Wednesday, 4 February 2026

 Emma KEALY (Lowan) (10:20): I would like to speak to the Public Accounts and Estimates Committee 2024–25 budget estimates report from October 2024, and I would like to specifically highlight today matters regarding the Department of Transport and Planning specifically related to the public and active transport portfolio. There are aspects within this report which reflect upon the regional rail revival program, and I would like to give an update to the house on some of the issues that this project is presenting, particularly to the agricultural and the freight community. There is a proposal at the moment that there will be a removal of the rail crossover at Sunshine. For the freight industry, this is an essential crossover that enables freight from the west of Victoria to get to port in an effective and efficient way. The removal of these rail crossovers will add a minimum of 45 minutes to each freight route. This is something that will cost additional time, which of course is more money, which will be passed on to reduce the margins for our grain growers and other growers in the west of the state. That is the bad news, and the very bad news is that the line that the freight will be diverted to has extremely limited capacity, which means that there will be likely congestion issues along that line. While the best case scenario is an additional 45 minutes for each route, the problem is that that is only if you can get a slot, so this could be absolutely catastrophic for the freight industry and particularly for our growers, who rely on getting their food and produce to market effectively. It will put additional pressure on our growers financially, but it may push some out of business, whether it is some of our growers, whether it is the people who are involved along that supply chain and freight chain or whether it is the freight companies themselves. I urge the government to immediately review the business case and the impacts of these rail crossover removals, because it could have a significant impact on freight and the agricultural sector in Victoria.

The committee report also reflects upon additional rail services, and it would be remiss of me not to mention that in the west of Victoria we have no rail services. In fact what we have to support the Overland rail service has been neglected by the Allan Labor government. In fact all of our toilets at public rail stations across the state have been shut up. I heard of a horrific story recently where a pregnant woman who was waiting for the Overland in Horsham had to do a bush wee because the toilets at the station were locked. This is something that has been raised by Horsham Rural City Council. The community have raised it. It is an issue that is not just at Horsham; it is also an issue at Stawell. It is an issue along the line through to Nhill as well, which has been raised. We have got the services there, we have got the facilities; can we just make sure they are cleaned once a week or that there is a way for people to access them, because it is a waste of resources to say, ‘There’s a toilet there. We’re going to keep it locked the whole time.’

When we speak to additional rail services, of course we need to absolutely push on that there is an opportunity to return passenger rail to the west of the state. There is a huge influx of jobs that are being created around the Wimmera region, and that needs to be supported by access to public transport services. There certainly is the demand to support rail services to the west of the state, from Ararat through to at least Horsham, if not looking also from Ararat down along the Maroona line to Portland. This could be achieved by adjustable bogies on train sets that mean they could travel between broad gauge and standard gauge, which seems to be an impossible barrier for this government to consider looking at. It is not an expensive solution. It is something that should be delivered and should be considered.

While we look at it, we need to look at additional bus services as well in the Grampians region: Halls Gap to Pomonal, the Halls Gap Zoo and the floor of the valley in the Grampians. Sandlant have been offering a service to Halls Gap. They would like a variation and to expand their services into that area to support our local people to access their towns but also to support visitors who are coming to the area.

I cannot go past the issue around our school bus services. I condemn the Allan Labor government for their horrific handling of cutting the school bus lines in and around Casterton. Kids were left abandoned and stranded in the morning because the families were not notified that the pick-up point had changed. We now have buses travelling on incredibly dangerous roads. We have got kids travelling more than 2 hours on a bus. It needs to be reviewed.