Tuesday, 17 March 2026

 Matthew GUY (Bulleen) (19:00): (1579) My adjournment matter is for the Minister for Public and Active Transport, and I want to talk about rail heritage weekend. I am sorry to disappoint the member for Oakleigh; it is not anything which I can yell at him or he can yell at me about, but it is about rail heritage weekend. On the recent long weekend at Newport rail workshops – credit to Steamrail Victoria and a number of other rail heritage organisations – they had a fantastic rail heritage open day program where a number of them came together and showcased the best of Victoria’s rail heritage. Rail heritage, like restoring cars, trams, trucks or old buildings, is like artwork. It is the same kind of premise: you restore something and you keep it because it is something that is part of your historical form and historical past.

Victoria has a reasonable history in rail heritage compared to other states. We learned the lessons of what we did not do in the 1950s. Then in Victoria quite a number of particularly steam locomotives were restored and kept operative in this state, particularly compared to New South Wales, although nowadays we are lagging behind New South Wales. Recently I was in New South Wales for the retirement of what are called the V-sets, which was a big deal – credit to the Minns government for putting on a big deal for the retirement of the very, very popular V-sets. One of my colleagues up there who I met while I was in New South Wales said the V-sets are to Sydney what the W-class trams are to Melbourne. The New South Wales government did a good job of restoring both the livery and the colour scheme of the V-sets for their last revenue run from Lithgow back down to Central. I think Victorians would think the same about our Comeng trains, which have been operative since 1981 under the Hamer Liberal government, who ordered the Comeng trains, and then they were progressively reordered by the Cain government through the 1980s. They were 60-odd per cent of our fleet in the 1980s, and people will know them and remember them. They have been part of Melbourne’s suburban fleet for a long time.

The reason I raise this and my adjournment action for the minister tonight is: looking at what New South Wales has done with the V-sets to keep a number of them in good, restored order, I ask the minister to preserve two sets of Comeng trains, restored to their original early-1980s condition for rail heritage in Victoria, so that we can retire with dignity what has been a stalwart of our metropolitan rail network for the last 40 years.