00:00Across Melbourne's east, digging and drilling is well underway, on stage one of the largest
00:07and most expensive infrastructure projects ever undertaken in Australia.
00:11Boring on the twin train tunnels starts here next year.
00:15The sheer size of the rail loop linking Melbourne's suburbs is matched by the price.
00:19The first leg between Cheltenham and Box Hill will cost at least $34 billion alone.
00:25It's a gigantic investment, but experts are torn on whether or not it's a good idea to
00:29build an orbital train line through Melbourne's suburbs.
00:33I think the project is a bit visionary.
00:35It's a tomorrow project, enabling us to deal with crippling traffic congestion and changing
00:41the urban development profile of Melbourne to make it much more liveable.
00:45If we're going to be the size of Tokyo, we have no choice.
00:49It's going to transform the nature of Melbourne, and the bit that I really like about it is
00:53not so much what's happening below ground, it's all of the housing and retail and other
00:58development above ground.
01:00It might be a good idea conceptually, but when you take account of the enormous cost
01:07of the first stage of it, let alone subsequent stages, it's hard to say that the benefits
01:13of it will exceed those costs.
01:16And that's the biggest problem for the so-called SRL.
01:20It's the eye-watering cost.
01:22Victoria is going to pay a third, and that's going to drive state debt up to $188 billion.
01:28Interest payments on debt are $26 million a day.
01:32It means that an increasing proportion of the taxes which Victorians pay, and the grants
01:37which Victoria gets from the federal government, are being used to pay interest rather than
01:43to provide health, education, policing, child protection and other services.
01:48Victoria is the most indebted of all the states, so we don't have a feasible plan to pay for it.
01:53If we choose to do this project, we do without a lot of other projects that might be higher value.
01:59So it's going to crowd out things like Geelong Fast Rail, Melbourne Airport Rail, because
02:05the government simply can't afford them all.
02:07Even those excited by the concept are conscious of the cost.
02:11The government's got to keep a lid on the costs and make sure that other high-priority
02:15investments are also made, be they in public transport or other fields.
02:20To get new trains on tracks, the state has asked Canberra to stump up a third of the cost.
02:25But Infrastructure Australia is still assessing the case.
02:27It means that federal funding for this project will be a hot topic at next year's federal election.
02:33Hi, I'm Jacinta.
02:34Regardless, the state has already signed contracts worth $7.5 billion.
02:38I don't think it's a good idea.
02:40I think if it was a good idea, the government would have told us why it was, and it hasn't
02:45really done that, and it would have told Infrastructure Australia why it's a good idea.
02:49And with so much labour and capital tied up in the project, even those that are supportive
02:53are urging the government to pump the brakes.
02:55Let's say they push it out to 2038.
02:57Is that really going to matter?
02:58But what it will do, it will free up some of the resources to be redeployed elsewhere
03:02where it's needed right now.
03:03There's also disquiet among some Labor MPs about the merits of the project.
03:07But those at the top are unwavering.
03:10There's no turning back.
03:11We're not for quitting.
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