State Treasurer Tim Pallas could face electoral backlash over Werribee education ‘super city’
The Andrews government’s rejection of a “super city” plan for Melbourne’s west has upset many locals. But could the decision cost one of the state government’s most senior members his seat?
VIC News
Don't miss out on the headlines from VIC News. Followed categories will be added to My News.
State Treasurer Tim Pallas could face electoral pain after the Andrews government dumped a $31 billion “super city” plan for the city’s west.
New polling shows voters in Mr Pallas’s seat of Werribee are overwhelmingly in favour of the Australian Education City project going ahead, while 44 per cent would be less likely to vote for a local member who opposed the plan.
Mr Pallas held the safe seat comfortably at last year’s state election, but suffered an 11.2 per cent swing against him on primary votes, forcing the ALP to rely on preferences.
The treasurer weathered a strong campaign by independent candidate Joe Garra who got about 20 per cent of the vote, while Liberal Gayle Murphy polled 17 per cent.
The Australian Education City consortium has taken legal action against the government in a bid to reverse its July decision not to proceed with the project on public land at East Werribee.
As preferred bidder, AEC had proposed a massive education and innovation hub that would eventually support up to 90,000 jobs, 55,000 students and 70,000 residents.
AEC, which is headed by Chinese-Australian businessman Bill Zheng and has several high-level business partners, said it had invested about $93 million into an expression-of-interest process to develop the 400ha site.
A poll by OmniPoll, commissioned by AEC, revealed that 79 per cent of Werribee voters believed the so-called super city should go ahead.
This includes 86 per cent of Labor voters, 81 per cent of Coalition voters and 62 per cent of Greens supporters.
Seven out of ten voters thought the issue was important, while 47 per cent said they would be more likely to vote for a member who supported the project.
Just over half of all voters disagreed that the state government had done a good job in creating jobs in Werribee, said the poll of 500 people conducted by phone in late August and early September.
OmniPoll Market Research co-partner Martin O’Shannessy said it was rare to see such clear-cut results for a commercial issue, with most voters aware of the AEC plan and in favour of it.
“This is a campaignable issue — the more people know about it, the more they want it,” he said.
A state government spokeswoman said “we know people in the west want to see more jobs and investment in services”.
“That’s why we are removing three level crossings in Werribee and Hoppers Crossing, expanding the Werribee Mercy Hospital and building the Wyndham Police Complex,” she said.
“We’ve also invested $250,000 to support Victoria University’s work to develop new opportunities in the west, including their East Werribee campus, and our $128 million for the Tech Schools Initiative includes the Wyndham Tech School.”
City of Wyndham director of deals, investments and major projects, Kate Roffey, said that while the council had no stance on AEC’s specific proposal, the jobs-creation concept was correct for the rapidly growing west.
MORE NEWS
FROM FANCY FRANKSTON HOTEL TO DRUG CESSPIT
EMBATTLED LABOR MP SETTLES UNION WRONGDOING CASE
“Linking education to industry, that’s the right sort of model for the area, and it is a national economic innovation cluster,” she said.
“We will never solve our transport issues — we’re just growing too fast — we can never build enough, so the key for us is to have jobs here so that people don’t need to travel back to the city.”
Ms Roffey said the council opposed selling off the East Werribee site mainly for housing.
Comment has been sought from Mr Pallas.