Wednesday, 9 September 2026

 David DAVIS (Southern Metropolitan) (10:44): I move:

That:

(1)   a select committee of six members be appointed to inquire into, consider and report, within 30 days of the house agreeing to this resolution, on the Auditor-General’s report titled Delivering the Suburban Rail Loop, tabled in Parliament on 26 August 2026;

(2)   the committee consist of two members from the government nominated by the Leader of the Government in the Council, two members from the opposition nominated by the Leader of the Opposition in the Council, and two members from among the remaining members in the Council, to be nominated jointly by those remaining members;

(3)   substitute members may be appointed and the provisions outlined in standing order 23.08 will apply;

(4)   the members will be appointed by lodgement of the names with the President within five calendar days of the Council agreeing to this resolution;

(5)   the chair of the committee will be a non-government member and the deputy chair will be a government member;

(6)   the first meeting of the committee will be held within one week of members’ names being lodged with the President;

(7)   the committee should conduct at least one or two full days of public hearings involving the:

(a) attendance of the former Treasurer, the Honourable Jaclyn Symes MLC;

(b) attendance of the former ministers for the Suburban Rail Loop;

(c) voluntary attendance of the Premier, the Honourable Ben Carroll MP;

(d) voluntary attendance of the Deputy Premier, the Honourable Gabrielle Williams MP;

(e) attendance of other witnesses the committee believes are appropriate; and

(8)   the committee should investigate all other matters relevant to this reference, including matters that arise from the Auditor-General’s report.

This motion seeks to establish a select committee of six members to be appointed to inquire into, consider and report within 30 days of the house agreeing to this resolution on the Auditor-General’s report titled Delivering the Suburban Rail Loop, tabled in Parliament on 26 August. The committee will consist of two members from the government, opposition and crossbench, and substitute members may be appointed. It will require the lodgement of names with the President. The Chair will be a non-government member, and the Deputy Chair will be a government member. The first meeting of the committee will be held within a week of the members’ names being lodged. The committee should, according to the terms of reference I propose, conduct at least one or two full days of public hearings involving the attendance of the former Treasurer and the former ministers for the Suburban Rail Loop and seek the voluntary attendance of the Premier Ben Carroll and the Deputy Premier Gabrielle Williams and the attendance of other witnesses the committee believes are appropriate. The committee can investigate matters that are incidental and relevant to the reference.

This is an important reference. This bombshell report Delivering the Suburban Rail Loop of August 2026 was a report that pointed to the time delays, the cost overruns and all of the problems with the Suburban Rail Loop and the government’s management of major projects. But what we did not understand at the time is that there would be a bombshell deep in the middle of this report that related to the project’s funding, and the project’s funding was not just the value capture that people were aware of – some of the government’s attempts to crank up collection of money in and around the Suburban Rail Loop – not even state government funding that the community was aware of and not even the partial federal funding that the community was aware of. It also included a significant amount of money that it did not publicly announce in the budget papers. It did not disclose those points.

I would take the chamber to page 15, where it talks about lack of public transparency on the largest value capture revenue measure. This is important, and I am going to quote some sections of this because I think it is important to get the Auditor’s actual words on record here. It states:

The timing and content of announcements about government decisions on the package of value capture measures intended to fund one-third of the SRL East project cost lack transparency.

DTF and DPC advised the government that it needed to announce the project’s value capture measures before the end of 2024 …

so impacted parties could plan and to ease concerns from the community. I am paraphrasing here. It continues:

The government announced the value capture package in December 2025. In this announcement it said it will use 5 value capture measures …

•   existing land tax revenue in SRL East precincts

•   existing windfall gains …

•   infrastructure contributions from property developers

•   a car parking levy …

•   revenue from state-initiated property development.

The Auditor then said:

However, it did not announce its decision to introduce a new levy on public transport fares from 1 January 2025 as part of the annual Consumer Price Index (CPI) fare increase. The levy involves an annual 1 per cent increase to all public transport fares in metropolitan Melbourne and regional Victoria, on top of existing annual CPI adjustments.

This is still in place.

The government plans to allocate 60 per cent of the revenue it collects through the levy, estimated at $4.8 billion in net present value (NPV) terms to 2062, to fund SRL East.

This levy will be the project’s largest source of value capture revenue.

Yet the government saw fit not to announce this.

The government first approved the levy in August 2021.

Guess who, by the way, was the public transport minister at the time. It was Ben Carroll.

It also confirmed it in December 2023 and November 2024 when it made further decisions on the project’s value capture revenue package.

In November 2024 the government confirmed it needed the levy to service its borrowings for the project.

The government and Transport Victoria did not acknowledge the levy in their public communications about the 2025 and 2026 annual fare increases.

I mean, this is just extraordinary. I do not believe we have seen this in my time in public life or in the last 50 years, where a government has introduced a new tax, a broad-based tax, and not told the community about that tax. That ‘tax’ word is a word that chills many Victorians, and I understand why the government was reluctant. But you cannot introduce a new tax – what happened to the idea of parliamentary sovereignty? What happened to the idea that Parliament would make decisions about new taxes – King Charles and all of that? People remember that the House of Commons and later the analogous house here, the Legislative Assembly, would in that mode be able to check the introduction of new taxes and new arrangements, but this is not what has happened here. The government secretly introduced it at a budget and finance committee of the cabinet in 2021.

It has been further confirmed at other committees. Ben Carroll says he did not know when it came in. I must say, if these committees were making these decisions, either he must have known or he is so highly incompetent that he does not deserve to be in the position he is in. If he did not check the minutes of cabinet matters, there is a problem. If he did not check the cabinet subcommittee minutes as they went to the cabinet, that is a big problem for his competence. But frankly –

Ryan Batchelor: On a point of order, Acting President, Mr Davis has a motion before us proposing the establishment of a select committee. He appears to be straying quite significantly from that. Maybe he could be brought back to the motion.

David DAVIS: On the point of order, Acting President, I have just quoted page 15 of the Auditor’s report, and that is directly mentioned in my motion. The Auditor’s report lays out exactly the dates I am referring to: August 2021, December 2023 and November 2024. These are cabinet subcommittee meetings when these decisions were affirmed or reaffirmed. That is precisely what I am referring to.

The ACTING PRESIDENT (Michael Galea): As first speakers do have wide leeway, I will rule out the point of order.

