Zoe McKenzie (Flinders, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Today I rise to share some commitments for Flinders from an excellent press release dated 31 July 2018, because I think they might have been forgotten. It reads: 'Labor will deliver Frankston to Baxter rail upgrade'. I can't read it all, because the then shadow minister for infrastructure's excitement for this project was, at the time, effusive, and today time is short, but here goes:

A Shorten Labor Government will move quickly to deliver the much-needed Frankston to Baxter Rail Upgrade …

Federal Labor is an advocate of the electrification and duplication of the Stony Point Line to Baxter to improve train services for commuters across Dunkley and on the Mornington Peninsula.

In 2016, Federal Labor committed funding for a business case to ensure the project could proceed as soon as possible upon the election of a Federal Labor Government.

Currently thousands of Dunkley and Peninsula residents drive and park at Frankston, Kananook or Seaford stations because the Metro line service ends at Frankston.

Nothing has changed, mind you. It goes on:

A Federal Labor Government will electrify and duplicate the track to Baxter, giving commuters better access to high quality public transport and park-and-ride options

The project will reduce travelling times, increase capacity and above all, get commuters home earlier so they can spend more time with their families.

I ask the Prime Minister, who was the shadow minister for infrastructure at the time and under whose name this press release was issued: what happened to this promise? The $225 million for the Baxter rail electrification now sits before his $120 billion infrastructure razor gang.