Wednesday, 3 June 2026

 Dylan WIGHT (Tarneit) (16:46): I stand here this afternoon to grieve for Victorians whose jobs will be cut –

A member interjected.

Dylan WIGHT: I have been; I have done a lot – under a future Liberal government. In fact I stand here this afternoon to grieve for all Victorians if those opposite ever get the gift of government again. Since coming to government in 2022 this government has created over 300,000 jobs and also has the fastest growing economy anywhere in this country. They are just facts. Every single one of those jobs, including many, many jobs in the public sector, are at risk if the vandals on the opposition benches get the gift of government ever again. How do we know this? Because they have been up-front with the Victorian people and with this Parliament about what their economic plan is going to be into the future. I will make the point that their economic plan is akin to basically putting a thousand dollars each way on the number one dog at Meadows on a Monday night. They have been up-front with the Victorian people. What they have said that they will do is slash $40 billion from the Victorian economy in the way of public sector jobs. Seven and a half thousand jobs are on the line at this election in the public sector here in Melbourne, but you cannot cut that deep and you cannot cut that hard with the public service without affecting frontline workers.

We have seen it before. It means that under a future Liberal government there will be less teachers in our schools, there will be less nurses in our hospitals, there will be less police on the beat, there will be less firefighters keeping us safe and there will be less paramedics attending to emergencies and to sick Victorians. We have seen it before. In previous iterations of Liberal governments – let us go back to 2010 and 2014 – they went to war with our firefighters. Indeed, member for Melton, they went to war with our paramedics, and they did so because they did not respect their work. They did not think that they deserved a good wage for the incredibly hard work that they do. They did not think that we needed to continue to employ those frontline services. They cut money out of education. They cut money out of health. Go back even further than that – the point that I am making is it is in their DNA. Every time I mention former Premier Jeff Kennett, the cries from the opposition benches are: ‘Oh, that was 30 years ago,’ or whatever it is. Yes, but he is their hero. It is in their DNA. They want to be Jeff. They love the guy.

You can bet your bottom dollar if there is a future Wilson Liberal government in this state, the member for Kew has already said that she will cut $40 billion out of our economy. That will mean that our economy is not growing as fast as it is right now. It will no longer be the fastest growing economy anywhere in the country. But she will also sack 7500 workers. The member for Narracan might laugh, but frankly it is sad. And the people of Victoria should be concerned, because they are a dangerous, dangerous show, a special collection of deadbeats who want to come in here –

Wayne Farnham: Speaker, I think you know what I am going to call a point of order on.

The SPEAKER: I remind the member for Tarneit to use parliamentary language.

Dylan WIGHT: Thank you, Speaker. We know what those opposite, as incompetent as they are, will do if given the gift of government ever again. They have been up-front with the Victorian people about it; I will at least give them credit for that. But we on this side and Victorian workers should make no mistake of what is on the line come 28 November this year. It is a binary choice. I understand there is a third party that is acting as a disrupter at the moment, but as to who will govern, it is still a binary choice between a Labor government that has created 300,000 jobs since coming to office, that is growing the economy and that respects the work of paramedics and firefighters and teachers and nurses and healthcare professionals, or a Wilson-led Liberal cut squad who have already said, point blank, that they will sack – I cannot use the word ‘you’ – Victorian workers. That is what is on the line. Everybody in Victoria, every worker in Victoria, every frontline worker in Victoria but really anybody working in the Victorian economy should be cognisant of that and understand what is on the line when they walk to that ballot box.

Furthermore – and I know that the member for Mordialloc touched on this somewhat – there is a third disrupter in the Victorian political system at the moment that is going to play a role when we go to the ballot box. We have already seen it time and time and time again and that former Premier providing advice that the opposition just lurch further to the right in order to appease One Nation supporters, One Nation voters, the One Nation–curious and also the party itself. Victorian voters need to understand the ramifications of a Liberal–One Nation government. There is no capacity for them to govern in their own right. People need to understand the ramifications of a Liberal–One Nation government. Take something as simple as the minimum wage increase awarded to the lowest paid Australian workers – Victorian workers – in the last 48 hours, 4.75 per cent, still slightly under inflation. It is not an inflationary wage increase. These are people that are struggling to make ends meet. You know, they are not going to pump up the price of holidays or housing or anything of that nature. They are putting food on the table. Funnily enough, a 4.75 per cent wage increase was 4.75 per cent more than the Liberal Party or One Nation wanted. They did not want an increase – ‘It’d be inflationary.’ I understand that is more of a federal issue than it is a state issue, but people need to understand that they are cut from the same cloth. They are anti-union; we have heard all of that today. They are anti-worker; we have heard all of that today. They never met a worker that they did not want to sack. I mean, honestly, for those two organisations to come out and speak against an at least near-inflation increase for Australia’s lowest paid workers is one of the lowest acts in the current climate that you can imagine. And if we end up with a Liberal and One Nation coalition in this place, you can bet your bottom dollar that that is exactly what we will get.

