The Age: Labor split over new tollway plans

A new tollway proposal in Sir Rod Eddington’s transport plan for Melbourne has split the Victorian Labor Party’s transport policy committee.

The committee’s secretary has resigned in disgust at a decision to endorse all 20 recommendations in Sir Rod’s report to the State Government, including a new multibillion-dollar road tunnel linking the city’s east and west. The committee’s response to the Eddington proposals will be presented to the ALP state conference today, and Premier John Brumby will release his transport plan for Melbourne next month.

The secretary, Pat Love, has written to his committee colleagues, along with Roads Minister Tim Pallas and Public Transport Minister Lynne Kosky saying he would bring forward the end of his term because of the committee’s support for more freeways.

“Recent decisions of the committee, most importantly the decisions to support all 20 recommendations from the (Eddington) study, prompted me to bring this forward prior to the state conference. I handed my resignation to Kevin Bracken last Monday,” he wrote in an email sent on Thursday night and obtained by The Age. “As you know, I have argued both internally on the committee and externally in public forums that now is not the time to build another road tunnel.” Continue Reading…