Mr  Pallas  (Tarneit)  —  Before  the  first tree was ever planted on Collins Street two doctors opened  a tiny  clinic at the foot of Exhibition Street. This was a time when hospitals were considered to be  a charity’s domain, so when the colonial government chipped  in  14  700 to  fund the  clinic, it  was no  small gesture. Individuals founded this budding six-bed specialist medical centre, the government  backed it and the community supported it. We could call it  an early experiment in public health.

We know that centre by a different name today, the Royal Children’s Hospital.

It  is a monument of  our  state, but no party  owns its legacy. Generations  of investment built it, and if anything can claim credit for the  Royal  Children’s Hospital,  it  is  a  particular  world  view:  one  that says a government must constantly seek opportunities to work  with business and the  community to build something  greater  and  bigger than itself. That world view is the  purpose  of office, the purpose of  a  budget,  and  the  Royal  Children’s  Hospital is its lasting testament.

It  is not the only one. Victoria is the headquarters of  world-leading  medical research,   the    birthplace    of    multiculturalism,    accountability   and antidiscrimination, and  home to the  country’s thinking economy.  That  did not happen by accident. A succession of strong and steady governments  put  us where we are. These were governments that were not fearful of their purpose. They were not dismissive of the people.

Here, more than  anywhere  else, we saw a greater standard of leadership devoted to the progress of this state and the skills of its people.

That was the Victorian way. Previous governments had a plan; they had a purpose. They were not panicked; they were not  preoccupied. I  honestly do not know what on earth happened to this  one. I honestly cannot explain why a government would so  casually  undermine the very things that made  this  state  so  great.  This government fears  its own purpose and dreads its own cause. It does not  believe it is  its  role to invest in the  people  of this state. It  does  not work its hardest to protect our most vulnerable. Ultimately it does not believe it is its responsibility to build a better society. It might say it in its slogans, but it does not ring in its heart.

This  government  dismisses the public.  Victorians  are its  obstacle,  not its object. It  ignores their voice and  removes their choice. The  Victorian people never chose to spend $8 billion of their own money on a tunnel they do not want. They never chose to have the lifelines of their economy locked up behind chained gates. They never asked for a war with paramedics. They never asked for a health system in crisis. They  got  it, but they cannot  find  out much more than  that because  this  government  hides  the crisis in our health system. It denies the crisis in  our economy. It will not  even reveal  the business  plan, the  basic justification,  for  its  signature  policy. It  established  an  anticorruption commission that cannot  even investigate misconduct in  public office. It  is  a systematic reversal of Victoria’s reputation for inclusion and clarity,  and the effects are felt in lounge rooms and boardrooms across this state.

There is a different kind of feeling  in the cabinet room, however, because this government is unstable.

I do not just mean  a hint of dysfunction or  a  trace of despair; I am  talking actual,  factual, could-collapse-at-any-moment  calamity.  How  can   government members fight for your job when they are so busy fighting for their own? How can they address  Victoria’s priorities when their first priority is  mere survival? They are a circus.

When a  government is  so volatile,  so volcanic,  its every  word and sound  is compromised — even its most  formal ones,  such as  those tabled  on Tuesday. A simple recipe: put a  government in a blender  and leave it on for  three years. This budget is what it spits out. The government is not strong, it is not steady and  it was never ready. And what  has it done to the  state of Victoria? It has sent it backwards.

Let us look at  jobs.  Victoria  used to be no.  1.  We were the engine  of  the country; today we are more like the exhaust.

Unemployment  is up above the national average. Wages have  ground  to  a  halt. Nearly 52  000  Victorians have lost their jobs under this government. These are not just statistics;  they are families.  Under  this government Victorians  are three times more likely to have become unemployed than to have found a full-time job. They are out on their own, the way the Liberals like it.

The  Prime Minister, Tony  Abbott, celebrates workers being liberated from their old jobs.  Liberated!  He  means sacked.  The  Treasurer, Joe Hockey,  says  our economy is structurally sound, resilient and merely in transition. His resilient transition has left behind a  trail  of  wreckage.  He liberated a generation of workers who had dedicated their professional lives to putting Australian cars on Australian roads, and his ‘structurally sound’ economy houses the nation’s youth unemployment crisis. If you are a young person looking for work, Victoria is the worst place to be on the Australian mainland. Interstaters used to come here for a job. Now our own sons and daughters are moving to Sydney.