David DAVIS: The purpose of this reference, the purpose of this committee is to get to the bottom of the sequence that occurred here – to actually hold the hearings and to understand what has happened. That transparency is very important. Public transport is important in this state. Slapping it with a 1 per cent levy every year – and an increasing levy; it goes 1 per cent more every year, going all the way to 2062 – would collect $4.8 billion from those who would travel on public transport: people who get on the train at Wodonga and come to the football in the city and those who come from the country elsewhere, down in the east or the south. In Ms Bath’s electorate they come from Sale or Bairnsdale into the city to do some shopping, and they are slapped with a levy – a secret levy – on their ticket. It is just incomprehensible that the government thought that they could get away with not telling the community. It had to come out at some time, and I think we should pay tribute to the Auditor for the very extraordinary work he has done in ferreting out this secret and nasty tax. It is a tax on public transport, with 60 per cent of it going overwhelmingly to support the Suburban Rail Loop. One of the reasons we want this inquiry and we believe it is important is because what it will do is it will actually get to the bottom of some of these points. It will actually work its way down deep to understand them.

I pay tribute today to the work of Marlo Baragwanath, the Ombudsman in Victoria, and her article in the AustralianFinancial Review:‘Secret SRL levy a sign of Victoria decade-long integrity problem’. She makes I think a number of serious points, and I would commend this article to members of the chamber and the community. She said:

It’s the job of integrity agencies like mine to hold the public service, the parliament and the government up to the light for all to see.

…

A secret levy might not attract attention on the day-to-day, but, bit by bit, it fogs the glass of government. And so it destroys trust in government on the one side, and engenders a culture of paternalistic secrecy on the other.

This matters because when trust breaks down, the system breaks down. We’ve seen that across the pond in the US …

And she talked about that. She continued:

In doing so, we seek to balance the inherent imbalance between individuals and the state. But I don’t think we should be patting ourselves on the back just yet. Because as things stand, integrity doesn’t matter to the community.

Not because people don’t care, but because there’s a wide gap between the ideal of democratic integrity and the reality of government and its agencies in Victoria today.

She said:

We need to bridge this gap.

And I think we do.

We must strip away the jargon, dismantle the lofty abstractions … we cannot expect our community to live it deeply, nor to expect the government to model it.

This is about restoration and healing …

She intends, apparently, to make this point today at the Australian Public Sector Anti-Corruption Conference in Canberra, singling out the levy in Victoria as something that is corrosive of trust. She said:

I’m referring, of course, to the auditor-general’s report revealing an unannounced levy across all public transport fares – in effect, a secret tax. Whether that money is earmarked for the Suburban Rail Loop, as the report indicates, or whether the government’s claim that it was intended for public transport more generally, is irrelevant to the key issue.

What matters is that Victorians have been subjected to an extra levy that was deliberately implemented simultaneously with the ordinary fare increases for inflation. And because of this – and because of the deliberate choice not to announce this levy – none of us knew about it.

It’s a pillar of liberal democracies that the process of taxation be clear, transparent in its implementation, and fair. The very fact of its secrecy makes this levy none of those things.

We can’t trust a government whose decision-making is like an underground stream – we know it’s there because of the outcome, but damned if we know its course.

This inquiry has the capacity, through hearings, to understand exactly how this tax arose, to actually hold the government to account and to ferret out the start of this tax: who thought of it, why, and why was it kept secret.

Ben Carroll has not been clear about when he knew. He refuses to answer that question directly, and he should be asked. He should actually come clean on when he knew and, if he knew back in 2021 or 2023 or 2024, why he did not act, why he did not speak up. He says now that integrity is critical. He says integrity cannot be compromised, and yet in government, as Deputy Premier, he did compromise integrity. He did not come clean on this, and he should have. He should have been honest, and I think the community will judge him harshly for that.

This motion is straightforward. I note the intention is that this be tabled out of session, and we will suggest an amendment, with advice from the clerks, to put that beyond any question. I think it is implicit in the terms of reference to inquire into, consider and report within 30 days of the house agreeing to this resolution, hopefully today. But let us be quite clear that it can be tabled out of session in case the chamber is not sitting. In that circumstance I ask the chamber for support on this motion.

Ryan Batchelor: On a point of order, Acting President, is there an amendment to this motion that is being moved?

David DAVIS: Yes, Mr Welch will move the amendment. I cannot move it. It will be circulated when he speaks on the motion.

Ryan Batchelor: I will get to that in my substantive contribution, but that is useful to clarify.

Members interjecting.

The ACTING PRESIDENT (Michael Galea): There is no point of order. But for the Hansard record, Mr Davis, you are telling the chamber that Mr Welch will be moving the amendment?

David DAVIS: He will formally move it, but I have foreshadowed it.

 Ryan BATCHELOR (Southern Metropolitan) (10:58): I think the last exchange we just had should tell you everything you need to know about the motion that is before us. Mr Davis, in a contribution that barely touched on the substance of the written page and the motion before us, glanced over, fleetingly referenced the question of the motion, which is: should there be a select committee? Instead he went on an extended contribution, shall I say, to be generous, about the Auditor-General’s report and the substantive question. It tells you everything you need to know about what they are proposing. Then at the end of the contribution he said, ‘We’ve got to move an amendment to it.’ Yet he had not, using the provisions in the standing orders that we know exist whereby motions can be amended prior to them being debated on the notice paper, done any of the work to get the motion in a fit state to be debated here. He got up at the end and just dropped in that he has got to move an amendment, but he is asking other members of the chamber to make a contribution without seeing what that amendment is. I think that should tell you everything you need to know about the lack of seriousness with which the Liberal Party takes the substantive question before us today. I think it should give all members pause for thought about what it actually demonstrates in the mind of the opposition, in the mind of Mr Davis, because what we did not hear in his contribution was any detailed substance about the process or the merits of a select committee.

What I want to do is go to some of those issues. I think what the motion before us today, in its terms, demonstrates is further evidence of a worrying trend that we see from the Liberal Party when it comes to the establishment of things like committee inquiries or other sorts of inquiries, because the terms of the motion do not just seek to put terms of reference to a select committee but also seek to dictate to that committee how an inquiry should be conducted. They do not want to empower the committee to investigate. They do not want to empower the committee to make decisions based on evidence before it about how it should conduct an inquiry, which is the normal process that we would go through: we would set policy-based terms of reference and we would identify matters that the committee should inquire and report into. What the motion before us today does in its very terms is it seeks to tell the committee what it has got to do, and that is just one step away from predetermining the outcome that the committee would seek to address. On its very terms Mr Davis is yet again seeking to dictate what the parliamentary committee might choose to do, and I think that tactic again from the Liberal Party demonstrates that they are not serious about having a genuine inquiry into the topic. What they are actually interested in is embarking upon a political exercise.

