Thursday, 19 June 2025

 Wendy LOVELL (Northern Victoria) (12:57): (1666) My question is for the Minister for Public and Active Transport: when will you finally carry out the essential bus network review for Shepparton? The Allan Labor government has once again failed Shepparton residents. The 2025–26 state budget provides funding to improve bus services across the state, including bus network reviews in Labor’s priority regional areas of Geelong, the Bellarine Peninsula, Ballarat and Bendigo, but not Shepparton. The last time bus services in the Greater Shepparton area were reviewed was in 2009, over 15 years ago. Since then there have been significant shifts in the demographics of the region, with growth expected to continue and accelerate. There is not one bus service that connects workers with the industrial estate in Shepparton. It would be impossible for someone from Mooroopna to use the bus to get to work at the Shepparton Marketplace, and services do not even connect Mooroopna and Tatura with Shepparton on the weekends. I have repeatedly called for a bus network review, and it is time Labor stopped ignoring the needs of Greater Shepparton residents, who deserve much better.