Wednesday, 3 December 2025

 Gabrielle WILLIAMS (Dandenong – Minister for Transport Infrastructure, Minister for Public and Active Transport) (15:46): Labor governments build transport projects for the future. We know that investing in public transport is an investment in fairness. It means better access to opportunities, to jobs, to education and to recreation as well, and that is what the Metro Tunnel is all about. For well over a decade those opposite have talked this project down at every opportunity. They have called it a hoax, they have likened it to the Berlin Wall and just this week the Leader of the Opposition called it and the thousands of additional services it unlocks a waste. But it turns out that not everyone on the opposition benches thinks this project is a waste. Success has many parents, and so we have seen a few on the opposition benches scrambling to sun themselves in the warm glow of a newly opened Metro Tunnel. They have seen the light. The opposition leader says ‘waste’, but her colleagues are high-fiving the gunzels and saying, ‘How good is this?’ Mr McGowan in the other place has not only joined the Metro Tunnel flag-waving, he is claiming credit. But Victorians know the truth, and they will not be gaslit. The Brumby Labor government began planning the tunnel, Liberal infighting under Baillieu and Napthine killed the project and then the Andrews–Allan Labor governments recommitted to it, funded it and delivered it in full. The Metro Tunnel and, most importantly, all the extra services it unlocks have been delivered by Labor and Labor alone. The real question, though, is: how long will it take the Leader of the Opposition to cut them?