Members statements
Health system
Ms STALEY (Ripon) (15:14): I note that the independent Parliamentary Budget Office has had a look at the Cheltenham to Box Hill rail project, the suburban loop, and they have come to a few conclusions about it. The first and most important conclusion is that it does not stack up. The independent Parliamentary Budget Office has had a look and they have said that it is only going to return 60 cents in the dollar for every dollar spent on it. My constituents in Ripon know that this project has never stacked up for them and will never deliver a single benefit to anybody in Ripon, and that is why they no doubt are delighted to know that an incoming Liberals and Nationals government will instead fix the health crisis. That will include rebuilding the St Arnaud hospital—$30 million. We will do stage 1 of the master plan. We will put $400 million into the Warragul hospital—a really needed facility. In Mildura there will be $750 million to build a new Mildura hospital. In Wodonga there will be $300 million as part of the full redevelopment of the Wodonga hospital. And let us not forget Shepparton—$100 million into a cancer centre in Shepparton. Some of these will train nurses and doctors as well. We will fix the health crisis while the government will pursue a project that does not stack up.