Thursday, 28 November 2024

 Evan MULHOLLAND (Northern Metropolitan) (18:44): (1349) My adjournment is for the Minister for Roads and Road Safety. It is one that is familiar – it is the 13th time I have brought this topic up in this place this year, so it will be familiar to you, President. It is on Donnybrook Road in my electorate and the desperate need for duplication. But I am also seeking the action of the minister to explain the recent change – near Donnybrook Road in Kalkallo travelling north – from 100 kilometres an hour on the Hume Highway to 80 kilometres an hour, which is supposedly due to exit congestion on Donnybrook Road. So not only is Donnybrook Road impacting all of my constituents in Mickleham –

Wendy Lovell interjected.

Evan MULHOLLAND: and Ms Lovell’s constituents in Donnybrook and Woodstock – in Kalkallo it is now affecting everyone travelling north on the Hume Highway. It is slowing down our entire transport industry because of this government’s lack of action on Donnybrook Road. They are literally slowing the entire state down. When you are heading north on your summer holidays, heading to northern Victoria or heading to New South Wales on the Hume, and you are stuck in traffic around Donnybrook Road, know it is because this government has not duplicated Donnybrook Road.

The Mickleham side of Donnybrook Road was actually duplicated by the Liberal Party, because under my colleague the former Minister for Planning Matthew Guy we signed a developer contribution agreement so that we worked with developers to duplicate the Mickleham side of Donnybrook Road. What does Labor do? They change that policy to ban developer contribution agreements and not use them, so the Donnybrook and Kalkallo side of Donnybrook Road is an old farm track. The bridge over the Hume is a disgrace. It is one lane each way. Traffic grinds to an absolute halt. Then staffers of the member for Kalkallo have the gall, replying in community groups, to say, ‘Oh, well, Matthew Guy signed off on all this housing. Why didn’t he do anything?’ He did. He set an agreement in place, which made sure there was a beautiful, four-lane duplicated road in before and as people moved in. The Kalkallo side and the Donnybrook side of those estates, of the Lockerbie precinct structure plan, were entirely in the purview of the Labor Party, and it is a disgrace that they have not duplicated Donnybrook Road yet. I seek the urgent action of the minister: finally get on with it – duplicate Donnybrook Road.