More  than half of unemployed youth  have been so for over  a year. We are at  a juncture where ordinary young Victorians might not ever be able to build  a good life for themselves.

The figures are worse in regional  Victoria. Kids  are forced  to leave home, to leave town  just  to find work, just to study. Let  me  tell the house about the part of Victoria that has seen the biggest rise in youth unemployment. There has been an almost  50 per  cent rise  in unemployment  in Melbourne’s outer east. A real  government would be pulling every lever to give these kids a chance. There is only  one university  and TAFE  in  this  region  —  well,  there  was.  The government cut it, closed it  and is selling it. The future of Melbourne’s outer east  is  chained  up  behind 10-foot gates at the Swinburne Lilydale campus. We believe there  is no  louder warning  for the  future of any community than  the sound of a school shutting its doors.

When  the books are written about this government,  chapter 1,  page 1,  line 1, will read, ‘They cut TAFE’. Government members wear it, they own it and they are actually proud of it. Do you know what? We will reopen it. We will give it back, and we are proud of that.

We are proud of our plans for primary and  secondary schools across the state — the schools this government forgot. They are the  schools where kids are crammed into portables that were  built before the  Bulldogs won their premiership,  and the  schools where classrooms are falling into disrepair  and falling apart. Our loved ones  deserve the best start, but they are not getting  it — children and adults alike. If they cannot get  the skills they need, they cannot get the jobs they want. The very people who need their government to step in get put last.

They are on their own: people who  are at home in a panic waiting those needless extra minutes for an ambulance; people who are  in crowded emergency departments waiting  for  agonising hours; people  who  need urgent surgery  and are waiting longer than ever; people who are waiting on a train platform in the city loop or waiting  in traffic or waiting at a level crossing; workers at factories who are hanging in the balance, waiting for good news, waiting for bad news, waiting for an opportunity — waiting for anything.

A generation of Victorians are calling  on  their  government  to  help, but the response they get is, ‘Your call is important to  us, but the government is busy with itself right  now;  please wait’. They might  have to wait for a  whole new government because this one has ground to  a halt. Victoria has stopped,  and this budget will not  get it going again. It  is  too  narrow, too shallow, too little  and  too  late. It is not a defibrillator; it is barely a pinch.

And Tony Abbott is in  Canberra winding  up the punch, hitting Victoria harder than any other state. The  federal government is  cutting our  health funding  more than  any other state and chasing down our pensioners, our students, our seniors and our sick.  That  is  what the Liberals do. Somewhere out there, there is a vital service to confiscate.  Somewhere  out there, there is a  major  company that needs  a  few more reasons to  leave  our shores. Prime Minister Tony Abbott and the  federal  Liberals want to charge you for visiting your GP.

They  want  to tax you for  the  deficit they doubled. They  want to abandon our struggling industries, which provide these things we call jobs.

They want to make people work  longer, pay more and receive less — and  if this Victorian Liberal government does  not speak  up, it means that it has signed up to say,  ‘All the way with Tony A.’ Victorian government members  have the  same goal, follow the  same creed and are from the same Liberal tribe. And what do we get? We get half-baked plans and a half-mast economy; we get the white flag from Ford,  Holden  and Toyota; we get the red  flag  from  a dozen more; and we  get uncertainty for every single Victorian.

When  a  government will  not  support  our  industries,  they  will not  remain industries; when a  government  has no jobs  plan,  no job is safe;  and  when a government does  not care,  then you are on your own. The  Victorian people  now have a question to ask: can we trust such a dysfunctional government to make the right decisions for us? If Victorians look at this  budget, they will have their answer.

It is cunning accounting perhaps, but a collapse of economics — you  know, that science that is devoted to providing people with the simple  things they need to live and thrive,  the  most fundamental duties of any government, the basics. On every measure this government fails.

