Thursday, 19 February 2026

 Danny O’BRIEN (Gippsland South) (09:47): Regional Victorians want our roads fixed. We need new schools and hospitals. Thousands of us are languishing on surgery waiting lists. We are unable to get dental treatment or mental health support. Our CFA volunteers are driving around in 40-year-old trucks, and some cannot get new trucks because their stations are so small and out of date they will not fit inside. With all of this, at the same time this government has overseen the corrupt funnelling of at least $15 billion – that is ‘billion’ with a ‘b’ – to criminals and bikies on the Big Build projects. What a disgrace. Just think what could have been done with that money and how it could have improved the lives of everyday Victorians by funding more surgeries, more police, better roads and more support for our emergency services like the CFA and the SES. We need a new Sale College, which the community has been campaigning for for nine years. That money, that $15 billion wasted, could have built 215 of them. It could have built 3000 new fire stations like the ones needed for Foster and Mirboo North. And yet this rotten Labor government stands back and says, ‘Nothing to see here.’ Indeed ministers are openly mocking the report. They are shooting the messenger instead of taking action. They are saying that evidence presented by a respected investigator is ‘florid ramblings’ and ‘reckless’. What a disgrace. What an affront to hardworking Victorians, who are seeing their hard-earned tax dollars flushed down the toilet of corruption and graft under Labor.