Damning report into Andrews government’s Belt and Road deal

A damning report has revealed Victoria’s controversial Belt and Road deal with China did little to boost the state’s economy while ignoring the national interest.

Victoria’s Belt and Road deal with China was “without precedent internationally”, according to a damning report which reveals how the Andrews government’s controversial dealings with the Communist Party did little to boost the state’s economy.

The Australian Strategic Policy Institute’s analysis of China’s influence in Australia’s states and territories, to be released on Tuesday, warns the state government’s actions highlighted the “vulnerability” of Australia’s federal system as Victoria ignored the national interest.

The Belt and Road agreement, linking Victoria to the Chinese government’s trillion-dollar soft power infrastructure initiative, was torn up by the Morrison government last year.

“There was little that was normal about the Victorian government’s exchanges and cooperative agreements with the national government of China. They were exceptional in Australia, and with respect to the (Belt and Road Initiative), without precedent internationally,” Swinburne University expert Professor John Fitzgerald wrote.

Daniel Andrews in Tiananmen Square, China. Picture: Twitter

The report found that despite the deal, there was “no significant improvement” in exports from Victoria to China in recent years and “no evidence” that Daniel Andrews’s engagement “added anything of value” to the state’s efforts to recruit more Chinese students.

Prof Fitzgerald criticised the Premier for sidelining departmental experts and circumventing his cabinet on Belt and Road, recommending governments needed to rely on the public service to “curb the impetuosity of political leadership”.

He also raised concerns about the “catalytic roles” played by the Premier’s multicultural advisers — who had connections to Communist Party-linked groups — in developing Victoria’s China policy.

This pointed to a “particular vulnerability in states and territories that conflate multicultural policy with formal relations with foreign governments”, he said.

“Chinese-Australians shouldn’t be confused with China,” Prof Fitzgerald said.

He also said that unlike New South Wales, Queensland and Western Australia, Victoria did not have a sister-city link with Taiwan, which could be “indirect evidence of Victorian government oversensitivity to anticipated political pressure from Beijing”.