MEDIA RELEASE

A $50 million ghost prison. A $6 million Metro Tunnel fraud covered up for months. Week after week more waste is exposed — and Victorian families are left paying the bill.

Two damning reports this week laid bare the true scale of Labor’s waste culture - and it is only Monday.

The Herald Sun revealed that the $50 million Rivergum Residential Treatment Centre — built in 2018 to house the state’s most dangerous offenders — has sat almost empty for nearly a decade, housing fewer than 20 prisoners while remaining fully staffed at enormous ongoing cost to taxpayers. Insiders describe it as a “complete flop.”.

Simultaneously, The Age has exposed that Taskforce Hawk only launched a major investigation into a $6 million Metro Tunnel fraud after media reporting — not because the Allan government or project consortium ever formally reported it to police. Swiss giant Schindler falsely claimed the money for flood-damaged escalators that CCTV later confirmed were never replaced. Schindler repaid the funds and dismissed three employees, yet government officials stayed silent.

These revelations follow last week’s exposure of six-figure diversity bureaucrat roles being advertised as Victoria’s debt races toward $200 billion. CFMEU corruption buster Geoffrey Watson SC has estimated Big Build rorts have cost Victorian taxpayers $15 billion — a figure the Allan government dismisses even as new scandals surface every week.

The pattern is unmistakable: waste, cover-up, and a government that refuses to be held to account — while Victorian families struggle with cost-of-living pressures and wait longer for the hospitals, schools and emergency services they were promised.

“Every week there’s a new scandal, and every scandal is money that should have gone to Victorian families — their hospitals, schools and roads. This government has turned waste and cover-up into a way of life, and ordinary Victorians are paying the price.”

“A ghost prison sitting empty for a decade. A $6 million fraud hushed up for months. These aren’t just numbers — they are nurses not hired, ambulances not funded, and cost-of-living relief not delivered to families who desperately need it.”

“The Allan government didn’t even bother reporting a $6 million fraud to police — police only found out because the media exposed it. If they won’t act on blatant theft from taxpayers, what hope do Victorian families have?.”

“Family First’s promise is simple: audit every Big Build dollar, hold contractors and bureaucrats to account, and redirect savings to the services families actually rely on. Enough is enough.”