What they are seeking to do with the terms of this motion is put their thumbs on the scale yet again. We absolutely saw it recently when the government set out quite clear and highly regarded terms of reference for a royal commission. The immediate response of the Liberal Party was to try and put their thumb on the scale of justice and tell an independent royal commissioner what they needed to do. They do not want genuine inquiries in the state of Victoria. What the Liberal Party are interested in are predetermined outcomes and telling independent processes exactly what they should be doing, because they do not want a transparent process, they do not want an independent process; they want a process where the outcomes are predetermined. This motion on its face tries to tell a parliamentary committee how many days it has got to sit for and who it should call as witnesses.

Why doesn’t Mr Davis just put the recommendations in the motion up-front? That would be more transparent. Instead what we have got is Mr Davis, yet again, and the Liberal Party, yet again, trying to tell an independent process what it should be finding. They are doing it here, he has done it before in other motions that he has raised and they did it recently with the royal commission. They could not handle the fact that the government had set up an independent royal commission with broad and expansive terms of reference, led by an eminent and independent jurist. What they wanted to do by releasing the names of people who must be called and by saying they were going to fiddle with the terms of reference and put their thumbs on the scale of justice are exactly the sorts of things that Mr Davis is doing here today by predetermining, for an independent parliamentary committee, how many days they should sit for and who they should hear evidence from. I do not think we can take their exhortations seriously when the face of this motion seeks to predetermine the outcomes of the process that they apparently are wanting to set up to get to the heart of these matters.

To top it off, we then have Mr Davis realising that the motion itself is so inadequate that one of his colleagues has to move an amendment to it, and he cannot even talk about what it is. I am sorry, but if we are expected to take this motion seriously, then we expect that the process that leads up to it is also taken seriously. Yet again we see from the Liberal Party a disinterest in –

Nick McGowan interjected.

Ryan BATCHELOR: On a point of order, Acting President, Mr McGowan just used some unparliamentary language, and I ask him to withdraw.

The ACTING PRESIDENT (Michael Galea): Mr McGowan, I ask you to withdraw.

Nick McGowan: I withdraw ‘hypocrite’.

The ACTING PRESIDENT (Michael Galea): Mr McGowan, please stand up and withdraw without repeating the remark.

Nick McGowan: My apologies for saying that word. I withdraw.

Ryan BATCHELOR: What should give you every indication about the lack of seriousness with which the Liberal Party take these issues is the sideshow that we see from their front bench.

There has been, by the Auditor-General, a very substantial and thorough investigation of these issues, a 171-page report undertaken by an independent officer of the Parliament going to all of these issues in depth, with expansive powers. The report is detailed. The report is candid. It demonstrates there was a lack of transparency about the application of the rail improvement charge, and that charge is gone. The Premier has been clear there was not sufficient transparency in that charge’s creation and implementation. The Premier himself made it very clear that that was not acceptable, and it has gone. We have had a 171-page substantial independent inquiry into all of these matters.

What we have seen today from the substance of their motion and by their behaviour in the debate is that the Liberal Party do not take these issues seriously. This motion, yet again, seeks to predetermine what an independent process seeks to do. It seeks to tell an independent process how long it should take, how many days of hearings it should have and who it should call as witnesses. It is going to be amended, and those amendments have not even been circulated. We cannot take this motion seriously in any way.

 Richard WELCH (North-Eastern Metropolitan) (11:08): I rise to speak on Mr Davis’s motion, and without delay I will circulate my amendment to the motion, if I may, which is a little bit of housekeeping to provide for the fact that the report may be tabled on a non-sitting day – no more, no less. I move:

After paragraph (7), insert the following new paragraph:

“(8)   after the report is adopted by the committee, the chair may give the report to the Clerk and request that it be tabled when the house is not sitting and the provisions outlined in standing orders 23.22(2) to (4) will apply; and”.

We heard in Mr Batchelor’s contribution that the Victorian Auditor-General’s Office (VAGO) report was detailed and was candid and that it was clear that the secret tax levied was wrong. We had the Premier apologise and undertake to immediately withdraw it and say it was wrong, so as a point of fact there is clear agreement that there was something very problematic about what occurred, and it should be dealt with as a matter of seriousness, because it is not trivial; there are a whole number of reasons that it is not trivial. How this could occur over a number of years is a really serious question for this chamber, for this Parliament and for the Victorian people as well.

I think if we were not so close to the election, there would be more to do and more to say about it. But in the circumstances, I think very much like the Victorian people were demanding a royal commission into corruption on the Big Build, the Victorian people are absolutely entitled to get some further clarity about how this actually happened in practice. I think it is no different, really, for all intents and purposes. The Victorian people are entitled to know what happened. How did this occur? How did it occur over multiple years? How was there a cover-up of this? And actually, for once in this government’s life, have some accountability around that, because this constant refrain of ‘Oh, I can’t prosecute the past.’ Well, this is not the past. It is like a burglar robbing a home yesterday and saying, ‘Well, that was yesterday; we can’t prosecute yesterday when I committed the crime, because today is today.’

This is not a matter of yesterday, because when it comes to the Suburban Rail Loop (SRL), the debt is now and the debt is going to be into the future for our children. The debt is contributing towards $10 billion a year being paid in interest in our state. The issue is 20 per cent of our infrastructure budget going to this project. If this is not relevant now, I do not know what is. Whilst we still have the apparatus of government here and the people who are accountable can answer, now is the right time to investigate this. We are not proposing a royal commission, we are proposing a brief inquiry to get to the bottom of it. It will have representation from all sides of the chamber. It is completely appropriate.

If the government is sincere about ‘Integrity is no longer optional’, I can think of no better place to start than the SRL, and I can think of no better way to start than on this matter. This speaks to the finances of the SRL. The SRL has always defied gravity in terms of the logic of its finances. We know that it was a proposal that never had a solid, genuine business case, never went to Infrastructure Australia, never had their approval. It was never costed properly, and the business case relied on the building of the northern segment of the SRL, with all its benefits, to justify the cost of the eastern side. But it did not incorporate the costs of the northern segment. So the benefits of the northern segment were in the business case but not the costs, and that somehow justified the eastern segment of the project.

