Time for fair slice

WE ARE about seven months out from the Victorian state election and will have a federal election within a year.

These are the times when hardworking civilians who pay their various fees and duties and rates and taxes — on their incomes and their spendings — can occasionally see some of their hard-earned paid back into worthy projects for their communities.

The Federal Government has rightly been under fire for neglecting infrastructure funding in Victoria which typically gets annual millions while NSW gets billions.

The case is so plainly obvious, except to idiots and ideologues, it is made even by the PM’s fellow Liberals such as Victorian Opposition Leader Matthew Guy.

As a corrective to this, PM Malcolm Turnbull this week revealed a $5 billion commitment to a rail line running from Tullamarine airport to Melbourne.

But it is regional centres such as Geelong that are in real need of federal funding.

Beyond some vague local meetings among professional stakeholders momentum for the most important project for this city — a convention and exhibition centre and hotel — seems to be being lost.

The feds suggest it will be part of a Geelong City Deal but have committed not a dollar or a date to the process starting in earnest.

The State Government of Daniel Andrews, once very gung-ho about the project, also seems to be letting its dysfunctional relationship with Turnbull stand in the way of Geelong’s progress in this vital area.

With no runs on the scoreboard for long talkedabout ‘jobs boon’ projects like Land400 (gone to Queensland) and silence on a move of Comcare, the feds should get serious about our region.

It is nice that Mr Turnbull. sometimes referred to as ‘the Prince of Point Piper’ has rediscovered the Victorian capital. But it has been too long since the Commonwealth, which Geelong financially supports, gave a little back here.