Push for new jobs
It has been made clear in the Bendigo Advertiser (Monday, July 20) that the Andrews Labor Government has abandoned its commitment to create 100,000 full-time jobs in two years.
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In misleading figures provided to the Addy, Regional Development Minister Jaala Pulford claimed the Labor Government had “created 23,000 jobs” in regional Victoria. The figure included jobs created before the November election, as well as part-time jobs. The Andrews Labor Government used to say that it was “alarming” that part-time employment was becoming “a greater part of our economy”. Now, the government is happily using part-time jobs to boost its numbers. The truth is that since December, when the Andrews Labor Government took office, Victoria has lost 9,500 full time jobs.
If the government was to meet the 100,000 target in two years, it would have needed to create 25,000 full-time jobs by now. Perhaps the government should stop spending time fudging figures and actually start doing something to create regional jobs.
To start with, the Andrews Labor Government must invest more than a paltry 2.9 per cent of its major infrastructure budget into regional Victoria so we can see some real jobs-creating projects get underway.
Peter Walsh, Leader of The Nationals
Will there be delays?
With the revelation that our state government has bungled the biggest metro timetable boost in years. (The Age 22/07/15 by Adam Carey and Clay Lucas).
Will this delayed timetable overhaul , previously planned for April cause further delays and disruption to the Bendigo-Southern Cross commuters? The Sunbury metro line will be involved in probable delays due to running anti-clockwise through the loop all day , causing crowd congestion at southern cross station in the morning peak as commuters head for the loop change trains , brought about by this change.
Ballarat train commuters in july were complaining about punctuality for regional service and over-crowding. And; figures from Public Transport Victoria shows that since the regional rail link opened on 21st june, there have been days when the number of V/Line service that arrived on time have plunged to as low as 67.8%.
Ballarat’s overcrowding is a result of a decision to remove carriages from that line to add to trains travelling on the Geelong line, which now has more frequent services. The Public Transport users association spokesperson said the problem is a direct result of a lack of planning. Or, has it got to do with politics , motivated by looking after those swinging seats in the metro system?
Bill Collier, Golden Square
Why increase GST?
Why are our supposedly knowledgeable leaders wanting to increase the GST which once again is going to hurt the lower middle class people of our society.
While the top end of society escapes the pain and suffering. When are our so called intelligent and educated leaders going to realise the stupid and idiotic decisions made by their predecessors, the real reason we have a short fall in funding to go towards Health, Education and Infrastructure is they sold of all our assets.
They sold off Gas, Electricity, Water and the TAB to Private Companies, these assets returned a dividend back to the Government's which once went to supporting Health and Education and what ever else needed funding. It's not hard to work out that once you sell the milking cow there is no milk to be given, we have no assets so there is no money in return other than to the pockets of Private companies and Foreign Investors. We are moving towards a disgruntled and a poorer nation, there's no give and take far from what our predecessors thought for, the conditions that would assist us in becoming a prosperous nation are slowly disappearing unless our leaders change their ways of thinking.