CONSTITUENCY STATEMENTS

Mr TEHAN (Wannon—Manager of Opposition Business) (10:13): The problem with the Labor Party is that eventually the continuous spin catches up with reality. We've seen this in Victoria with the condition of our roads. We heard spin after spin after spin of the Victorian state Labor government about the amount of money that was going into the roads.

Then, all of a sudden, you had the Albanese Labor government come to office and they stopped funding the roads, even though we got more spin and spin from them. What we've seen happen to the roads over the last four years is nothing less than shocking, absolutely nothing less than shocking. There is not a part of the state now which you can't drive in where it doesn't have crater after crater after crater of potholes, and Victorians have had enough.

I've got to say, it's why I'm so pleased that Jess Wilson and the Victorian coalition have announced they'll put $5 billion into fixing our roads. Now what I'd like to hear from the Albanese Labor government is for them to come out and say, 'We'll match that. Rather than cutting road funding, we will absolutely match funding into our roads.' You'll remember, when we were in office, Deputy Speaker Sharkie, the coalition, on the major highways through Victoria, was putting in 80c for every 20c the state Labor government put in.

Of course, Anthony Albanese got in and he said: 'Oh no, we shouldn't be doing that. We'll cut it back so that we'll only put 50c in for every 50c the state puts in. So what happens?

Road funding deteriorates. Road funding goes through the floor and the roads just go to pieces. What we now need to hear from the Albanese Labor government is what they are going to do for our roads.

And I say to the infrastructure minister, you can start with the Western Highway, because we had that sad death where that motorcyclist hit a pothole on the Western Highway. That's a road that we used to put 80 per cent of funding into, and it's back to 50 per cent. You need to reverse that, you need to make sure that road is fixed properly and you need to make sure the duplication continues.

We need to see the duplication from Beaufort to Ararat completed. It's only half done—finish it. Come out and announce that it will be finished and do it before the Victorian state election, because we need to hear that.

Otherwise, sadly, we're going to see more deaths like we saw with that poor motorcyclist last week.