Jacinta Allan grilled over ‘dangerous’ state of Victoria’s regional roads, dismisses Coalition’s $5 billion funding pledge

The Victorian Premier faced a grilling on the state of Victoria’s regional roads on Monday after the state opposition pledged to invest $5 billion to fix an estimated 1 million potholes.

Ms Allan acknowledged there had been “huge damage” caused by weather events in recent years, telling reporters she had “made the road network a priority” since becoming premier.

However, when asked whether she would match the Liberal and National parties’ $5 billion commitment, Ms Allan rejected the idea, claiming the commitment couldn’t be trusted.

“I won’t be matching Liberal and One Nation cuts,” she said, in an attempt to undermine the Liberal and National parties by tying them to One Nation.

“We’re coming into an election, a Liberal – National Party outfit make big commitments and big promises, and then cut funding when they’re in government. We’ve seen this before, which is why this latest commitment just cannot be trusted.

“When it comes to any commitment (they) are all about cuts, and there will be no matching of Liberal-One Nation cuts by my government.”

Pressed on the issue, Ms Allan acknowledged that more work needed to be done to fix Victoria’s regional roads.

But Ms Allan said her government had already provided record funding.

“We acknowledge that we have work to do, which is why every year for the past three years, we’ve invested $1 billion in road maintenance, and 70 per cent of that is dedicated to upgrading the roads in regional and rural Victoria,” she said.

“This is the most funding that’s ever been allocated to the road network to do these works.

“We’ve got crews out there right now undertaking these works. But it’s a task that you’ve got to do year in, year out, and that’s exactly what we’ve done since I’ve been premier.

“And it is needed. It’s needed for a range of reasons: Additional traffic, population growth, the movement of trucks around the network, but also too the flooding events that have occurred in recent years have done a lot of damage to the road network.”

Ms Allan was also asked repeatedly what rating she would give Victoria’s roads out of 10, but she refused to provide a direct answer, instead repeating that her government had provided $3 billion in funding over the past three years.

Opposition pledged $5 billion for regional roads

Victorian Opposition Leader Jess Wilson and Nationals leader Danny O’Brien pledged to invest $5 billion to upgrade the state’s regional roads during a visit to Warrnambool on Monday.

The commitment represents a 25 per cent increase on current funding, with Ms Wilson describing the regional roads as “dangerous”.

“Our roads are littered with dangerous potholes that are causing untold damage to vehicles – leaving motorists thousands of dollars out of pocket,” Ms Wilson said.

“Drivers shouldn’t be the ones footing the bill for blown tyres, cracked rims and worse because Jacinta Allan and Labor cannot get the basics right.”

Mr O’Brien said the funding would see an estimated 1 million potholes fixed, though he was unable to say how many potholes existed across the state.

“Roads have been falling apart all across Victoria and Victorians are fed-up with half-hearted patch up jobs that quickly fall apart. The Liberals and Nationals will finally address the roads crisis that so many Victorians have had to put up with,” Mr O’Brien said.

The Nationals leader said the Labor government had allowed the state’s roads to turn into “goats’ tracks” while overseeing $40 billion in cost blowouts and $15 billion lost due to Big Build corruption.

“We will end the waste and stop the corruption so we can build better and safer roads,” he said.

 “Under Labor, our regions receive less than 12 per cent of infrastructure spending despite making up 25 per cent of the state’s population.

“This plan forms part of the Liberals and Nationals’ broader commitment to regional Victoria through the Fair Share Guarantee, which will see 25 per cent of the state’s infrastructure spending directed to our regions.”