By AIDAN KNIGHT, LIAM DURKIN and BLAKE METCALF-HOLT
SO fresh or classic hits?
Leading ladies of state politics were in Gippsland last week, as the battle intensifies to the November election.
Opposition leader Jess Wilson toured the region, at the same time her direct opponent, Premier Jacinta Allan, faced mounting pressure.
After the Express went to print, Ms Allan announced her resignation as leader of the Labor Party ahead of a caucus meeting on Tuesday, July 28.
The state Liberal party is not immune to leadership changes, although Ms Wilson and her local National allies presented a united front when visiting regional towns last week.
Ms Wilson was joined by state Nationals leader and Member for Gippsland South, Danny O’Brien for much of the Gippsland ‘Fresh Start’ tour.
The tour made its way to Morwell last Thursday.
Quite poignantly, the Latrobe Valley leg coincided with the opening day of the Commonwealth Games in Glasgow.
Gippsland was set to host Games events, before the Labor government pulled the pin in 2023 amid spiralling costs.
Local Nats members Melina Bath and Martin Cameron published a satirical video of themselves playing all the sports promised for the Latrobe Valley, alongside a musician dressed in a kilt playing the bagpipes marching down Traralgon’s Kay Street Gardens.
The timing was hard to ignore. Morwell Gun Club, which was to host Commonwealth Games events, held a shoot on the day the Games opened on the other side of the world.
Back in the town’s CBD, local business owners met with Ms Wilson over coffee to discuss a number of key issues.
One was heard to say “it’s heart-breaking to see”.
They walked down Commercial Road, surveying the obvious desolation and bus interchange, which became the scene for a recently released music video by emerging rapper TVRGET.
Part of the lyrics to his song This Is Morwell go: “we’re livin’ in hell, if not they’re livin’ in cells, brains are fried, kids want to play with knives.”
The opposition leader had time for only five minutes to talk to reporters during the Morwell stopover.
Cutting to the chase, Express journalist Liam Durkin asked straight out “have you ever seen a town more neglected than Morwell?”
“It’s quite confronting when you see the number of shops that are boarded up,” Ms Wilson admitted.
“It’s not fair that the local community isn’t safe and that we’re seeing these record levels of crime. Certainly we’re doing a lot of work to bring this to the attention of the government, but clearly the government’s not going to do anything about it.”
Among the contingent joining Ms Wilson was prominent Morwell businessman Alfi Prestipino and Advance Morwell Chair Graeme Sennet.
Mr Sennet said Ms Wilson was visibly taken aback by the scale of Morwell’s decline.
“She was very shocked at the number of vacant shops we had in Morwell, and could certainly understand the issues facing both the traders and the local community and the impact that the antisocial behaviour is having on the town,” he said.
Despite being near the end of a week-long regional tour, Mr Sennet said Ms Wilson remained engaged.
“Considering (we were roughly) the third-last stop, she was pretty energetic too … she seemed genuinely, genuinely interested in what people were saying,” he said.
Mr Senett described Morwell as “a really interesting case study” of long-term structural change, pointing to “so many variables” that had compounded over time after much of the town’s businesses shifted from Commercial Road to Mid Valley.
He also noted the end of the SEC era, the closure of Hazelwood and the 2014 mine fire as contributing factors.
Crime was a key topic during the discussion between Ms Wilson and business owners.
The Coalition has committed to providing more police and granting them more power should they win November’s election.
“I think they’ll concede that things need to be done here and elsewhere,” Mr Senett told the Express.
Labor Member for Eastern Victoria Region Harriet Shing was in Newborough last Friday, the day after Ms Wilson’s visit to the Latrobe Valley.
Local residents have repeatedly taken aim at the Labor party this election season for its supposed lack of presence in the region.
That was again, both subtly and plainly, highlighted during the Liberals regional tour.
Member for Morwell Mr Cameron said that the Coalition aren’t around “just to cut a ribbon and leave again” during a TRFM radio interview.
Ms Shing responded when prompted of the remarks, saying that she grew up in region, works in the region and lives in the region.
“I’m determined to represent the community I serve. The electorate that I represent in the Upper House goes from Monbulk right through to Mallacoota,” she told the Express.
“My office is in Morwell, I’m a regular participant in conversations and meetings.
“The leader of the Opposition can throw mud all she wants, but the bottom line is, it’s good to see her venture out of her leafy suburb of
Kew to have a conversation, even if it was only for an hour or so.”
Ms Shing then centred on the Liberals planned public sector cuts, which dovetailed into doubts over one of Ms Wilson’s central announcements during her Gippsland visit, being the pledge to build the long-awaited new West Gippsland hospital.
“The Liberals don’t deliver hospitals, they close them. The Liberals don’t build hospitals, they privatise them. And the Liberals don’t care about public healthcare and that’s evident from their track record,” she said.
Ms Shing went all the way back to the 1990s Kennett Liberal government, which saw a major reshuffling of the state’s public healthcare system, including the closures of Moe and Traralgon hospitals for what is now Latrobe Regional Health.
However, the last time the Coalition was in government (2010-14), growth was initially seen in terms of the amount spent on health, before it dropped towards the end of its reign.
The previous Napthine government was involved in a major pay dispute with Ambulance Victoria in 2013 and 2014, which was resolved once Daniel Andrews came into power.
“The Liberals and One Nation Coalition make all the good promises they want. The starting point is their promise to cut $40b from government investment,” Ms Shing said.
“That means that we will see cuts to frontline services. We will see cuts to the programs that support nurses, our midwives, our GPs, our specialists, and frontline workers across the board.
“We are (going to) continue to do the work, the long-term work that communities need and deserve including across regional Victoria.”
Latrobe City Mayor Sharon Gibson was unable to meet the Opposition leader, as she was stuck in bed with the flu.
Speaking with the Express from her sickbed however, the Mayor hoped the visit wasn’t just a token tick the box exercise.
“I’m delighted that someone in a leadership role has come down, I would hope there is meaningful conversations and actions from this … we’ve been promised the world before,” she said.
“We have real issues that are so different to any other area because no other area in Australia has had five power stations and the third is about the shut.
“Where is the help? If they are coming with solutions, that’s great, but we don’t want empty promises.”
Mayor Gibson was glad to see the Opposition leader make the effort.
“(I’ll) give her due to that she came down,” she said.
“When we met with the Minister of Police (Anthony Carbines) last year, he promised to come down and see first-hand the issues with our crime and he still hasn’t made the journey.
“He did listen to us, but he hasn’t followed through.
“That’s what we’re asking for – politicians to follow through.”
Women are strongly represented in Gippsland this election season.
Tracie Lund is the Labor candidate for the seat of Morwell, while Rochelle Hine is on the Greens ticket.
Pauline Hanson meanwhile continues to dominant column inches federally.
