Bendigo appears to have missed out on funding for infrastructure items in the Federal budget.
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No items on the City of Greater Bendigo's election wish list were funded in the budget delivered on Tuesday.
Funding for the new Bendigo Airport Terminal, a function centre at the central Deborah Gold Mine and money to expand the Golden Dragon Museum were all on the city's list of priorities.
A sum of $102.8 million was set aside for 2019-2020 to establish a Regional Airports Program.
It is not clear yet whether this money will benefit the Bendigo Airport.
Federal member for Bendigo Lisa Chesters said there was no new money for the city in the budget.
"There's funding for Hobart, there's funding for Wodonga, there's funding for Shepparton. There's no new money for Bendigo. It demonstrates again that the Liberals are not even aware that we exist," Ms Chesters said.
LaTrobe University's Rural Road Trauma Research Hub and funding for the Bendigo Airport extension were Ms Chesters' priorities, she said.
Ms Chesters said Labor would reverse funding cuts to schools, restore the funding that's been cut to hospitals, increase funding for Medicare and fix the NDIS.
Read more: Long battle for NDIS funding takes its toll
COGB Mayor Margaret O'Rourke said she thought there would be more specific commitments for Bendigo in the lead up to the election.
Liberal candidate for Bendigo Sam Gayed was approached for comment but said he was not able to comment on the budget.
Ms Chesters said the budget would do very little to ease the systematic cost of living pressures with which many Bendigo households struggled.
The budget lowered taxes from 32.5 percent to 30 percent for people earning between $45,001 and $200,000 from July 1, 2024.
About 60,000 people in the Bendigo electorate had an income of less than $41,600 in the 2016 census, Ms Chesters said.
Ms Chesters said the biggest winners from the tax cuts were those on the highest incomes, not many of whom lived in Bendigo.
"Our household incomes are less than a national average, so not prioritising households for tax cuts is a direct attack on us. Labor has said that if we get the privilege to be government we will fix this," Ms Chesters said.
Greens candidate for Bendigo Robert Holian concurred.
"[The budget] delivers for high income earners of which there are very few in Bendigo. The tax cuts that were announced in the budget ... benefit people earning about $200,000 more than anyone," Dr Holian said.
"People would be rightly annoyed that their money is being used to line the hip pockets of quite wealthy people already."
Dr Holian said it seemed the government's priority was to deliver tax cuts, even if that meant not providing essential services.
He said the tax cuts could fund University and Tafe, increase Newstart, build affordable homes and fight climate change.
"We seem to have enough money to do what we want in the country. What we've noticed is the government's priority is to deliver tax cuts at whatever cost," Dr Holian said.
"The government and the Liberal party are making a choice to reduce the tax of high income earners, rather than providing essential services."
Both Ms Chesters and Dr Holian slammed the government for boasting of a surplus, while having underspent on the NDIS.
Ms Chesters said she had met many people in Bendigo who cannot get basic equipment and care from the NDIS.
"The Liberal budget has been propped up by NDIS understamp," Ms Chesters said.
"Promises of a surplus have been subsidised by shortchanging people with a disability, with a massive under-spend on the national disability scheme."
Australian Council of Social Services CEO Cassandra Goldie said the budget turned its back completely on people with the lowest incomes in the country.
Ms Goldie said the size of the tax cuts set Australia up for cuts to essential services into the future.
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