2015-10-07
Mr BARBER (Northern Metropolitan) — It certainly takes guts for the Liberal Party to move this motion, and no wonder it got the leading member of the Mission: Impossible team, prodded him up here and said, 'You are going to have to come in here and somehow explain how in four years the coalition could not deliver this'. I do not think it took that long for a satellite to fly out to Pluto and take photos of its moon, but in four years the coalition could not deliver this service. The former government knew — it must have known, because V/Line told that government in 2010 — that the regional rail link would have standing room only from day one, and that is even with offering a shuttle service for what is effectively now a suburban railroad picking up expected massive growth through the suburbs around Werribee, being run with non-electrified shuttles to try to get those people into the city in the morning; never mind who might have been able to get on a Geelong train or who had made the trek all the way from Warrnambool itself.
Look at some of V/Line's latest statistics on its Geelong line data in recent months. V/Line advises customers about the likely level of overcrowding they are going to experience on some of these trains. We are advised that the 5.52 a.m. from Marshall, with 302 seats, is likely to be at 100 per cent capacity; the 6.31 a.m. from South Geelong, 100 per cent capacity; the 6.31 a.m. from Waurn Ponds, 100 per cent capacity; the 7.14 a.m. from South Geelong, which gets passengers into the city at 8.17 a.m., so 40 minutes early for work, is at 100 per cent capacity. And so it continues for the 7.16 a.m., the 7.36 a.m. and the 7.38 a.m. services, the latter arriving at about 8.42 a.m. and likely to be at 100 per cent capacity — that is, standing room only. Yes, good on the former government for adding a few more car parks at Marshall, but guess what? They are at 100 per cent capacity too by pretty early in the morning, as I have observed when I am travelling in the other direction on the Warrnambool line.
The performance of this train line as well was nothing to boast about when the Liberals were in charge, and I will give the recent statistics on that. Going back to August 2014 — that is, when the government of which Mr Ramsay was a member had had all the time it needed to make the necessary changes on that line — the Warrnambool line, in terms of on time at destination was running on time 83.6 per cent of the time; and that is when the definition of 'on time' does not mean on time, because on time on V/Line means within the nearest 6 minutes or so. I thought on time meant on time, but apparently you can be 6 minutes late and still be on time, and yet on the Warrnambool line that can only be achieved 83.6 per cent of the time. In September 2014 it was 83.8 per cent; in October, 87 per cent; in November, 90 per cent; and so on and so forth, although we have seen some sort of precipitous decline in the last few months, back down to the mid-80s again. V/Line's own benchmark is 92 per cent, but the benchmark should be 100 per cent.
In that whole four years there was not one train service added along that line. There is a bus that runs from Geelong to Colac in peak times. One bus service was added as a result of Mr Ramsay's government's effort, although in fact that bus only runs one way. I was quite intrigued when I noticed that on the timetable there is a bus that runs from Geelong to Colac but does not actually return. I thought to myself, 'Is there a whole bunch of buses just piling up in Colac?'. No, because I asked the bus driver who is based in Colac, and in fact the bus runs from Colac to Geelong, not taking any passengers, not making any stops, and then it turns around and runs back to provide that afternoon peak service to get some people home at some kind of decent hour.
There have been a lot of debates in here about working hours, penalty rates and all the other things that go with that, but the fact is that if you try to commute from Colac to Geelong and back, you can be out of the house for 14 hours. No wonder everybody drives. No wonder the roads are getting hammered, and no wonder Mr Ramsay then has to come in here and plead for more road funding. His government did not do what it ought to have done when it had the chance.
In relation to rolling stock, we have the same old loco-hauled, rattly, falling-apart stuff that we have had now for decades, despite the fact that V/Line told the government back in 2010 that it would need to advance its orders for more rolling stock or simply wait for what is described as a cascade — that is, new rolling stock going onto certain lines, which releases rolling stock for other lines that then goes off to the north-east line, where the rolling stock rattles itself apart after the rail upgrade was stuffed up. Eventually, like the seventh brother of the family getting the hand-me-down jeans, Warrnambool gets some rolling stock from the very bottom end of this cascade. There was nothing to advance those priorities from Mr Ramsay's government when it was in charge.
By the way, if we are going to be moving from loco-hauled to V/Locity trains on the Warrnambool line, we had better get something sorted out about the level crossings. We have had previous incidents in Victoria where those sorts of trains have hit large trucks because the trucks did not have very good visibility. The angle between the crossing of the road and the rail, which we can see as we go down the Princes Highway, does not improve visibility, and therefore there will be a real risk if we start putting V/Locity trains onto the system tomorrow.
Bikes on trains are a constant problem. Municipalities all down the Warrnambool line are building their bike trails and touring trails and encouraging tourists to come and have a biking weekend along various parts of the Otways, but the V/Line ticketing regulations still say that it is at the discretion of individual conductors as to whether bikes are taken on board, depending on the levels of overcrowding.
The former Minister for Tourism and Major Events, Louise Asher, launched a bicycle tourism strategy pretty early in the life of the last government, and one of the early items for delivery was to sort out the business of bikes on V/Line, but nothing happened. I checked the ticketing regulations last week. They are the same as they have always been. If you and a bunch of your mates rock up for a bike touring weekend on one of the very few services that are available to you on the Warrnambool line — you might have a long weekend planned and you have booked all your accommodation — and the conductor says, 'Sorry, we're too full today. You can't bring your bikes on. There are too many of you all coming at once', that is a hopeless situation. In terms of getting them on replacement coaches or even regular V/Line coaches, you can forget about it; you are just not able to do it.