Our health  system is  in crisis. Victorians are waiting longer than ever on the elective surgery waiting list, and they are  waiting  longer  than  ever  for an ambulance.  They  ask  this  government,  ‘Why  can’t we  get  the  treatment we expect?’, and the government replies, ‘You get the treatment you deserve. If you get sick, if you need  an ambulance or if you need surgery, then you are on your own’.

This  government promised 800 new hospital beds — 757 to  go.  This  government spends twice as much on prison beds as it does on new hospital beds.

This government provides funding for only three hospital projects, none of  them in Melbourne. That is its solution to the chaos at,  say,  Frankston  Hospital’s emergency department — three  projects  hundreds  of kilometres from Frankston. But the men and women of regional Victoria should not  get too  excited, because this budget is bad news for them.

Regional Victoria is home to 25  per cent  of Victoria’s population, but it will get 4 per cent of Victoria’s funding for  major  projects. What else? Apparently there is going to be record spending on schools, but I cannot  find any evidence of it here. On average per year, the coalition will have spent less than half of what  Labor spent on  new school buildings,  facilities, classrooms and grounds. But I can credit the Liberals with one innovation.

Surprise  funding.  If  you are a  school  that does not make  a request for  an  upgrade,  you  get funding  by surprise.  As long  as you  find yourself  in a targeted Liberal seat and you have kept good and quiet, then here is a Premier with a cheque and a wink.

Meanwhile, let me tell members about some of  the schools  in my  community that did  submit  bids for funding:  Baden  Powell College, Manor  Lakes  College and Werribee Secondary College. They have been ignored  for the third year in a row. Tarneit Senior College still  has  a  mound  of  dirt obscuring its school sign, construction has stopped and the kids are doing physical  education  in  the car park. Baden  Powell  College  had to ship  in  18 portables — and  this  is the fastest growing area of the state. How  do  members think Victorian teachers and parents at this school feel when other schools win the electorate lottery?

Perhaps they should not bother making submissions to the government for funding; they should just make  submissions to the Victorian Electoral Commission at  the next redistribution.

The education cuts have stopped. This government will spend $124 million less on TAFE.  I would  have thought  the  government  would  run out  of things  to cut eventually — adult education,  TAFE  and  training,  secondary schools, primary schools — but  I was wrong. It found  one more: kinder. The  Premier  and Prime Minister  Tony  Abbott are  cutting  kinder for  4-year-olds.  Together they are tearing  up a partnership and  short-changing every young  family in this state. The  shredder is working  overtime in Canberra,  cancelling  our most  important national partnerships: funding  for essential  vaccines, for Victorians  needing dental surgery and for schoolchildren with disabilities — going, going, gone.

Those opposite  make  a  lot  of  noise  about  tearing up contracts. These were contracts with Victorians. These were agreements people relied upon. Our seniors rely on  aged  care, and the Premier  will  cut that too.  There  will  be fewer options  for  our elderly  and  more excruciating decisions  for their families. Privatising our aged-care facilities is not enough;  another $75 million will be ripped from the system. There  will be more funding cuts from home and community care, which lets seniors live in their own homes with their families and  not in a hostel. Now these seniors will literally be on their own.

There is a  checklist in the Premier’s office  about how to make life harder for seniors.  Every  box  has  been  ticked.  Increase vehicle  registration,  done. Increase  public housing rents,  done. Cut gas  and electricity concessions  for pensioners, done.  This  government  is  on  a  roll;  it  is the highest taxing government  in  Victoria’s  history.  Government  members are hoarders — taxing more, charging more, cutting more and keeping more.

Government members claim  a  surplus, but ordinary people do not see the benefit of a surplus  if it leaves every school and every hospital in deficit. With this surplus the  government has  blood on  its hands. It was built with the  biggest cuts  to  TAFE  in Victoria’s  history  and  with institutional  neglect  of our hospitals and schools. It  was built  on inertia  and austerity. It has made our state a harder place to raise a family and a harder place to live.

This government  is obsessed with the baubles and the bonanzas of a budget,  but it  always forgets the fundamentals and  cuts the basics to the  bone. We have a Premier walking around  like Donald Trump, trying  to build the  world’s tallest building and the world’s biggest  boat,  but  our schools are falling apart. Our hospitals are  in crisis,  crime is  going up and companies are going down. This government  is turning  Victoria  into the world’s  most livable wasteland,  and there is nothing in this budget that will fix that.

