Frankston YOUR GUIDE TO WHAT’S ON THIS WEEKEND FOR PENINSULA FAMILIES FACEBOOK:
peninsulakids.com.au mornpenkids
An independent voice for the community
INSTAGRAM:
Your weekly community newspaper covering Frankston, Frankston South, Karingal, Langwarrin and Seaford For all advertising and editorial needs, call 03
FREE
Tuesday 16 November 2021
5974 9000 or email: team@baysidenews.com.au www.baysidenews.com.au
A taste of things to come
Although no election date has been set yet, Prime Minister Scott Morrison has begun campaigning early. He visited Sabrini Foods in Carrum Downs with Liberal Dunkley candidate Sharn Coombes (pictured middle) and Senator Jane Hume last week. Picture: Gary Sissons
PM plays blame game on rail inaction Brodie Cowburn brodie@baysidenews.com.au PRIME Minister Scott Morrison has blamed Premier Daniel Andrews for the lack of progress on the Frankston line extension to Baxter. Mr Morrison reaffirmed a $225 million commitment to duplicating and electrifying the train line to Baxter shortly after he became PM in 2018. Since then the project has slowed to a crawl. A business case released at the end of
2020 quoted the full cost of the project at between $1.3-$1.5 billion, but the federal government has not put any more money towards it. Mr Morrison visited Sabrini Foods in Carrum Downs on Friday. While there he said that his government remains “committed to the [Frankston line] project” and pinned the blame for the standstill on the state government. “Sadly, the Victorian government does not want to do their part of that project and that’s why that has not been able to proceed. That’s disappointing. The Pre-
mier has made it very clear in all of our meetings that it is not a project that he wishes to pursue,” Mr Morrison said. “He doesn’t want to build the rail line so that obviously makes it an issue. The East-West Link also, I mean that is also a project which we may have contributed to and the Victorian Labor government have been clear that they don’t want to do that. But I think people know what our commitment is and you can still see it referred to in our budget each year.” The Times asked the Premier’s office if it was true that he did not support the
Frankston line extension. A response attributed to a government spokesperson read that “the Andrews Labor Government is spending over $4 billion delivering on our Frankston line election commitments that pave the way for its extension.” “The Commonwealth Government committed to extend the line to Baxter but has not funded the project. The Commonwealth has not yet provided any funding for a second business case and has not announced any intention to break their commitment by not extending the
line to Baxter.” The state government has not made a funding commitment to the extension itself. A $425 million private development near Leawarra Station could be an incentive for the state and federal governments to get moving on the Frankston line extension. Frankston Council hopes that the private development, understood to be a hotel tower, will encourage other levels of governments to spring into action. Continued page 6