12 deaths in the south-west this year. We are already at last year’s total and only halfway through this year. Twelve is 12 too many.

The minister wrote to me. I received the response today, telling me that the road from Portland to Nelson is not a problem, that the two tragic fatalities had nothing to do with the condition of the road. On 27 ‍June a 29-year-old man was killed when a truck lost control. The truck skidded for 80 metres; the front wheels were torn off. That stretch of road is notorious and locals have been pleading for upgrades. Minister, it is your job to take Victorians’ concerns seriously, not to mock the fact that they have been raising these issues. I will stand with them while my community buries its sons and daughters, and I will not have this government ignoring them. They need to fix south-west roads and save our lives, because every time someone gets behind the wheel someone is waiting for them to get home.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: I remind members that ‘you’ refers to the Chair.