MR PALLAS (Treasurer) — I rise to update the house on the projects the Andrews government is aiming to deliver for Victoria. These are both new projects and new achievements. The new achievement, of course, to reaffirm what the Premier has already advised to this house, is that the state will meet all government contribution components of the western distributor. After four long years of stagnation under the previous government, the Andrews government is working to deliver multiple transformative projects such as the western distributor and, might I say, Melbourne Metro.

But while these projects are transformative, they also share a common feature: none of them receives the substantial support for delivery of the federal coalition government. Today we announced that the western distributor will proceed with or without the assistance of the federal government. We simply cannot wait for Canberra to get its act together and recognise the need for this vital infrastructure.

There are some encouraging signs coming out of the federal coalition. We welcome its acceptance last week that the $1.5 billion will remain in Victoria. There are real positives in the proposal it has put forward: the Murray Basin rail project; the Monash upgrade, provided it can be delivered in a sensible time frame; and the regional and rural roads networks. But there are still more thought bubbles than backing of good projects. Less talk and more projects are what we need.

Of course we have a federal government that exists in some sort of bizarro world. It still short-changes the fastest growing state in the nation and denies us vital infrastructure, because when it comes to actually building the infrastructure that stacks up there is one government building it, and it sits on this side of this chamber.