There were all the models where it said $11 billion would come from state, $11 billion would come from federal and $11 billion would come from value capture. It was the value capture part that was always incredibly puzzling, because the government knew it would never stack up. You could not extract $11 billion in value capture tax from that corridor, no matter which way you cooked it. No matter what commercial properties you built there and no matter what residential properties you built there, it was never going to be enough to extract $11 billion of value out of it to provide that figure. The figure was much more like $3.5 billion. The government has as much as conceded that, because it had to go into these levies on car parks, it had to impose a $35,000 levy on every new residence built and it had to factor in windfall gains tax. Now we know that it knew this. How do we know? Because 40 per cent of that value capture of $11 billion was in this tax that was never revealed, never disclosed. So they knew it did not add up either. They knew they had to go to external sources, other taxes, to make up that shortfall.

What I find particularly puzzling in this is that in the VAGO briefing when this report was handed down, the question was asked: was this tax revealed to Infrastructure Australia when they made their assessment, when the updated figures were provided? You will remember there was this long period when Infrastructure Australia would not sign off on this project, which forestalled any federal funding, and then the government, with great fanfare, provided updated figures and updated data to Infrastructure Australia, and suddenly Infrastructure Australia supported it. What VAGO confirmed is that this tax, this source of funding, was not included in those updated figures. It was not included in these updated figures. And what I think that points to is that that had to have been a conscious decision not to disclose. It had to be, because if you knew that was 40 per cent of the vital figure, it had to be a figure that you would have had to have disclosed. That then raises another really interesting question, because obviously the ratings agencies have been looking at this project with great concern repeatedly. So were the ratings agencies informed of a tax that the Victorian people were not? I think that would be a question that would need to be asked as well, because when you think about the ramifications of this cover-up, it actually goes wider and wider and wider in terms of how deliberate and considered and repeated it was, how many people got rolled into it, and how many other bodies got rolled into it – every other body except the Victorian people. If you look at the marketing material of the SRL, never once was this disclosed.

If we are talking about returning integrity to Victoria, this is a very good place to start. It is not the past, it is absolutely the present and the future. There are so many unanswered questions. It is not just about saying, ‘Oh, whoops. Sorry, we slipped up.’ No, that is just so incredibly trivialising of what has happened. This is a matter of great seriousness. And if the standard you walk by is the standard you accept, this Parliament cannot accept governments operating this way in Victoria. We will not have it. I urge the chamber to support this motion and this inquiry.

 Rikkie-Lee TYRRELL (Northern Victoria) (11:17): I rise to support the motion moved by Mr Davis to establish a select committee to inquire into the Auditor-General’s report on the delivery of the Suburban Rail Loop. The Suburban Rail Loop is one of the largest and most expensive infrastructure projects ever undertaken in Victoria. With a project of this scale, Victorians have every right to know how decisions were made, how their money is being spent and who is ultimately accountable.

What makes this report particularly concerning is the revelation of what has effectively been described as a secret levy associated with the project. If Victorians are being asked to shoulder additional costs to fund the Suburban Rail Loop, they deserve to know about those costs. There should be no hidden taxes, hidden levies or financial arrangements kept from public scrutiny. This is precisely why the Auditor-General’s findings cannot simply be acknowledged and put aside. The proposed select committee would provide an opportunity to properly examine these matters, hear directly from the former Treasurer and former ministers responsible for the Suburban Rail Loop and give the Premier and Deputy Premier an opportunity to explain their understanding of the decisions that were made.

This motion is not about prejudging the findings or targeting individuals, it is about transparency, accountability and protecting Victorian taxpayers. Billions of dollars are involved in this project, and the financial consequences will be felt by Victorians for decades. If a levy or additional financial burden was created without adequate public disclosure, Victorians deserve a clear explanation of what it was, why it was introduced, who approved it and how much it will ultimately cost them. A select committee with public hearings and a 30-day reporting timeframe is a reasonable and proportionate response. Victorians deserve to know where their money is going. They deserve transparency around the Suburban Rail Loop, and they deserve accountability from those who made the decisions. For those reasons, I support the motion and commend it to the house.

 Michael GALEA (South-Eastern Metropolitan) (11:19): It is a pleasure to rise to speak to the motion today of Mr Davis. Once again, as my colleague Mr Batchelor was saying, it is a bit of a haphazard job. We have had to see Mr Davis have his errors fixed by his colleague. I appreciate you circulating that amendment, Mr Welch, to clarify the intent of Mr Davis’s motion. Once again, his sloppy and slapdash behaviour has seen some hasty changes made at the last minute. But it is a good topic to be talking about, and indeed in many ways I can continue my remarks from earlier this morning when we were debating the ins and outs of the rail improvement charge and the comments that I made earlier today in which it was very much made clear that whilst there is inherently nothing wrong with using public transport fares to invest in public transport – it is in fact something that we should be doing – it is a completely different story to do that in a way that is not open, honest and transparent with the Victorian public. That is exactly why Premier Ben Carroll took the decisive action to axe it upon the publication and airing of this information in the Victorian Auditor-General’s Office (VAGO) report.

Like other members, I do appreciate the role that VAGO have and the important role that they play. Certainly Mr Welch would be aware, and Mr Puglielli too, through time spent on the Public Accounts and Estimates Committee (PAEC), of the very important work that the Auditor-General’s office does in the checks and balances, performance engagements and other performance reviews that they undertake on behalf of the Parliament and indirectly on behalf of the state as a whole. It is an important document and a valuable one to read. Certainly I have had the opportunity to read through it, as I believe some members opposite have as well.

Coming to the select committee now, Mr Davis curiously was relatively absent from speaking about the details of this in his contribution. I can see why, because to look at this with any more than a cursory glance, you would see that this is a very poorly constructed select committee for the very simple reason that you have set out a timeframe of 30 days, Mr Davis. When you have five days to appoint members and then a few days to have a meeting after that, there certainly appears to be no time to open and close submissions and very little time to have any hearings, let alone time for the report to be drafted and for members to meet and deliberate and move amendments and do a minority report and then have the report be printed. You have been here a long time, Mr Davis. In fact you should probably be well aware that a 30-day turnaround is simply not going to produce any report of substantial value. Indeed, as Mr Batchelor said, it is clear that you have your own views on what this report should say anyway through the stipulations in the terms of reference.

David Davis interjected.