There is nothing  in  here that will improve  our quality of life, and  there is nothing  in here for the things that matter. Congestion is destroying our  city, trains have ground to a halt and  cars pile  across level crossings every single morning. This government was the last  to see it coming. It was the world’s last convert to the cause of public transport.

It  has gone from a  do-nothing government to an ‘Oh  my God, quick, somebody do something!’ government  — a government of  panic and disorder.  Disorder  is no substitute for decision, and panic is no substitute for a plan. This  government has done  nothing for three years. Now it is facing  the test of the people, and here  it is, cramming for the exam — no  time to spellcheck, no time to revise, no  time to consult and  no  time to consider our  priorities.  Look at what the government has given us: a mess, with no direction and no design.

Where  is the  investment  for transport in  our  growing communities,  for  the roundabouts in half-built suburbs that  become car parks each morning or for the country roads  and V/Line services that are deteriorating by  the day? Meanwhile the government is signing up to an $8 billion tunnel in inner city Melbourne. It is the Premier’s  biggest priority, but  it is not Victoria’s  biggest priority. The  Melbourne  Metro rail tunnel is, but the government is not  building  that. Melbourne Metro was supposed to double the size  of the city loop and  have five new stations. It would have been the  solution to  the gridlock that plagues our train system. It would have been the  gateway to new train lines and the project this state needs, but the government is not building that.

If this budget really is a story about infrastructure, then someone tore out the beginning, the middle and the end. It is like a Magic Eye picture: if you squint long  enough, you  can just make out the bare silhouette  of our  most important project, but you have to look hard.

Melbourne  Metro  went through  the  CBD;  this one  does  not.  Melbourne Metro alleviated train congestion; this one does  not. Melbourne Metro improved access to  the city  loop;  this one  does not.  Melbourne Metro  would have  four more stations and service our hospitals; this one does not. It is the evil twin.  No, it is a ghost train — a tunnel to nowhere and a service for no-one.

There are four massive problems with it.  Firstly, there  is no  access to  four major  hospitals  or the  University  of Melbourne.  Instead  the Premier, Denis Napthine, wants  to make  it easier  to get to  South Melbourne  Market and  the Mahogany Room. These are his priorities — as Neil Mitchell helpfully suggested, ‘punters, not patients’.

Secondly, there will be more delays at the North Melbourne station.

At the  moment, when  my train  stops  at  the  invisible station  in the  North Melbourne  rail yards, I can listen to an entire Bruce Springsteen  song  before the train  starts moving again. Thanks to  the Premier, now I  might  be able to listen to a whole album. Am I not lucky?

Thirdly, trains on the Frankston line will not run through Flinders Street. They will not even come close. They will be in a tunnel somewhere underneath a suburb they have probably not heard of.

Fourthly, the  south-eastern suburbs  will be locked out of the city loop — cut off forever. ‘We apologise for the inconvenience, but the next city loop service to depart  from  the  Cranbourne and  Pakenham  lines  has  been  cancelled  — for eternity!’. Welcome to Denis Napthine’s Victoria, where commuters on our busiest rail corridors cannot even get  a direct service to the city’s biggest stations. They have to find  their own way to the platforms that most  people use — ‘Mind the gap’.

This plan has all  the elements of something that  was drawn up on the back of a napkin  on  budget morning. I wonder how many people in  the  department  learnt about this ghost  train when the rest of  Victoria did. The experts who  have to untangle this labyrinth are as confused as we are. There is no business case and no justification, and there is nothing  to progress its design. There is nothing in the way of a process for  public consultation, no possibility of construction starting in  2016 and  no firm date for completion. There is  just panic,  blind panic.

There is all this commotion  about where the new station  will be located. It is enough  to drive  you round  the Fishermans Bend! I suspect a lot  of Victorians woke  up yesterday morning  asking  themselves where  on  earth Fishermans  Bend actually  is. One of those  people  was the Premier. Here  is a tip: the casino, South Melbourne Market, the  Montague precinct and  the factories of  Fishermans Bend are not the same place. It is ‘design as you go’, and ‘make it up as you go along’. In fairness, the government has realised  its mistake, so now there will be a new tram line for Fishermans  Bend  where the train was meant to  go.  Stay tuned, because next we can expect a zip line to the Royal Children’s Hospital.

