Geelong mother says she is living in city of broken election promises

Sherryn Vessey's Mount Duneed home, in Geelong's rapidly growing south, is surrounded by broken election promises.

A fire station, ambulance station and new secondary school were all promised by Labor during the past two election campaigns, to be built within a couple of kilometres of Ms Vessey's home.

No ground has been broken on any of the three.

About 8 kilometres to the south there was a 2018 promise to build a community hospital, and about 8km north a 2022 promise to find a new home for a small, but important, homelessness service.

Geelong was supposed to be the epicentre of the Commonwealth Games, with the athlete's village and a new pool to be built within walking distance from Ms Vessey's home.

But the Games, and the pool, were dumped, denying the city the opportunity to feature on the world stage and reap the economic benefits of being a key host of the "Regional Games".

"You could get at a little radar and go around the area plotting the promises that have been broken … the athlete's village, the hospital, the fire station, the ambulance station, swimming pool.

"I could keep going, but so many broken promises."

Ms Vessey has long advocated for a new secondary school to be built in the booming growth zone. Next year, her eldest child will be moving up to high school but it will not be nearby.

"She's going to go to a high school in Geelong, and she'll catch the bus in and out every day," she said.

Ms Vessey was blunt in her assessment of what a politician's pre-election promises were worth.

"You just wait and see and hold your breath and wonder what's gonna come out of it. Probably not get your hopes up. I learned that after the last one."

It can be hard to define when a promise is broken, as governments can delay projects and assure they are still coming.

During the 2022 election campaign, then-premier Daniel Andrews travelled to Geelong, where he promised to rescue homelessness charity The Outpost, which had lost its venue.

Mr Andrews promised his re-elected government would find "a permanent home for Outpost… free of charge".

Four years later, the charity has been forced to enter a commercial lease, as no permanent home has been found.

Government briefings show it needed to pay the lease, or find the charity a new home, to consider the commitment kept.

Following a 2017 Boxing Day house fire that killed a woman in Armstrong Creek, the government committed to building a new fire station as quickly as possible.

"We are working quickly to find a location for the station and this is an absolute priority for me," Emergency Services Minister James Merlino told the Geelong Advertiser in mid-2018, as the government hinted of a nearing announcement of where and when the station would be built.

"It is unacceptable to see a growing community not as protected as it should be."

Since that commitment, the government purchased land for the station, then sold it off.

There is currently no timeline on when, or where, a station will be built.

Instead, a fire truck sits behind temporary fencing near the Armstrong Creek land initially bought for the station.

Similarly, an ambulance station promised for the area had a forecasted completion date of 2026 in the 2023–24 state budget.

The most recent budget pushed that back to 2028.

The Torquay community hospital was promised in 2018, and in 2022 Labor politicians invited media to photograph them turning the sod on land it had acquired for the project.

The project has since been wiped from government websites and ministers refuse to give a straight answer on whether it has been ditched permanently.

The ABC sent a detailed list of questions regarding these projects to Premier Ben Carroll, but he did not respond.

Instead, a government spokesperson provided a comment.

"Geelong and the Bellarine deserve high-quality public services, which is why Labor has invested billions into rail, road, hospitals, schools and frontline services, but we know there's more to do," they said.

Mr Carroll travelled to Geelong on Thursday for a transport announcement, where the ABC was able to directly ask why Geelong residents should trust that the latest round of election promises would be kept.

"I'm asking the people to look at what I've delivered in three months," Mr Carroll said, before spruiking his delivery of the Big Build Royal Commission.

"Yes, we could always do better. We can always do more.

"But I've made it very clear that I'll be a financially responsible premier, socially progressive and also deliver services that I know that people of Geelong need."

Liberal Leader Jess Wilson was unavailable to respond to questions about whether politicians should keep their promises, but South Barwon Liberal candidate Libby Pettit said Geelong needed more than election commitments.

"Labor has had years to deliver for the Geelong region, but all we've received are broken promises," Ms Pettit said.

Deakin University senior politics lecturer Geoff Robinson said he had not seen a convincing correlation between election promises and voter behaviour during his extensive career.

"There's not much evidence, even for fairly electorate-specific promises, actually making that much difference to people's behaviour in the end," Dr Robinson said.

"The parties think it does, and they bid against each other … But, evidence for actually having a hard impact on how people vote is pretty limited."

Dr Robinson also has a somewhat blunt assessment of the value of a politician's promise.

"I think that governments maybe all tend to over-promise and underdeliver.

"I think maybe a general pattern that might come up in obituaries of Labor's term in government, perhaps, is being too ambitious and then not delivering."