Michael GALEA: No, the WorkCover inquiry was done over a couple of months, Mr Davis. That was not a 30-day inquiry. Indeed we had a very rushed committee just last year on the Victoria Planning Provisions – 278 and two other ones as well – and indeed that was still a very brief report and very rushed. But as Ms Watt knows, as she was on that committee with me as well, it was a lot more than 30 days. For a 30-day report, really, you may as well just come into this place not just with your recommendations but with the minority report that you are going to write. You may as well just seek to table that. You may even have it already, Mr Davis, in which case I would encourage you just to table that and we can be done with it, because that is exactly what this is all about.

With a very limited, very incapacitated sort of length of time in order to conduct an inquiry, this will not be able to do anything like the sort of work that the Auditor-General has done over many, many months with detailed preparation. Indeed we have the report of the Auditor-General, and what neither Liberal speaker so far has actually been able to say is what exactly this committee will be able to show that is not already shown in the Auditor-General’s report. I would welcome it if Dr Heath has something that she can say to furnish that. But quite simply, no opposition speaker has actually said why this is needed.

Renee Heath: I’ll tell you why it’s needed.

Michael GALEA: Well, please do, Dr Heath, because there is nothing that this select committee could find that is not already outlined in the Auditor-General’s report. Indeed we know that this is just a political sideshow that Mr Davis is seeking to inflict. With such broad and confused terms of reference listing former roles, which is not generally accepted convention in terms of how you would set up a committee, but also the curious inclusion of outlining voluntary attendance of the Premier, the Deputy Premier and other witnesses, it sort of underscores that Mr Davis himself knows that these are flawed terms of reference. If you were seeking to do this properly, you would actually refer it to a joint committee that could compel people from both houses. That is indeed why, Mr Davis, when you did table this and outline and give your notice of intention to move this motion in the last sitting week, you also moved a parallel motion which would have referred this to PAEC, which as a joint committee does have those powers to compel the attendance of members and ministers from both chambers.

It is very curious that you have decided not to do that. I appreciate that you have had discussions across the chamber, but in your remarks to the house today you have not put on the record what the reason is that you want to apparently have this great big inquiry but do not want to compel any of the Assembly ministers to appear. I would be very open to further contributions from Liberal speakers to outline the reason behind that and why you have chosen this particular path that you have, because, again, it seems to be very vague, and again, as the Liberal Party is wont to do, it is setting out terms of reference in a way designed to specifically achieve its own short-term political aims, but not even doing that to the fullest extent because, as you well know and as we have been through before in other inquiries in this Parliament, you cannot compel members of the Legislative Assembly to appear before a Legislative Council committee. Mr Davis, your own weasel words in this motion confirm that by talking about voluntary attendance in your stated list of aims.

Let us get back to what this is really about. This is, again, a Liberal Party that is determined to undermine a project that is city shaping, that is going to be changing the way our city and our state move around for generations, in much the same way that the city loop did a few generations ago and in much the same way we are seeing the Metro Tunnel start to do as well. We know that the Liberals have said that they will ‘pause work’ on the Suburban Rail Loop. We know what that means. It means a cut, and it means effectively the project will be neutered, because there is no way to pause a tunnel-boring machine. They are already out there. They are already building the tunnels as we speak. I am not sure if Mr Davis has spoken to any engineering experts or anyone else who could tell him this, but if you literally stop a tunnel-boring machine, if you so-called pause it, you cannot just then go back in a few days later or a few months later, find the keys and switch it back on again. Pausing a tunnel-boring machine, because they are such heavy pieces of equipment, it will start to literally sink into the ground and it will be a lost asset forever. What a ‘pause’ means, then, is that you either renege on the contracts and then you cost the taxpayers billions of dollars with absolutely zero benefit for the people of Victoria, or you increase the cost of continuing and finishing the project just so you could have your political moment in the sun, pause the project and have a big press conference, and then actually dramatically increase the cost of the project by the costs related to the very pause that you have just done for a political point.

On the other side of the chamber here what we have is a government that is committed to spending taxpayers money as wisely and as carefully as possible, and that is exactly why this government has gone through in fine detail the contracts, discovered these savings and presented them as a way to ensure that we can continue to deliver this important, vital, state-shaping project in a way that is more cost effective and more responsive to the needs of Victorians so that we can continue to invest in this and other crucially important areas of public spending. That is exactly what we will continue to do on this side of the chamber. We have had nine going on 19 going on 40 different positions now from the Liberal Party on the Suburban Rail Loop. But when you have a gaping chasm of $40 billion worth of cuts that they need to find in their budget, you know that it is not just one rail project that they will be after. It is the local hospital, it is the schools, it is the services and it is the free kinder that they openly attack each and every week in this chamber. Free kinder service? Completely gone under a Liberal–‍One Nation coalition government.

Richard Welch: On a point of order, Acting President, I think in his enthusiasm Mr Galea has strayed from the topic of the motion.

The ACTING PRESIDENT (Jacinta Ermacora): There is no point of order.

Michael GALEA: To Mr Welch’s credit, I probably had, but I will conclude my remarks there.

 Renee HEATH (Eastern Victoria) (11:29): I am going to start with exactly the question that Mr Galea asked me. He said, ‘Nobody has explained why we need this, and nobody has outlined it,’ which in fact is false because we had two coalition speakers that did. The reason we need this is because trust in our public institutions is at an all-time low, and there is a reason for that – because the hallmark of this government, particularly in the Carroll era, which has not been here for very long, is lack of transparency. Transparency is what builds public trust. A proven track record is what builds trust. Victorians do not want to see a politician standing there just trying to survive a press conference while their life says something completely different to what their words do. Your words should mean something, and Premier Carroll has proven time and time again that his do not. I will explain this, because one of the things he said before he rolled Premier Jacinta Allan was: ‘No, I’m not going to roll her, because I’ve got a little girl at home who needs to see a dad who backs a woman.’ His next move was to do exactly the opposite and roll Premier Allan. He said we do not need a royal commission, and then his first act as Premier – I am not kidding you – was to call a royal commission. Not only did he say we do not need one and then slowly come back, he made it his hallmark, his primary policy. I tell you what, that is why we need it: because Victorians need to know that their public money, their hard-earned cash, is being used responsibly.

Before I get into the substance of this I want to reflect just very quickly on the bizarre rant from Mr Batchelor. Do you want to know what the rant was about when he was saying there is no integrity on this side and he was completely gaslighting and deflecting – at Olympic levels, by the way? What this amendment means is that this report can actually be tabled. So while he was saying that it is about a lack of transparency on our side, what it actually means is that the public will be able to access it and that it will be transparent. So no, we do not need to go through the motions of ‘We’re doing something about it.’ We want to make sure that whatever this investigation finds will be accessible not only to people on this side of the house but to the public, so they know exactly what happened. That is what transparency is; that is what integrity is. For Mr Batchelor, rather than address this issue of public trust and integrity – I just think: what qualifies this government to say things like that? It is deflection at its best, because they have presided over the biggest corruption scandal in this state’s history.

