Minister defends Suburban Rail Loop after Infrastructure Australia calls for ‘exit strategy’

Suburban Rail Loop Minister Harriet Shing has defended the Victorian government’s signature rail project after Australia’s peak infrastructure body suggested “exit strategies” be developed in case the multibillion-dollar project can’t be delivered.

In a press conference on Saturday afternoon, Shing stood by the Allan government’s $35 billion estimate for SRL East – the first stage of the train line between Cheltenham and Box Hill.

Suburban Rail Loop Minister Harriet Shing.Credit: Gus McCubbing

In its evaluation of the project, released on Friday, Infrastructure Australia said it had low confidence in the Allan government’s costings for the project.

But Shing would not commit to the government providing a detailed and updated cost estimate for SRL East and a cost-benefit analysis demonstrating its benefits, as Infrastructure Australia has recommended, instead saying the government would continue to work with the peak body.

“We are on time. We are on budget. We have workers on the sites today,” Shing said.

“We will see tunnel boring machines in the ground next year, and trains running across the network from Box Hill to Cheltenham in 2035.”

Infrastructure Australia’s report, provided to federal Infrastructure Minister Catherine King before she released $2.2 billion for the project last month, listed three different requirements for future Commonwealth funding. They included an “updated and detailed cost estimate for SRL East and supporting station precinct interventions” and a cost-benefit analysis that demonstrates the line’s benefits.

When pressed about whether Victoria would provide these three things, Shing repeatedly said: “We will continue to work with Infrastructure Australia.”

The SRL minister was asked whether she was being evasive during the testy press conference, but argued she was providing as much information as she could.

Shing pointed to the SRL business case, released in 2021, when asked if Victoria had the “exit strategies” that the Infrastructure Australia report called for, adding that the business case “sets out a pretty comprehensive approach to this major project”.

The minister said the project’s value should be assessed as a whole, rather than with a focus on one part like SRL East. “It’s a loop. It’s not the suburban rail segment,” she said.

Shing said the Victorian auditor-general had assessed the project as being on time and on budget.

But opposition major projects spokesman Evan Mulholland said the Infrastructure Australia report was a “damning assessment” of Premier Jacinta Allan’s “pet project”.

“It completely obliterates her cost projections for this project,” he said.

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