JUST when you thought it couldn’t get any worse for regional Victorians, along comes another brutal set of numbers.
Revelations this week that road and rail projects across the state have blown out by a staggering $12.7 billion since December are a sledgehammer blow.
To drill deeper, the ballooning costs are costing Victorians an extra $83.6 million a day.
Regional roads are crumbling and in a state of disrepair, yet big city projects like the North East Link continue to dish up dastardly numbers of excessive waste.
The $12.7 billion in blowouts in the past six months is enough to fix half of the pothole-riddled regional road network.
Yet our roads remain in disarray, with the Allan Labor government slashing the road maintenance budget by 75 per cent next financial year.
The roads maintenance budget is 16 per cent lower than it was in 2020.
As the blowouts continue, expect more popped tyres and damaged rims as the neglect hits home.
In the recent State Budget, Labor allocated just $2 billion to regional Victorians of a $98 billion total spend on infrastructure and services.
You don’t need to be a mathematician to work out that’s only about two per cent of the total spend.
Why the staggering gulf, given regional Victoria provides 25 per cent of the state’s population?
Labor can’t manage money and regional Victorians are paying the price.
Peter Walsh
Leader of The Nationals