Let me just say, if you are in this place, you are not suffering a cost-of-living crisis. Mr Batchelor is coming in, so I will get this out before the points of order start rolling in. Nobody in this house is living with a cost-of-living crisis. There is not one. Everyone here is on at least five times the average wage of a Victorian. They do not know what it is like. That is why it is more important for Victorians to know what taxes they are being slugged with, what people knew, what they say and why what they say does not at all reflect what they do.

There is a track record, and it is the public’s right to know exactly what is happening with their money. Victorians have lost their belief that their government is open, truthful and legal. We have seen many examples of this. There is a good quote by HG Wells:

As soon as a government departs from that standard it ceases to be anything more than ‘the gang in possession,’ and its days are numbered.

This is how these guys are acting: like a bunch of thugs – a gang that can hide whatever they want. This is why we need it: because we have got the Premier saying he did not know about it, then quickly scrapping it because it is politically convenient. He is also the former roads minister who has passed the blame to past premiers for the state of the roads while he presided over the cuts in roads. This is a Premier who is so out of touch. If there is one thing that is a real, visible reflection of a government that is functioning or not, it is potholes in roads. It is the physical manifestation of a government that is functional or one that is not. He is also the former education minister. I was so impressed when he took over and his first act as education minister was to say, ‘We are going to mandate and we are going to bring in the science of learning and phonics,’ because he admitted that one-third of children not being able to read and write properly is wrong.

Sheena Watt: On a point of order, President, just reflecting on the recent point of order by Mr Welch where he raised the relevance of the speaker to the motion before us, I too raise it. The position of the Premier on education policy may not be relevant to the motion before us. Can I ask you to consider that?

The PRESIDENT: It may not be, so I will ask the member if she can try to constrain herself to the motion.

Renee HEATH: The reason it is relevant is because after he made that announcement he then failed to follow through. There was not enough integrity to actually enforce it, to allow people in Victoria to trust that what he says is what he does.

Then there is the mess with the TAC, where we have seen that people in Victoria are being slugged more and getting less and there is less transparency than in any other state. Here are some quotes that I will read to you about why this is important. I am simply answering the question that I was asked: why is it important? Why do we need this inquiry? Here are some words from the Ombudsman:

Instead, when one of our integrity agents tables a set of recommendations, all too often they’re attacked personally …

And haven’t we seen that today? I will just come across for a minute. Rather than looking at the substance of this motion, we have seen members of this government personally attack my colleagues, personally attack Mr Davis and personally attack Mr Welch, rather than talk about this. I understand that is the reality of what is going on. Anyway, the Ombudsman said this:

Instead, when one of our integrity agents tables a set of recommendations, all too often they’re attacked personally –

it is actually quiet for a minute; they are like, ‘I don’t know. I’m used to attacking them personally’–

or their work is dismissed by the government of the day.

Isn’t that what we get in every question time? Every question time when we ask something, the government, who have led us into more debt than New South Wales, Queensland and Tasmania combined and has presided over more corruption, tell us all how stupid we are and how we just do not understand it, we just do not get it. I tell you what: they got us into this mess, so I would not expect them to know how to get us out of the mess or even have the concept to answer that question. The Ombudsman said:

This is a dangerous sign. Because maladministration, corruption and misuse of public funds – taxpayer dollars – breed resentment, disillusionment and, ultimately, distrust.

That is why we need this inquiry. I will go on to say some other things the Ombudsman said:

It’s a pillar of liberal democracies that the process of taxation be clear, transparent in its implementation, and fair.

I will stop here and talk about fairness for a minute. Do you know 25 per cent of Victorians live in regional areas like those we represent, yet about 11 or 12 per cent of the money goes back into it? It is regional Victorians that have been slugged for this money. They deserve to know where it is going, because what you are doing is not fair. Anyway, I will continue:

The very fact of its secrecy makes this levy none of those things.

We can’t trust a government whose decision-making is like an underground stream – we know it’s there because of the outcome, but damned if we know its course. That’s just not good enough. We can’t expect people to trust a government or a process that refuses to be brought into the light.

It is a pretty good explanation of why we need this inquiry. She said:

This matters because when trust breaks down, the system breaks down. We’ve seen that across the pond in the US, and we’re seeing an earlier stage of the same process here in Australia.

I am sick of my region being promised things that are not delivered. I am sick of the Warragul hospital upgrades, the Wonthaggi Hospital upgrades, all of these things being promised and not delivered. Integrity matters. Your words should be reflected in your actions. That is a really basic thing. That is why we need this inquiry. I commend the motion to the house.

 Aiv PUGLIELLI (North-Eastern Metropolitan) (11:39): I rise on behalf of Greens colleagues to contribute to this motion before us today, and it is picking up on the theme that particularly opposition speakers have raised for the need for further clarity on what has been a pretty damning report on the government. This motion seeks to set up a select committee to consider and report on the Victorian Auditor-General’s Office recently tabled report Delivering the Suburban Rail Loop. Audits and investigation of a project like this, a project of this size and the decisions around it, need serious consideration. SRL East is expected to cost up to $34.5 billion. This is massive, and it is massive in my local community in the eastern suburbs of Melbourne. On the report, VAGO found that:

The government’s new revenue raising measures are intended to fund one-third of the project costs. These measures include a levy on all public transport fares in metropolitan Melbourne and regional Victoria. It has been using this levy to raise revenue since January 2025.

This was in effect a secret tax – I think it is not being political to say that it was shrouded in secrecy – on every public transport user over the last 18 months. This is another example of transparency lacking in the current Labor government. This is also in the context of full fares in Victoria for public transport already being the fourth highest in the world. Obviously they are currently half price until the election. Goodness knows if it will continue beyond that. But already the full fare itself is too high, so to think about a cruel surcharge being placed on top of that and people having to pay that in secrecy for 18 months is abhorrent. I will note on the record that Greens policy is that public transport should be frequent and it should be free. No hidden fees, no secret taxes, no ifs, no buts – that is it. Fundamentally, looking at what is before us today, this is a matter of decision-making. It is about who knew what and who knew what when. Evidently by the reporting on this and what has already been discussed, this is a massive can of worms. I do not say that to make it sound light. This is explosive stuff that we are considering before us, and it needs to be thoroughly investigated.

