Mr RICH-PHILLIPS (South Eastern Metropolitan)
My question is to the Minister for Emergency Services. In May 2017, five years ago, the government funded and committed to building a Cranbourne SES unit to be completed by June 2018. Why hasn’t it been delivered?
Ms SYMES (Northern Victoria—Leader of the Government, Attorney-General, Minister for Emergency Services)
I do not have a list of projects in my folder in terms of their status. It is something that I am regularly briefed on. We have an area in the department that works with our agencies in relation to infrastructure projects. It is fair to say that with COVID there are some planning issues. There are a few issues across some of the projects in relation to land availability, and we are working through every committed project to make sure that they can be brought back on track and delivered. But in relation to the Cranbourne SES project, I just do not have that level of detail on hand, but I am more than happy to get a briefing for you or take it on notice and provide you with a status update of that project. But, rest assured, all of the projects that we have committed to are certainly going to be delivered.
Mr RICH-PHILLIPS (South Eastern Metropolitan)
I thank the minister for her response, though I note that the project was committed to be finished long before COVID started. June 2018 was the scheduled completion time. The Victorian government established the Emergency Services Infrastructure Authority to ‘improve the delivery of emergency services infrastructure in Victoria’. Council meeting agendas identify that the ESIA approached the City of Casey in November 2019 to help identify a site for the Cranbourne SES, so my question is: given Cranbourne SES was supposed to be completed in June 2018, why did the ESIA not even commence site identification until November 2019?
Ms SYMES (Northern Victoria—Leader of the Government, Attorney-General, Minister for Emergency Services)
I thank Mr Rich-Phillips for his question. I can provide a more timely update to the house that the project will commence in the coming months. In relation to the historical issues, I am just not across the detail of interactions with council. That was well before my time as minister.