In terms of extra V/Line buses that might have supported and connected some of the services that Mr Ramsay is suddenly so enthusiastic about, there is nothing. There has been not one skerrick of an addition of a V/Line coach service in this region in the life of his government, despite the fact that you can run V/Line coaches for about $5 a service kilometre. The total budget for V/Line coaches for the whole of Victoria is $32 million, so you can imagine what you could do with a few million dollars to make sure that even the train services we have now are better connected to the surrounding towns. I looked it up on a journey planner the other day, and I realised that I could get to London quicker than I could get to Mortlake if I tried to get there via a train and bus combination.
There is something seriously wrong with the system. It is a total embarrassment to the coalition parties that they have made so little progress in this area for so long, right back to the Kennett government, which wrecked it in the first place. Eventually the public had to come back in — —
[Interjection.]
Mr BARBER — Here we are, Mrs Peulich, and all the cost-cutting done back then was simply passing forward future costs, and today we are looking around for the funds to deliver these extra services. In the meantime the community has paid the cost in terms of car dependency, with every family having to own one car per adult just to survive in places like Colac, Warrnambool or any of the towns along the way. If you do not have a car — if you are too young, too old, too poor or too disabled to drive yourself — you are stuck or dependent on someone else. It is as simple as that. Those are the real costs that do not make it into Mrs Peulich's party's balance sheet. Mrs Peulich, who has a pocket calculator where her heart ought to be, is talking about savings, which are really just moving them off the public balance sheet and back onto the citizens of these electorates. It is coming out of their pockets. Better than any tax cut that Mrs Peulich is ever likely to offer would be to run a fourth and then a fifth service along this line. There would be families down there who would be able to do with one less car, which would put hundreds of dollars back into their pockets.
It is election time and there are about to be a couple of by-elections, and all we have is this belated and recycled promise. Mr Ramsay has made the promise four or five times now. He thinks he is going to get four or five times the credit for continuing to recycle it. Recycling is a good thing, but not in relation to political promises. Mr Ramsay's credibility is zero. Every council and mayor along the entire line is in consensus that this is their no. 1 priority issue. Mr Ramsay's government was not able to deliver it, despite having the Premier and the Minister for Public Transport as local members for all those years. I have a bit of political advice that I can give to any community: if you have the Premier and the transport minister as your local members and you still cannot get one extra train service added, it is time to reconsider your voting choices. I think that is what we will be doing come these by-elections Mr Ramsay is so innervated about.
The coalition dropped one seat in this region at the last election. That seat should have gone to the Greens but instead went to Mr Purcell's party. The fact remains that the voters have already indicated once to the coalition what they think about the level of service they are getting down there. It was goodbye to a former member for Western Victoria Region, David O'Brien, who is now having a second go and running for the Assembly seat of Polwarth. Maybe we will see him again in 2018 if he is not sick of having his backside kicked by both Vote 1 Local Jobs and the Greens.
The credibility factor is nil. The voters in this area know that the Greens and our local Greens representatives have been completely consistent in advocating on this issue, whereas Mr Ramsay continues to duck and weave depending on whether he is in government or opposition. First it is the passing loop, then it is the lack of rolling stock, then it is the level crossings, then, 'We forgot the signalling that goes with the passing loop'. There is always going to be an excuse. Otherwise those opposite would have just run the train and released the timetable. Was the new timetable being drafted under Mr Ramsay's departed government? Was there public consultation underway? Were the signalling issues being sorted out? It is a bit of a mystery. Terry Mulder assured us in the Colac Herald that he was working on it, but it was like heat haze on the horizon — no matter how far you walk, it is always just a bit further away. But of course in opposition Mr Mulder well and truly found his voice.
I am not going to seek to amend Mr Ramsay's motion to point out that his government had four years and could not do this. I have pointed out that Geelong and Melbourne peak rail services are overcrowded and unreliable and suffer regular delays — they did the whole time Mr Ramsay was in government, and that continues to this day. I certainly, though, endorse paragraph 4 of this motion, which:
calls on the Andrews government to make the necessary changes and introduce a fourth daily service to meet the needs of train passengers using the Warrnambool line.
It is incredibly important for the environment that we move people off roads and onto rail. It is incredibly important to community safety. Travel by rail is six times safer per kilometre travelled then road.
While we are at it, we could talk about the shocking state of the freight network, which is another Kennett legacy. Dr Napthine was good enough to admit that it was probably a mistake to have sold off V/Line freight when the coalition was in government previously. We have still not really recovered from that. It would also be good to see some advocacy from all parties about getting more freight on rail on the Warrnambool line. The Australian Lamb Company down at Colac is dead keen to start transporting more of its containerised lamb by rail. It adjoins the railway line and is willing to host a spur line or a loading bay on its site.
It is incredibly important for regional development that we get these extra rail services. If we do, it will become viable to live in some of these small and quite beautiful towns along the Warrnambool line and still commute to the job centres of Geelong and even Melbourne. That means people taking their pay packets back to these communities every night when they go home from work. In terms of a just outcome for the community, it is important that the significant part of the population without the ability to drive themselves are also given the freedom to move around — to visit friends or get to a doctor's appointment without it having to be an overnight trip.
These are essential aspects of livability and community life that other communities in Victoria probably take for granted, being on lines that have been a bit better looked after over the years, communities in Liberal or Labor marginal seats that are constantly being fought over. But Warrnambool is struggling for some of the most basic services. While I cannot but agree with the sentiments in the motion, the fact is that governments Labor, Liberal, Labor, Liberal and now Labor have failed to take action in this region. The community's voice is being heard louder and louder. Increasingly at the ballot box they are stating quite clearly that the old parties have failed them and they are looking to send better advocates to this Parliament than Labor and the coalition parties have so far been able to deliver.