On that, given that it is a proposal for a select committee – and as I think Mr Welch mentioned, the context of this is important given the timing of where we are at in the term and the work that would need to go into looking at this properly – we have been seeking advice regarding the capacity of a select committee in what is genuinely expected and sought to be looked at in the motion that is before us. We are informed and it is our understanding that only one of the former ministers that is being sought to be brought before the committee could actually be compelled, which is a significant limitation on a committee like this doing the work that it needs to. Yes, we can read into whether, compulsion aside, a minister would choose to appear, but that compulsion power is important if you have an uncooperative government, and I would say this is a pretty uncooperative government most of the time. Just saying. Further to that, looking at the motion itself, we are looking realistically at one or two days of public hearings. So coupling that with the limitations on compulsion of ministers. and then even for that one minister that is compelled, I am also informed that I do not believe they would be compelled to respond to questions about previous portfolios –

David Davis interjected.

Aiv PUGLIELLI: Perhaps there is conjecture on that point. That is okay. But there are significant limitations with respect to a select committee, and if there is a select committee and this does get up, chances are it is going to be me from the Greens team that is on it. I recognise the importance of select committees; however, there are significant limitations here for a matter that is of huge concern to many Victorians and members in this place and it needs to be investigated in the appropriate manner.

What has already been covered through the report reveals the imposition of an unannounced rail improvement charge that added 1 per cent per year to metropolitan and regional fares above inflation in what was expected to raise $8 billion in net present value terms to 2062 – $4.8 billion allocated to Suburban Rail East. At some point in time this government concluded that this charge was essential to generate new revenue to service the borrowings that have been undertaken for this project. Yet there was secrecy around approving a communications plan that excluded any reference to this charge, so commuters paid this charge unknowingly through 2025 and 2026 without it being disclosed in fare announcements. It was not in the value capture announcement from the government at the end of last year, and yet we have this Premier come out and say that integrity is not optional.

Deliberate concealment of charges and withholding of information not only from the community but also reportedly from members of the government by government ministers is damning stuff. On what is a matter of significant secrecy and really damaging perceptions towards this government, its decision-making and its being forthcoming with decisions and how taxes are charged upon the Victorian community, this goes a significant way further to eroding the trust that Victorians have in the way that the economy is being managed but also the way the management of this project is being undertaken.

I will refer to the article that several members, particularly opposition members, have made a note of regarding the Ombudsman’s words. I particularly want to highlight two quotes, the first being:

This matters because when trust breaks down, the system breaks down. We’ve seen that across the pond in the US, and we’re seeing an earlier stage of the same process here in Australia.

I also quote:

Integrity agencies are the tension in the system that pulls the opposing centripetal and centrifugal forces back to the centre, to the point of balanced harmony.

We are talking about a lot of documents, departments, the Suburban Rail Loop Authority, ministerial offices, all of the approval pathways and the potential for a significant amount of withholding of information between those bodies. We will see, when and where this is investigated, what does come out. But it is a significant matter, and I do not feel confident that one minister being compelled to one or two days of hearings of a select committee of the Parliament would be the avenue for doing this. Instead the Greens, once the Independent Broad-based Anti-corruption Commission Amendment Bill 2026 passes this Parliament, hopefully very soon with refreshed IBAC powers, will be referring this matter to IBAC, and we will not be supporting the select committee motion today.

 Sheena WATT (Northern Metropolitan) (11:47): I rise to respond to the contribution and the motion that is before us today. Certainly I do so because Victorians deserve a serious facts-based discussion about the long-term benefits of this generational infrastructure project. What we have heard in the chamber today, unfortunately, is not a substantive critique of city-shaping infrastructure. Instead we are seeing a constant resistance to the kind of long-term investment that our growing state fundamentally requires.

Let us look really plainly at what is being built. The Suburban Rail Loop is the single largest investment in public transport connectivity the state has ever seen. The opposition’s continued resistance to this project highlights a stark contrast in priorities. It really is easy to oppose major projects from the sidelines, but true fiscal responsibility means investing in the infrastructure a city needs before it is completely paralysed by congestion. For years we saw a distinct lack of federal partnership under previous governments when it came to major rail projects in Victoria. Now we are seeing a concerted effort to undermine a project that is already underway, under the guise of fiscal prudence from a party that has historically underinvested in our public transport system. Can I also just note that we now have partners in Canberra who are willing to invest in public infrastructure and public transport, and can I acknowledge the commitments made by the Prime Minister in investing in the Suburban Rail Loop.

What we need to focus on is what the Suburban Rail Loop actually delivers for working Victorians. Suburban Rail Loop East alone is projected to take 600,000 cars off Melbourne’s roads. It delivers six stations. A trip from Box Hill to Cheltenham will take about 22 minutes. It is a kind of connectivity that fundamentally changes how a city functions. It turns a stressful 2-hour-commute round trip in gridlock into a manageable journey that can be completed during a lunchbreak, frankly. It opens up immediate job opportunities and provides direct access to major educational precincts at Monash and Deakin universities for growing students. Also, for those that come from suburbs that have never had a direct rail link it means less time stuck in traffic, less money spent on petrol and more time spent at home with family or studying or in part-time jobs or volunteering. It is the baseline standard of public transport a global city like Melbourne needs to remain livable.

However, faster, better train services are only one part of the equation. This project is entirely inseparable from the housing our state desperately needs. The activity centres that are being planned around the Suburban Rail Loop will deliver tens of thousands of new homes in precisely the locations where existing infrastructure can support them. This is near transport hubs, near employment centres, near essential services and of course near our world-class universities and research institutes. When we talk about these activity centres we are talking about well-planned, sustainable urban design that includes diverse housing options, including affordable housing and accessible homes for downsizers who want to age in place within their own communities. We know that not every young person wants or can afford a detached home on the urban fringe. Many young Victorians simply want the opportunity to live in the established communities where they grew up, near their parents, near their support networks and maybe near their jobs too. They want to live in well-designed apartments and townhouses where they can walk to work, access local parks and easily catch a train or tram to enjoy our city’s internationally renowned culture, nightlife and major events.

Renee Heath: On a point of order, President, I could be confused, but I think the member is talking about housing and ageing in place. I wonder if she is speaking to the wrong document, the wrong motion.

The PRESIDENT: No, I do not believe so. I will let the member continue.

