00:02A small token of appreciation for the biggest show of federal support yet.
00:08It's barely a year since Infrastructure Australia threatened to derail federal support for the first leg of the suburban rail
00:15loop when it poked holes in its business case and cast out on its $35 billion price tag.
00:21But the project linking Box Hill to Cheltenham was added to the body's priority funding list in March, clearing the
00:28way for today's $3.8 billion promise.
00:31The Victorian government and I negotiated as we always do, constructively.
00:37But Premier Jacinta Allen's pet project isn't quite full steam ahead yet.
00:41The Commonwealth has tipped $6 billion into the project so far and the door was left open to more.
00:48We'll of course look in future budgets for what the next contracting is.
00:52That's still billions of dollars short of what the state wants the federal government to chip in and the project's
00:57long-standing critics know it.
00:59This is a project the government has no plan to pay for.
01:02As that cash was splashed, across town the opposition vowed to claw billions back.
01:07It is also time for an honest and frank conversation about the size of Victoria's public service.
01:13The biggest saving made by shedding about 7,000 rolls in the back office of the swelling public service through
01:20natural attrition.
01:21No one is getting sacked. No one is losing their jobs.
01:26These protesters begged to differ.
01:28No more job cuts!
01:30We can only assume that it is going to impact frontline services.
01:34You can't cut that hard and deep without impacting our schools and our hospitals.
01:41The opposition maintains it will pause and review the suburban rail loop if elected as tracks are laid to November's
01:48election along two very different paths.
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