Sarah Henderson (Victoria, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Education) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I was delighted to recently join our wonderful hard-working candidate for Corangamite, Darcy Dunstan, to tour two major projects in the Geelong region: the Waurn Ponds rail upgrade and the Barwon Heads Road duplication. These projects represent an investment of more than a $1 billion by the former coalition government—$750 million for the rail upgrade and $292 million for Barwon Heads Road. This is in stark contrast to the Albanese government's failure to fund one new project for our region over three successive budgets, which is an absolute disgrace.

Since being elected more than two years ago, the Albanese government has axed $2 billion of federal funding from Geelong fast rail and cut billions from the Land 400 and howitzer Defence projects based at Avalon. Local federal Labor MPs have completely failed our region, presiding over the most savage funding cuts in our history. They even failed to stand up to dramatic cuts to local maternity services. Victoria is running out of gas, and we've not heard a word about the most nonsensical gas ban announced by the state Labor government on new properties or the indecision over the gas import terminal proposed by Viva Energy. In contrast to the massive investment delivered by the former coalition government, Labor has turned its back on our region and right across regional Victoria.

Darcy Dunstan is a former tradie, SAS soldier, business owner and dad. He fought for our country, and now he wants to fight for Corangamite. He wants to help get Corangamite back on track and to help get our nation back on track.