Thursday, 10 September 2026

 Michaela SETTLE (Eureka – Minister for Rural and Regional Development, Minister for Agriculture, Minister for Water) (14:20): I rise to update the house on the record investment in regional Victoria by the Carroll Labor government. We are proud to have invested more than $50 billion in regional Victoria. That investment has delivered new and upgraded schools and better hospitals and health services, expanded TAFE opportunities –

Members interjecting.

The SPEAKER: The Minister for Police is warned.

Michaela SETTLE: upgraded train lines and created jobs right across our regions. These are not half-baked promises on paper; it is real investment people can see in their own communities. Right across regional Victoria people can point to projects that are already making a difference because this government backed them with funding and got on with the job. Alstom in Ballarat is building trains for Victoria – good for the economy, good for workers and good for commuters. Regional labour force figures from July show that unemployment in regional Victoria is lower than any other regional unemployment in Australia. It is 2.2 per cent lower than it was in November 2014. Public servants in our regions provide vital services to our communities. They include allied health professionals like the speech pathologist helping your kid with their first words, forest firefighters who protect our communities through the summer and biosecurity professionals that are on the front lines of our bird flu response. Our public service provides important services to our region, so I read with horror a report yesterday from the Australia Institute about an absolutely implausible plan that would see 31,000 public service jobs cut. This means thousands of job cuts in the regions – our forest firefighters, our hardworking Agriculture Victoria staff and our allied health professionals there to support our communities. On this side of the house we support the regions.