Steve Price: Jacinta Allan desperately needs to break political promises to save Victoria

Jacinta Allan wasn’t strong enough to stand up to Dan as his loyal deputy but she must now become her own person and start breaking political promises before we’re dragged deeper into the financial hell hole.

Anthony Albanese laughed his way through public humiliation at the 2024 Australian Open this week. Picture: James D. Morgan

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese laughed his way through public humiliation at the Australian Open last Sunday.

As the majority of the 15,000 strong crowd joined in the noisy heckle, debate started about the reason. On national TV I argued it was his broken promise on stage 3 tax cuts. Others claimed it was a national rite of passage to howl down a sitting PM if they are in front of you.

What’s not in dispute is that the PM twelve months earlier was politely applauded when cameras landed on him in the front row sipping on a beer. A year is a long time in politics and the PM didn’t have the miserable failure of the Voice referendum hanging around his neck or a failure to deliver cheaper energy prices to consumers this time around.

A lot has changed for Prime Minister Anthony Albanese since he was politely applauded at the Australian Open while sipping a frothie in January 2023. Picture: Michael Klein

Breaking political promises is dangerous ground for politicians but Albanese and his Treasurer Jim Chalmers might have just got away with it.

That brings us to the rookie Premier of Victoria Jacinta Allan. She needs to talk to her Federal mate Albo and urgently get some political advice on breaking promises before she drags us all down into the financial hell hole engineered by her lamentable predecessor Daniel Andrews.

Clearly not strong enough to stand up to Dan when she was his loyal deputy, Jacinta Allan must now become her own person and start BREAKING promises.

Premier, you know deep down where you need to start – Cheltenham. For the sake of Victorians and their children and grandkids this fantasy project, the Suburban Rail Loop and its first stage, costed at $35 billion, must be cancelled.

Yes, you have signed the first of many contracts but surely you realise we cannot afford this folly.

Just listen to the numbers already committed – $3.6 billion to dig a little over 16 km – for half a tunnel to Box Hill. As anyone with half a brain asks about this project: “who wants to catch a train from Box Hill to Cheltenham anyway.” Not a bad question.

It’s been reported you want to sign another budget destroying contract for the other half – Glen Waverley to Box Hill – later this year. You need to stop before it’s too late and we are left with an empty tunnel under suburban Melbourne that will hang around your neck for the rest of your life.

Premier Jacinta Allan needs to pull the pin on useless major Victorian projects that will worsen the state’s debt. Picture: David Caird

Blame Daniel and just stop now.

Shrouded in secrecy, we are told this thing is costed at $125 billion to $200 billion. Australia’s most expensive infrastructure project is dwarfing road and rail projects in Sydney.

Victoria’s Big Build project list is so long, so expensive, so over-budget and so late in being delivered to have us once again called the “rust bucket” state like we were under Joan Kirner in the nineties. Premier Allan, if she ploughs ahead with the biggest of the Big Build, will make Kirner look like a conservative financial genius.

No-one ever mentions the collateral damage caused by these taxpayer-funded projects being built by Labor’s union mates on inflated rates of pay draining workers from private companies trying to survive.

Labor will claim they went to and won an election in November 2022 with Andrews as Premier and the SRL – suburban rail loop – as Government policy for voters to vote on. Every Victorian knows though that campaign was not fought on the suburban loop or any other of the big build promises.

Former Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews and then transport minister Jacinta Allan at the site of the suburban rail loop at Clayton in 2023. Picture: Andrew Henshaw

Labor won in a landslide even though their primary vote and two party preferred vote went backwards.

To their credit, they smashed the coalition winning 56 seats in the lower house – an increase of one seat – to the Coalition’s 28 but tellingly the National Party increased their seat numbers by three.

Remember this was before the disgraceful cancellation of the Commonwealth Games with its promises of regional spending and the financial bonuses that would come.

Jacinta Allan – herself a regional MP – will feel the full fury of country voter’s next time. Clearly no-one living in Mildura or Portland or even Bendigo is likely to catch a shiny underground train from Cheltenham to Box Hill.

John Pesutto has said the opposition policy was to reserve the right not to complete the suburban rail loop, but Steve Price said this means ‘stuff all’. Picture: David Crosling

The Coalition though need to man up and own the argument that of all the things Dan did this one has to be stopped. This week Shadow Cabinet met, and Liberal leader John Pesutto emerged to say that their policy – endorsed by Shadow Cabinet – was to “reserve the right not to complete the suburban loop.”

Seriously John, is that the best you could do? One contract is already signed for $3.6 billion, another to be signed this year and you could only reserve the right. What does that even mean?

I’ll tell you it means stuff all.

You and your cabinet need to tell Victorians you won’t build it and then you must demand Premier Allan convenes a cross party review whose sole purpose should be to advise the whole catastrophe to be cancelled.

Then and only then Premier you can appear before a tennis like crowd, be introduced and listen to the wild applause.