Sheena WATT: Further to the point of order, President, I am speaking about housing near the proposed Suburban Rail Loop. You absolutely cannot acknowledge a housing crisis while simultaneously opposing the single biggest driver of well-located housing supply in the state. If you oppose the Suburban Rail Loop, you are effectively opposing the construction of homes in established suburbs for the next generation of Victorians. You cannot keep telling millennials and gen Zs that the only path –

Renee Heath: On a point of order, President, I would like you to bring it back to relevance. The government has said now that the Suburban Rail Loop is not a housing project – you have changed your position on that – and I think you should bring her back to –

The PRESIDENT: That is not a point of order.

Sheena WATT: Wonderful. I am happy to take up the point of order, just to say that you cannot continually be telling millennials and gen Zs that their only path to home ownership is to move further and further away from where the majority of jobs and services are located when you have an opportunity to build up as well as out, which the Suburban Rail Loop presents. You certainly cannot have it both ways.

The Carroll Labor government believes that transparency and accountability strengthen major projects; they do not weaken them. We do not dismiss legitimate scrutiny. We acknowledge that bodies like Infrastructure Australia have raised questions about elements of the funding model and that the Auditor-General has rightly identified in the original business case that required refinement. I am saying also that the Auditor-General provides independent assurance to this Parliament and the Victorian community. Their audits examine whether public resources are managed effectively and economically, and they make recommendations intended to strengthen project delivery. Respecting the Victorian Auditor-General’s Office means engaging honestly with their reports and implementing their recommendations to make projects like the Suburban Rail Loop better. I made a contribution on the earlier documents motion about this. It does not mean weaponising their independent work to justify abandoning a project that many Victorians will rely on.

This is the largest transport infrastructure project in our history. It is entirely appropriate that it attracts rigorous independent scrutiny, and our government welcomes that oversight. However, there is a distinct difference between appropriate public scrutiny and political sabotage. Moving continuous motions like this before us, designed to generate quick headlines rather than genuinely improve the delivery of the project, does absolutely nothing for the commuters in Glen Waverley, in Clayton and in Box Hill or the students that want to get to the world-class facilities located out at Monash University and eventually, I hope, those in the northern suburbs who are simply relying on the trains to get moving and the government to help make that happen.

We must be clear-eyed about the true cost of the opposition’s approach. Cancelling a project of this scale halfway through its delivery is not an exercise in fiscal responsibility. Ripping up opportunities for thousands of active construction jobs and blocking the development of tens of thousands of homes is an exercise in profound economic waste. True economic management involves treating taxpayer dollars and contracts signed in the name of our state with respect and with certainty. It is also critically important for this chamber to note that this project is part of a much broader vision for the entire state, and this government is investing in communities across Melbourne and regional Victoria to ensure that growing suburbs have the access to the transport and services that they need. At its core this debate is about how we manage growth. Victoria is projected to reach the size of London by the 2050s. You do not meet that kind of population growth by standing still, and you certainly do not meet it by constantly attempting to delay or derail the very infrastructure designed to handle it. The public is rightfully tired of the games that seek to halt progress. They want a government that is prepared to make the long-term, generational investments required to keep this city moving, house its people and ensure sustainable growth.

We must recognise that this project is a structural response to the cost of living as well. We often talk about the cost of living purely in terms of immediate cash relief, but our government is proudly delivering this through initiatives like free public transport for under-18s and heavily discounted regional fares.

A member interjected.

Sheena WATT: That is what I said – for under-18s. But genuine long-term cost-of-living relief is also about the hours you get back in your week when you are not sitting bumper to bumper on the Eastern Freeway. It is the thousands of dollars saved every year when a household does not need to pay for registration, insurance, fuel and maintenance of a second car because a reliable train service goes to exactly where they need to go. It is the ability to find an affordable home near a station that gets you to wherever it is that you need to get to around our state. And rather than being pushed to the fringes of a city just to find a mortgage that can be serviced, there are so many benefits to improved options from a much more dynamic train line. This is what structural cost-of-living relief looks like – a permanent positive change to how a working family’s time and money can be stretched every single day. This is exactly what the Suburban Rail Loop is designed to deliver, because the alternative on offer from those opposite is not an alternative at all, it is a simple no.

 Evan MULHOLLAND (Northern Metropolitan) (11:57): I rise to speak on Mr Davis’s excellent motion for a select committee into this government’s shameful public transport tax, which they did not tell Victorians about. We know that the Victorian Treasury warned both Daniel Andrews and Jacinta Allan not last year, not in 2024 but in 2020 that the Suburban Rail Loop East would cost $37 billion. The government itself has acknowledged that construction costs have gone up 20 per cent since then, which means this project, from Cheltenham to Box Hill, is going to cost $50 billion. How does the government fill the hole? A secret tax on all Victorians that they did not tell Victorians about. They all knew in 2024. It was in their cabinet minutes, so these frontbenchers are either incompetent or they lied to all Victorians.

Sonja Terpstra: On a point of order, President, Mr Mulholland is aggressively pointing, and I ask that he not aggressively point.

Members interjecting.

The PRESIDENT: Order! We are eating into Mr Mulholland’s time. I actually was not looking at Mr Mulholland at the time, but I would advise members that Ms Terpstra is right that we should not be pointing at each other.

Evan MULHOLLAND: Did the state government tell Infrastructure Australia, when it was doing an assessment on value capture modelling and had to go back to the drawing board on the value capture, that it also included a secret tax? Last year when they announced all the publicly disclosed value capture mechanisms, it was not in there. Did this state government tell Infrastructure Australia and Minister King about this secret tax?

We know what Ben Carroll’s best friends think about this project. Stephen Conroy called it a dog of a project. Bill Shorten, his old mate, called it a lemon on steroids. Now he has supposedly shaved $2 billion off the SRL to go to different road projects. One billion dollars of that, the Victorian Auditor-General’s Office acknowledged, was not actually funded in the first place. They have now made almost $3 billion worth of road projects. Are they going to cut another billion from the Suburban Rail Loop? It is completely uneconomical, and the business case says it is uneconomical without the northern section. Look at the amount of interest we will be paying. Ms Symes has told this house that the value capture loan over 40 years does include interest, which means we are paying about $28 billion –

The PRESIDENT: Sorry, I am going to need to interrupt business for question time and ministers statements.

Business interrupted pursuant to resolution of Council of 8 September.

The PRESIDENT: Before I call the first question, I am pleased to acknowledge in the gallery Tania Maxwell, a former member of this chamber.