Bruce Billson (Dunkley, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is a rare thrill to have my three favourite Dunkley residents with me here today: my bodacious wife, Mrs Billson, Bella and Maddie. It is great that they give me the love and encouragement to do what I can for our community. It was late last year when I spoke about a delicious opportunity in the 'Riviera' of Melbourne, down in Frankston on the Mornington Peninsula, to turn a multimillion dollar investment into a refresh and relocation of the Frankston Railway Station—a real transformation in our city. It was great that the Napthine coalition government had allocated funding for a project of this kind. In fairness to the current state Labor government, they have supplemented those funds. But what we cannot do is just do a tart-up of the railway station. What we need to do is examine the strategic significance of that functioning piece of infrastructure and the land uses that surround it to catalyse the resources that are available, to encourage private sector investment and to realise that there are many moving parts in our great city.

We have challenges around further investment at the Frankston campus of Chisholm. We could integrate that into the transport hub. We have got a relocation task from the Mount Eliza Centre, part of the peninsula health network—their IT, their communication stuff. They could be in our city. We could have the vision that I have for the Caroline Chisholm university college—an open campus where any provider can provide the education. I urge the state government to treat this as a strategic planning exercise. They have refused to do so. They need to reconsider this opportunity.