Earlier this year, former Treasury economist Stephen Anthony encapsulated the Victorian government’s running of the state with the following remarks:
“Victoria is on a suicide mission to record borrowing, just as global interest rates are about to hit 5%”.
“Potholes can’t get filled, emergency departments can’t afford clean linen, primary schools can’t fix heaters”.
“Things are about to get very ugly”.
Anthony’s comments came amid an explosion in state debt. The two biggest credit rating agencies then warned that Victoria risked further downgrades if it didn’t get its debt under control.
Anthony’s claim that “potholes can’t get filled” was not hyperbole. The Herald-Sun reported that repair works on Victorian roads have been slashed by two-thirds in a bid to save on costs, prompting warnings that “motorists will see massive deterioration across the road network”.
“The damning figures show that resurfacing works for the next 12 months had plummeted by more than 65% on regional road, and 25% in metropolitan Melbourne, in just three years”, reporter Alex White wrote.
“This meant that nine million sqm of roads was being treated to fix and protect against rain and potholes in regional Victoria in 2022-23, but has now dropped by two thirds to 3.1 million sqm, in this year’s budget”.
“On Melbourne suburban roads works 729,000 sqm of works were done in 2022-23 compared to 542,000 sqm budgeted for 2024-25”.
Justin Bartlett, managing director of VSA Roads – regional Victoria’s largest supplier of quarried bitumen – warned that Victoria’s roads are deteriorating at an alarming rate, are no longer resilient, and every major rain event will create more potholes.
He also said the lack of maintenance will lead to “an exponential spend down the track”.
“We’ve already seen an exponential increase in potholes and its only going to get worse”, he told the Herald-Sun.
The above is a glimpse at Victoria’s future. The state’s population is officially projected to balloon by 4.2 million people over the next 32 years:
At the same time, a massive chunk of Victoria’s infrastructure budget will be blown on the $200 billion Suburban Rail Loop to nowhere, leaving little money for everything else.
It is a surefire recipe for lower living standards.
