The Traralgon to Sale Princes Highway duplication is expected to be finalised, pending state government funding, after the Commonwealth allocated $132 million for the project in Tuesday night’s federal budget.
Member for Gippsland Darren Chester said the final stages of the duplication would be a welcome addition for Gippsland with benefits including a potential boost to tourism and improvements to road safety.
Mr Chester said it would be “very difficult for the state not to say ‘yes'” following a commitment to the project by the Commonwealth in the lead up to the budget.
He said to date the federal government had funded 80 per cent of the duplication.
“It will save lives by reducing the number of road crashes but also improve productivity for local businesses and industry and I think it’s going to have a great boost on our visitor economy,” Mr Chester said.
Meanwhile, low and middle-income earners were the biggest winners in the budget with families potentially able to save hundreds of dollars off their annual tax bill.
“For middle-income households, with both parents working on average wages, this will boost their ‘kitchen table’ budget by more than $1000 every year,” Treasurer Scott Morrison said in his budget speech on Tuesday night.
According to the ABC, the Low Income Tax Offset for people earning less than $37,000 a year slowly reduces until they reach an income of $66,667, but is expected to extend to those on salaries of up to $90,000.
That would mean an extra $10.50 a week for workers on the maximum benefit – a cost to the taxpayer of around $4-5 billion annually.
“We take the view that if you don’t want me taking too much money out of people’s pockets then you have to provide the critical services and infrastructure we need,” Mr Chester said.
“If you can return money to local people through tax reform, that’s more money they can use to spend in our community or to save for their own retirement.”
It coincided with plans to scrap an increase to the Medicare levy – worth $8 billion – to fund the National Disability Scheme.
“Cost of living pressure is having an impact on people right around Australia but particularly those on low or fixed incomes,” Mr Chester said.
“It’s about helping families with the cost of living and giving them the discretion to spend or save that money for the future.”
More than $95 million has been set aside to establish a Murray-Darling Medical Schools Network, which involves seven universities as part of the More Doctors for Rural Australia Program. However, Monash School of Rural Health at Churchill will not receive any funding.
But Mr Chester said he was confident existing medical training in the Valley meant more “country kids” would pursue medicine “which gives us a greater likelihood of them practising in the regions in the future”.
“I’d like to see Monash putting more students with a regional background through the Gippsland campus because I’ve got no doubt it will deliver longer term benefits for our country communities,” Mr Chester said.
“Monash have enough funding for what they’re doing but I think they could do more to attract regional students to [the Gippsland] campus.”
Indigenous health spending will also receive a boost with the government spruiking it had increased spending on Indigenous health by about four per cent with a total $3.9 billion for 2018/19.
“In regions like Gippsland/ Latrobe Valley we have significant health issues and we need to be getting the kids healthy, getting them to school and giving them the real prospect of securing a job,” Mr Chester said.