We do not know precisely where the new station will be, but  we do know where it will  not be.  It will  not be  at the  doorstep of  Australia’s  most important hospital  precinct.  It will not take you to  uni.  It will not take you to  the city. It will not take you where you need to go, so I suppose we can assume this government is telling Victorian commuters where they can go.

You cannot even call this Metro-lite. It  is not even a Diet Coke version. It is more like New Coke. It is  a completely different plan, and it just will  not do the job. The plan will not fix our broken train system, and it will not even get a single new cent under this budget.

How much does the  government  really care? It is doing a  con  job,  which is a shame, and this is a 100-year catastrophe. There was one shot in the locker, and the government missed  it by a mile — actually it was about 3 kilometres as the crow flies, and we will never hear the end of it. The government had a choice — it had a chance, but it blew it. It will fill up another 20-page glossy pamphlet and send it to every address in the state. It will run non-stop, taxpayer-funded advertisements  about more space-age  projects which are  barely  a hole in  the ground. That will be the real legacy of this government — a hole in the ground.

In the  mind of the Minister for  Public Transport it is enough to say, ‘Mission accomplished’. It reminds me of  an  exchange between characters in the film The Castle,  ‘Go on, Minister,  tell  ’em. Denis dug  a  hole’  — and he  is  still digging! That is the price we have to pay for three and a half years of nothing. That is the cost of a dysfunctional government.

The government is proud of this mayhem, this dollar-sign saturation. Its members think it is  politically  brilliant, but while the insiders are all high fiving, the outsiders  are left high and dry.  An election is not  a cold distraction. A sham program of panic and disorder  is nothing to be proud of. Only Labor  has a plan to prevent it. Only Labor will consult the experts about the major projects Victoria needs. Only Labor will take the advice of an  independent body  — that is, Infrastructure Victoria.  Only  Labor knows the difference between Victorian politics and Victoria’s priorities. We have wasted years for  this government to say the same, and we are still waiting.

There is more to governing than dollar signs.

If people can  drive  to  a  hospital  emergency department 5 seconds faster but still face a  5-hour wait  inside, their lives will not have improved. If people happen to find a single seat free  on their train but not a single new classroom at their  kids’ school,  they are  not any  better  off.  If  people  hear  this government  boast  about jobs  but  see  the whole  state  falling  behind South Australia, they know where  they stand. Victorians will not be fooled by another empty promise. They know the  difference between a headline and a deadline. They are smart enough  to  know that the devil is in  the  lack  of detail, because a press release is not a major project and a dotted line on a map does not get you home. An artist’s impression is no substitute for the people’s impression — and people are  not impressed. They were  promised Doncaster rail,  Avalon  rail and Rowville rail, which never came. Now we have some new promises but no new detail and no new funding. The government may as well announce moon rail.

Ordinary Victorians have heard  it all,  they have  watched it stall and they do not buy it, because Liberals lie  about  public  transport.  A  plan  to improve access to the  city loop by cutting off access to the city loop is brilliant! If only we  had thought of it!  The  Liberals lie about public  transport. It is in their DNA to be dishonest. If a public transport project only ever exists on the Premier’s  notepad, it is  good  enough for him but  it  is not good enough  for Victorians. That is not good enough for the Victorian people, because chaos is not our currency, panic is not our policy and disorder is not a  decision. The Victorian people deserve so much better.

 They deserve a government that will work for them, not around them. They deserve a government  that actually governs; a  leader who actually  leads. They deserve real train lines,  not headlines without deadlines, and a health  system that  is not on the verge  of a flat line. They  deserve a plan for jobs, growth and skills.  Every  Victorian child deserves  every  single chance.  We  need  a government  that  will deliver  the  budget surplus that  matters  the most: the surplus in  the family budget. We need a government that will put people  first. We need a government who can make Victoria no. 1 again.