Thursday,20 March 2025

Roadside waste

This is an issue for Victoria’s reputation as a state that is attractive to tourists, because the first thing people see when they leave an airport and go on the Tulla or go around the ring road is rubbish, graffiti and overgrown weeds. In every other city you go to – go to Sydney and you get on the M2 – it is all clean, but you go to Victoria and the state of the roads and the overgrowth, the rubbish and the graffiti say a lot about the state Victoria is in right now. It says a lot about the fact that we are heading towards $188 billion of debt, paying $25 million of interest a day – over $1 million of interest an hour. It says a lot about that because we clearly cannot afford to clean up our roads and make our state look beautiful again, make our state a place where you come to and you think, ‘Wow, this is great.’ People would not even have to drive all the way from the airport if we had an airport rail link in the first place. This is very concerning. I suspect there is a lack of regular maintenance and waste collection. It creates an unpleasant sight, particularly for people visiting our state. I seek the minister’s attention and action to approve waste collection and the management of weed overgrowth along our major roadways in the northern suburbs. I ask the minister to work with VicRoads to take action to address this issue.