What the 2025 Victorian budget means for farmers
The 2025-26 budget has been handed down. We break down all the figures you need to know, including how much will be spent on Victoria’s crumbling roads.
Less than $1 billion is set to be spent on Victoria’s road network this coming financial year, with the state’s new Treasurer not outlining what the road spend split will be between city and country.
Treasurer Jaclyn Symes confirmed $976 million would be spent on thoroughfares statewide in 2025-26, which is a slight decline in real terms on this financial year’s allocation.
Roads Minister Melissa Horne confirmed she expects 70 per cent of the funds to be spent on regional roads.
However the allocation does not allign with the government’s own performacne measures, which show it will cut road patching work from a target of a million square metres in 2024-25 to just 70,000 sq.m in 2025-26, while other regional targets stagnate or decline.
Handing down her first budget since taking over from Tim Pallas, Ms Symes described the cash allocated to roads as “massive” in her speech to the state parliament.
“No family should ever have to choose between getting where they need to go and getting them there safely,” Ms Symes told parliament.
“Last year, the Labor Government delivered one of Victoria’s biggest single-year investments in road maintenance. This year’s budget goes further with a massive $976m to fix potholes, upgrade road surfaces and keep bridges and roadsides across Victoria safe.”
An $81 million figure was applied to specific rural road projects, with refurbishment of the San Remo bridge connecting Phillip Island to the mainland; an upgrade to the Mount Emu Creek bridge at Terang and Princes Highway upgrades at Lakes Entrance singled out for special mention.
The Treasurer confirmed $270 million to maintenance of the VLine network with $52 million for more frequent services along the Traralgon line.
Aside from transport, Ms Symes confirmed one third of the new $150 million Victorian Investment Fund would be allocated to general regional investment.
In agriculture specific funding, $36.4 million was allocated overall for drought and farm biosecurity management.
Agriculture Victoria received $16.6 million for ‘extra resourcing and equipment’ to respond to ‘future emergencies.’
Healthcare was a key theme in the 2025-26 financial blueprint, with the Maryborough hospital, Swan Hill hospital, Albury Wodonga Health and the pediatric emergency department at Geelong’s University Hospital noted beneficiaries.
Ms Symes said $900,000 would be allocated to the National Centre for Farmer Health next financial year.
Other medical funding included $84 million for regional ambulances, $27 million for ongoing funding for Urgent Care Clinics and $6.6m for rural nurses and midwives.
In regional education, $111 million will be spent on upgrades at country schools including Broadford, Colac West, Edenhope, Lismore, Stawell West, Drouin, Lakes Entrance, Leongatha, San Remo and Wangaratta.
Further cash was also confirmed for new technical education in Warrnambool while upgrades to TAFE facilities at Geelong, Hamilton and Ballarat were also included in the 2025-26 budget.
With CFA volunteers walking on Spring Street over the revised fire services levy, Ms Symes also confirmed on Tuesday that new CFA stations at Winnindoo, Hoddles Creek and suburban Ballarat.
A $40 million package for Fire Rescue Victoria was also allocated to heavy pumpers and ladder platforms.
The dispute over the fire services levy was not mentioned in the Treasurer’s speech.
In regional environmental funding, $17 million was allocated to Landcare/Coastcare, $8.4 million for Barmah National Park management and $2.3 million for the new Twelve Apostles Visitor Centre.
FIRE LEVY
Just $26 million has been set aside in the Victorian budget to refund 62,000 CFA and VICSES volunteers paying the Allan Government’s new emergency services tax from July 1.
The low level of the rebate means the government is banking on most farmers still paying the bulk of the tax across rural communities.
Primary producers must pay 71.8 cents per $1000 of their properties’ capital improved value under the new tax, which equals $178m across all farmland.
This week’s budget shows the government’s total emergency services tax take will raise $1 billion this financial year, rising to $1.62bn in 2025-26 and then $1.8bn in 2026-27.
Anyone with an investment property also faces a second round of tax hikes form July 1 next year, when they must pay a higher fixed rate component of the new tax.
Most of the extra tax revenue will be used to fund public servants in Emergency Management Victoria, Triple Zero, the State Control Centre – freeing up funding for the government to pump into other programs and to pay off debt.
All up the government expects its tax take to climb from $38.98bn this financial year to $41.68bn in 2025-26, $43.7bn in 2026-27 and then surging to $47.9bn in 2027-28.
Payroll tax is by far the biggest tax take, with the government expecting the key revenue stream to surge from $9bn this financial year to $9.58bn in 2025-26 and $10bn in the following year.
The bulk of the government’s revenue will go into paying public servants, with the budget showing its wages bill will blow out from $36.5bn in 2024-25 to $38.8bn in the new financial year – up 6 per cent,
Treasurer Jaclyn Symes has promised to cut public servant numbers, commissioning an independent review and “stripping back inefficiency in government spending, reducing duplication and winding back non-priority program”.
RURAL AND REGIONAL ROADS
Rural and regional road maintenance work has been slashed, despite this week’s Victorian budget showing year-on-year funding remaining relatively static at $976 million.
Department of Transport and Planning performance measures shows the government failed to meet its 2024-25 major road patching target of a million square meters, only managing to patch 566,000 square meters.
Rather than trying to lift its performance the government has simply slashed its 2025-26 target to a mere 70,000 square meters.
Even the 2025-26 road resurfacing and rehabilitation target has been cut from three million square meters to 2.7m square meters.
The cuts are sure to disappoint rural communities, frustrated at the lack of investment in roads that are falling apart and local councils crying out for more funding for their vast network of roads they maintain.
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