Six months out from the state election, state opposition leader Daniel Andrews speaks exclusively to Star Weekly.
A common sentiment we hear from residents is that Labor had 11 years to solve many of the issues facing the west and instead it let a lot of them fester and become much worse. Why should residents give Labor another chance?
Well, the fact of the matter is that in so many of the key and fundamental areas the basics that define our quality of life and define our standard of living … things are worse today than they were three and a half years ago. Whether it’s ambulance response times, hospital emergency departments, surgery waiting lists, unemployment, youth unemployment, the number of new jobs that are being created, the number of TAFE courses that are available for kids of working people across Melbourne’s West, roads, public transport, in all of those areas things are not better. Things are worse and getting worse because we’ve got a government and Premier that just don’t get the right priorities.
You touched briefly on TAFE there. It’s obviously a big issue and we’ve got Victoria University as our major university in the west, so will you guarantee to reverse the situation there and increase funding to TAFE?
We made a commitment two years ago that we would put this right and we’re going to repair as much of the damage as we possibly can. Not damage done by Labor… damage done by Liberals who, if they cared about the kids of working people, wouldn’t cut TAFE, and yet they have. [A total of] $1.2 billion gone, courses gone, staff sacked, campuses closed and fees skyrocketing, even for the courses that are left. There’s so much more money that needs to be paid out in order to enrol in those courses. We’re going to have more announcements. We’ve made an announcement in the broad sense; it’s called a statement of intent, if you like. There’ll be more detail including the costing, the funding and the exact detail of where money will go well before Victorians vote. We understand how important this is and at a time when you’ve got 20 per cent youth unemployment, cutting TAFE’s no answer.
The west desperately needs a second river crossing, so why are you opposing the East West Link, and what’s the alternative?
Well, I think what the west needs and what every community needs is a government that will be honest with it. What we’ve got at the moment is Denis Napthine, who’s done nothing for three and a half years and suddenly is going to do everything simultaneously… What I’m going to do is treat the people of the west with some respect. We’re going to get on and we’re going to get thousands of trucks off the Westgate every day. Then we’re going to get on and properly plan … Melbourne Metro should deliver extra stations servicing the west but they’re cut out of Denis Napthine’s botched transport scheme. That’s what it is, a botched transport scheme; a station at Fishermans Bend and he can’t tell you where, no stations in the north and the west of the city, no additional support for the growing western suburbs.
You’ve put out a plan to remove 50 of the worst level crossings in Melbourne. Which ones do you think would be the first to go?
We need to be careful to get expert advice on this. There’s a list. The RACV and the national safety regulator have got a list or data. There’s evidence of how many accidents, how many tragedies have occurred and we’ll be guided by that.
Residents have been calling for the Caroline Springs police station to be opened for 24 hours a day. Is that something you will deliver?
[Labor MP for Kororoit] Marlene Kairouz has spoken to me about this a number of times. I understand the issue well and our commitment to the people of Caroline Springs is that we will talk to Victoria Police about this and talk to the local community. We’ll try to expand those services as much as we can after we’ve had those discussions.
So you can’t commit to anything at this stage?
No, but we will have the discussion with the community and with Victoria Police and we will always look to try and expand the services there. Steve Bracks moved the TAC to Geelong, Denis Napthine moved VicRoads to Ballarat. With the planned East Werribee Employment Precinct, obviously there is a need for white- collar jobs. Will you commit to moving any government departments to that area?
In terms of employment and my number one priority, the western suburbs have had a pretty tough time of recent years with Ford, Holden and especially Toyota going. There’s a big job of work for us to do to make sure that tens of thousands of local families have got a job in the auto supply chain. I don’t want to give up on auto and I don’t want to give up on blue-collar manufacturing jobs. Moving jobs from one part of the city to another, I know there are some people who would be very strongly supportive of that, but it does cost significant amounts. And I would say to you that an ambulance when you call for one, a hospital bed when you need one, getting the asbestos out of our schools, building up our health system … those sorts of things plus public transport are a bit more important to me. It does cost quite a lot of money to move an agency from one part of the city to another. I know there is strong support for this, but it’s about priorities and it’s about choices and you can’t do everything.
So we shouldn’t be holding our breath to see any government departments move west?
No, but you can be assured that a Labor government will work hard every day to see that we not only build a strong future for those jobs that are at risk at the moment – for instance the auto components sector – but a Labor government will work hard every day to create new employment opportunities and it doesn’t have to simply be moving jobs from one part of the city to another.
Will you support or reject the proposal by Boral to expand the Melton tip?
I don’t think the council has brought the local community along on this issue. I don’t think the process has been very strong. I don’t think there’s community acceptance of this particular facility so we have very significant doubts about this, and we don’t support the project because that process has been poor and the community is not supporting it.
You’ve criticised the Napthine government over plans to remove frontline police. Can you guarantee the west will have more frontline police under Labor and will you commit to bringing down crime levels in the west?
I’ll tell you what I know. The back office is not the frontline. It’s as simple as that. If you promise more frontline police then you better not hide them away in a back office on a “taskforce”. Frontline policing is about a visible police presence, deterring crime, fighting crime and keeping communities safe. That’s what frontline policing is all about. Hiding people away, or even this other issue of ‘we need forensic accountants and CSI-type lab technicians’ – they’re not frontline police.They’re important, of course. Taskforces, homicide squads, drug squads… of course they’re all important. But to be building up specialist teams at the expense of constables on the street, on the beat, in local communities providing a presence, deterrence and doing good old-fashioned community policing, that’s not what was promised by this government and it’s not what communities want.
