Tuesday, 2 December 2025

 Harriet SHING (Eastern Victoria – Minister for the Suburban Rail Loop, Minister for Housing and Building, Minister for Development Victoria and Precincts) (12:22): I am really proud to share an update on the really remarkable progress that the Allan Labor government has made to our transport network this year. It is really hard to imagine Melbourne without the city loop, and 44 years later the Metro Tunnel is the latest game-changing addition to our state. The Metro Tunnel, which a Liberal premier once referred to as ‘worse than the Berlin Wall’ and which a Liberal Prime Minister cut all federal funding from –

Bev McArthur: On a point of order, President, is this the minister’s portfolio?

David Davis: Further to the point of order, President, the fact is the minister has not mentioned the topic she has said she is responsible for and is talking about a matter in another minister’s portfolio.

Harriet SHING: Further to the point of order, President, those opposite appear allergic to good news, but the very first sentence of my statement referred to our transport network – very squarely within the general order. You will see that the Suburban Rail Loop (SRL) is indeed a matter that falls within that jurisdiction.

Nick McGowan: Further to the point of order, President, the transport portfolio is not in the minister’s remit, as she well knows. The minister has only given reference to the Metro project, which is not, again, in her remit. She has not mentioned at all the SRL. So neither transport nor the Metro is the minister’s responsibility.

The PRESIDENT: The standing orders say that a minister may make a statement and there are no other great riders on what the statement will be. I respect that the house expects the statement to be in line with their responsibilities, and I feel that the minister is getting to that.

Harriet SHING: Thank you very much. What a shame that you do not want to hear on the other side of the aisle what it means to deliver city-shaping, nation-building projects. Just like the Metro Tunnel – and again I am looking forward to seeing all of you out there and I am looking forward to congratulating you on coming on board at last – the Suburban Rail Loop will transform the way that Victorians get to work, school and home. That is why we are getting on and getting it done as we prepare for tunnel-boring machines to arrive this year. Three thousand workers onsite have already dug over 813,000 tonnes of soil – that is more than the number of conversations that you have had to replace your most recent leader – across the project this year, and they have already worked over 5 million hours across the six SRL sites. That is 3000 workers that the Leader of the Opposition, who opposes the Suburban Rail Loop, now wants to sack – another Liberal with the same playbook: cuts, closures and blocking, because you cannot go around calling a project a twisted priority if you plan to build it.

The Liberals claim to be for home ownership. They are really good at describing the problem of shortage of availability of housing, but they are gearing up to cut and block 70,000 homes – homes which would let thousands of Victorians afford a home close to where they grew up within walking distance of public transport, jobs, health care and education. That is what the opposition leader means when she threatens to pause the SRL even after tunnel-boring machines have started digging. She means cuts, because she is not on the side of Victorians. Only the Allan Labor government has a plan for Victoria’s future.