PORT FAIRY Folk Festival was the location for a catch up with local Member of Parliament for South West Coast Roma Britnell.

What’s been going on in Parliament this week Roma?

I introduced a private members Bill to include the Port of Melbourne on the register of critical infrastructure in Victoria and to specify that the Port cannot be removed from this register by the Labor Minister.

During recent protests at the Port of Melbourne, more than 100,000 containers were unable to be unloaded. This included vital supplies of insulin and other medical products, with a cost to the economy of $84 million each week. Likewise, our farmers rely on open access to our ports to get their agricultural exports to markets across the world. Despite all these impacts, the Labor Treasurer described the protests as a “minor inconvenience”.

The current Labor government are discussing bringing in a new tax of between $150- $200 per truck that enters the Port – again, this will just add to the burden of increasing cost of living on consumers and export costs to our farmers.

What about this ‘Covid Recovery Tax’ the government have introduced?

Well, there are actually 53 new taxes the government have introduced. The state debt has now reached over $170 billion and they have no plans for paying that back.

The government is just short of money – so they have introduced the new taxes to try to fill the coffers – taxes that the average Joe Blow just can’t afford.

What is happening regarding the Public Housing Crisis?

In our region there is a massive public housing waitlist – the government have houses sitting vacant, some for years, I know there are many that have been vacant for months – and the Department of Family, Fairness and Housing are not managing the stock.

The story of Doug and young Nova Bowen has touched so many around South West Coast. Here is a family – where Doug lost his wife, and Nova lost her mother; four years ago – Nova suffers from Cerebral Palsy and is wheelchair bound – and they are currently couch surfing – they have even been living in an old bus in Wickliffe, without power and water. Nova has just been singing with the all - abilities choir, at the Folk Festival – but this should not be happening.

This family is one of our community’s most vulnerable and has fallen through the cracks – they are being failed by Labor. Despite raising it with Minister’s personally, as well as in Parliament last sitting week, there has been no action from the Government to assist Doug’s family. Labor are trying to deflect and it is un-Australian the way the Premier and Minister refuse to own up and take responsibility for the consequences of their mismanagement of social housing.

This week in Parliament I personally questioned the Premier on her Government’s failure. You will be appalled at how she treats this matter, and shocked by the endless excuses.

What other issues have you been covering?

There is the proposed off-shore wind project for Port Fairy and Warrnambool – in our precious marine environment.

The plans for future development at the Warrnambool Airport.

Cost of Living pressures - and the government’s attempt to deflect attention from increasing power costs by spruiking a revamped SEC as a possible saviour.

Unfortunately, often when I raise serious matters in Parliament, Ministers can take them on notice – to respond to later. In most cases they have 30 days to respond - Yet, some Ministers have been sitting on pressing matters, including the Dutton Way rock wall, Terang aged care, Tower Hill vegetation management and Warrnambool boat ramp, for up to six months! It’s unacceptable, and I let the Speaker know this week that they are not doing their jobs.

One of my favourite topics Roma – our roads. We are getting nowhere with road funding. Rural Roads has just put down 179 meters of new road (on the Woolsthorpe-Heywood Road)– over the same piece of road that was only done seven years ago, under ‘flood damage repairs.’ Firstly – it’s not flood damage, secondly – if they had done it properly in the first place – then it shouldn’t need complete replacement in seven years. Our roads are treacherous.

There are currently no tenders open for work on rural roads. The government have spent billions of dollars on roads and infrastructure in Melbourne and blown budgets out by billions of dollars – and continue to focus on Melbourne.

We know our roads are in poor shape and riddled with potholes – very occasionally they might fill one (pothole) but they are making no money available for real work. They just don’t understand what’s going on in rural and regional Victoria. I put in a FOI (freedom of information request) on the Woolsthorpe-Heywood Road – and it tells me that there have been 1250 potholes have been fixed – now wouldn’t it have been smarter to resurface the road properly?

Port Fairy takes great pride in the Folk Festival – what did you think of this year’s festival?

Port Fairy Folk Festival is amazing – it continues to have a great bunch of volunteers, who pull together to make this Festival ‘great.’

I always love it – and I am here to catch up with friends, watch a friend from my nursing days play in one of the bands, and just sit back and enjoy the beer garden and the music. It brings so much to the regional economy – and fills the air with wonderful music – we are all lucky to have it – and I will top that off with one of Rebecca’s ice-creams!