Wednesday, 16 August 2023

South-West Coast electorate roads

Roma BRITNELL (South-West Coast) (19:10): (295) My adjournment matter is for the Minister for Roads and Road Safety. The lives of Victorian motorists continue to be neglected by the Andrews Labor government as funding projects for major road upgrades continue to be put on hold. We have a government who despite being in power for 20 of the last 24 years do not have anything to show for it when it comes to our roads. They keep starving our roads of urgent and desperately needed funding year after year after year. My constituents keep asking me, ‘Why do we need to have our cars roadworthy when our roads are not carworthy?’

Right now, funding for upcoming major road projects in regional Victoria is shrouded in a fog of uncertainty. What we are hearing is the drying up of funding for road construction companies who are responsible for undertaking major road upgrades. I am led to believe no budget has been allocated to any upcoming major projects, even though the roads budget has already been cut by 45 per cent since 2020, including by another 25 per cent in this year’s disastrous budget. It is just deeply, deeply concerning that this government does not appear interested in allocating a single cent for upcoming major road projects in south-west Victoria. There are not even any tenders listed on the Victorian government website for upcoming major roadworks.

Why should Victorians have to gamble on road safety when we know this government has been burning cash since the day they got elected? Look at the Commonwealth Games, for example. The bill for the mess this Labor government left as a result could be more than what they have ever spent on regional roads. The community are so sick of this government, and they are even taking matters into their own hands by spray-painting around potholes to warn incoming drivers. Why is this government hiding and cutting important road funding and major road projects on our regional roads at a time when our roads are in a disastrously unsafe condition and have never been worse?

In March I tabled in this house a list of the most unsafe roads in South-West Coast. The minister is well and truly aware of these roads because I talk about it day in, day out. In case the minister has forgotten, they are the Woolsthorpe-Heywood Road, Princes Highway, Hopkins Highway, Warrnambool-Caramut Road, Hereford Road, Cobden-Warrnambool Road, Mailors Flat-Koroit Road, Myamyn-MacArthur Road, Hamilton-Port Fairy Road and the Terang-Mortlake Road. These are significant thoroughfares carrying domestic vehicles with families and children, but they also carry freight goods as well. Minister, you know our roads are dangerous. The action I seek is for the minister to confirm when the $150 million South-West regional alliance will receive funding for the upcoming year.