Wednesday, 19 November 2025

 Annabelle CLEELAND (Euroa) (11:01): I rise, like my colleague earlier, to speak on the Public Accounts and Estimates Committee 2025–26 budget papers, tabled in October. We have heard a lot about economic prudence in this chamber this week, and we tend to laugh not because it is a joke but because we feel like this government is not taking it seriously. When you dig into the budget papers and look past the gloss, you see a serious pattern of behaviour that is impossible to ignore. The state’s debt burden is not a harmless number tucked away in a spreadsheet; it has ramifications on every Victorian family and every Victorian household. It is a weight that families in Kilmore, Broadford, Euroa, Seymour, Benalla – all households – are carrying. They feel it every single day through higher taxes, fewer services and the growing sense that even the basics are starting to slip out of reach.

It has now been 182 days since the budget was handed down, and in that time Victoria has added $26.4 million to net debt every single day. Over 182 days it equates to about more than $4 billion pushed onto the state’s credit card, and that is signed in the name of every Victorian child, who will spend their entire adult life paying for this government’s failures. Every dollar of that debt comes with a cost to our communities – $20.8 million in interest repayments each and every day, and that is more than $4 billion. That is money that could have repaired dangerous stretches of the Midland and Goulburn Valley highways. That is money that could have improved the lives of Victorians. It could have resurfaced the crumbling shoulders that have contributed to some of the highest road fatalities on record. It could have reopened Benalla’s maternity services. It could have replaced ageing CFA tankers or supported SES units preparing for what will be one of the most concerning fire seasons in years. But instead it has evaporated into interest repayments because the government cannot manage money, and Victorians are paying the price. They are paying the price through the highest taxes in the country – more than 60 new or increased taxes – and that hurts every Victorian household and every Victorian business. It does not make sense.

Property taxes are skyrocketing while the housing shortfall grows every single year. It is an absolutely ludicrous idea that you tax the very people that are providing the supply that we so crucially need. Small businesses are crumbling under the weight of the taxes enforced by this government: Nestlé Broadford, ForestOne in Benalla, the Broadford paper mill and Seymour trailers. Every business, despite their size, is laying off staff because they cannot afford to service their tax bill under this government.

The fire services levy is punitive and completely unsustainable and punishing the very people that volunteer in Victoria to protect us. Family-run shops, farms and businesses that keep our country towns alive are not being backed; they are being bled dry by this government.

What do we get in regional Victoria in return? We get cuts – cuts to health, cuts to roads and cuts to emergency services –

Members interjecting.

Annabelle CLEELAND: Absolutely, across the board. If you want me to mention services, I am happy to. During a family violence crisis, we have our only Orange Door in the electorate closed and people are forced to travel without public transport into other regions – 12,500 square kilometres and we do not have an Orange Door in an area with one of the highest rates of family violence in the state. That is what a heartless government does, and that is what one that cannot manage money does. There are cuts to community health and mental health services – I am sorry, those on the other side want to argue about family violence figures in my electorate? That reiterates how heartless this government are and how they are abandoning regional Victorian families when they need it most. Millions have been stripped out of the very programs that once kept people well by supporting intervention. We are losing our mental health counsellors at a time where we have lost too many young men’s lives in recent years because they had nowhere to go, no-one to call. A two-year waitlist for a counsellor is unacceptable.

Victorians have a choice. On this side of the house we will always support regional Victorians.