We have seen them do it before. They will go to war with our essential services and with our teachers. They will go to war with our health professionals – with our nurses – because they do not respect their work. They think they should all be working in private hospitals. They will go to war with our teachers, as I said, and they will go to war with our paramedics and our firefighters. It is in their playbook. We have seen them. Every single time one of these enterprise agreements comes up, those workers will stop and there will be an industrial action, because those opposite do not believe that these workers should earn a decent living and a decent wage to be able to keep food on the table for their families, put a roof over their head and wrap a car around them. That is why I grieve for Victorians.

Out in my part of the west, the Wyndham LGA, we have been making significant investments into health care. In the last term we stood up the urgent care clinic. Obviously now, under a Labor government, they have taken back their responsibility for primary health care that the former Liberal government decided they wanted to run away from. But what we are also doing is extending the emergency department at the Werribee Mercy Hospital, a really important project. It is a busy hospital. It is a growing area. For that emergency department, under this budget we have provided extra money to be able to open, staff and facilitate it. It is twice as big as the previous emergency department, so it requires extra funds. It will allow a doubling of the amount of patients that can be seen in the emergency department of the Werribee Mercy Hospital. There is no way under a Liberal–One Nation coalition that those investments into growing areas like the western suburbs would be made.

Furthermore, to be able to open that emergency department we needed to hire more nurses, we needed to hire more healthcare professionals, and we needed to hire more allied health professionals and doctors. Does anybody in this place think that under a Liberal government that would be the case? I can already see the member for Narracan smirking, because he is going to stand up and talk about a hospital out in Narracan somewhere. In the western suburbs of Melbourne, whether that be Tarneit, Footscray, Werribee or Melton, there is only one party that has ever invested in it ever. There is only one party that has hired more police in the west, that has hired more paramedics in the west, that has built fire stations in the west, that has built schools in the west and that has upgraded hospitals in the west. There is only one party that has ever done it. I heard the member for Caulfield earlier wax lyrical about the western suburbs and how the Liberal Party will represent the western suburbs. Well, that would be new, because they have never, ever done it before, and they have had many chances. They had a pretty long-term government under former Premier Jeff Kennett. They had four years to do it when the population in the western suburbs was exploding, and instead of building more schools, upgrading hospitals or hiring paramedics or firefighters, they were signing horrendous precinct structure plans that are still crippling the outer suburbs where I live. In Wyndham, since coming to power in 2014 we have built 14 schools. Obviously, to facilitate the educational outcomes in said schools we have also hired dozens and dozens of new teachers to teach some of our most fantastic multicultural families and long-time Wyndham residents.

Compare and contrast that at a local level to the track record of the Liberal Party. When they were in power between 2010 and 2014, the population in Tarneit alone exploded – it is a really fast-growing area, as we know; I talk about it a lot – and there was not one new school, not one new teacher and not one school upgrade. It is an electorate of two halves, Tarneit: there is the new and exploding Tarneit, but there is also Hoppers Crossing, which has been there since the 1970s and 80s and obviously requires some capital upgrades, particularly to schools. There was not one capital upgrade and not one new school. Since Labor came to power in 2014, there have been 14 new schools in Wyndham; capital works upgrades to the Grange, to Hoppers Crossing Secondary and to Mossfiel; new teachers; and new educational support staff. Under a Liberal government there was none of it.

As I said at the beginning, I stand here this afternoon and grieve for every Victorian worker if those opposite in the Liberal Party, One Nation and the Nationals – I mean, I do not think there will be any Nationals left, to be fair – ever get the gift of government again. Life will be harder for every Victorian worker if those opposite ever come to government.