Michael Danby (Melbourne Ports, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary to the Leader of the Opposition) Share this | Hansard source

Well, he was imitating Bazza McKenzie! Some people were trying to humanise him by making him use sayings that appealed to the average Australian.

Anyhow, the federal government still owes Victorians $1.45 billion under the coalition's own asset recycling scheme after the lease of the Port of Melbourne. Because the Victorian government managed to get more money from the lease—$9.7 billion rather than the projected $6.5 billion—it was penalised by the current federal government and did not get the asset recycling money that is mandated to come to state governments that sell infrastructure and redeploy it for good infrastructure uses. There is an incentive offered by the federal government that was not fulfilled for that extra portion of the sale price that Victoria got.

Infrastructure spending futureproofs our nation on population growth and provides employment for thousands. I remember when the Prime Minister used to say 'jobs and growth' all the time. Now it is abundantly clear that he has abandoned that strategy. Sydney is a wonderful city, and New South Wales is a great state. It is silly to have interstate rivalries that go back to Federation. But people in Victoria will naturally feel this rivalry if we are getting eight per cent of expenditure when we have 25 per cent of Australia's population and 37 per cent of national migration coming to Melbourne. We are a very cosmopolitan city. People are willing to stand up; it does not concern them at all. But we want a fair slice of the national tax pie. This current federal government is undermining the contract implicit in Federation. Australia is the nation of the fair go. Victorians just want a fair go on infrastructure.

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