A rift has formed between Wyndham’s main advocacy group and the state government.
Western metropolitan MP Andrew Elsbury criticised the Committee for Wyndham for running an “overtly political” campaign.
“Previously, the Committee for Wyndham has been very good,” Mr Elsbury said.
“The way the Committee for Wyndham is running now it is not putting forward any different points of view – it is running an agenda.
“The agenda is aligning very much with my political opponents in the Labor Party, which brings a lot of questions to bare on just what the committee is trying to achieve.
“Once upon a time I could actually talk to them – we’d have a disagreement but we could talk to them. Now I’m not so sure.”
Just days after last month’s state budget was released, Committee for Wyndham chief executive Chris Potaris described it as a vote-buying budget.
“The Committee for Wyndham view the 2014-15 state budget as the state government’s need for an overt political gain and the need for desperately needed votes ahead of the needs of a growing community and region,” Mr Potaris said.
One of the committee’s grievances is that Werribee Secondary College received no money for vital repairs, despite the group running an advocacy campaign on behalf of the school calling for $7 million in urgent funding.
Asked if he thought the advocacy campaign had been worthwhile, Mr Potaris said: “Absolutely, our campaign and engagement with the state government has just begun, now that we know where they stand with their contempt for this region.”
He said that the committee would continue its campaign with the school.
But Mr Elsbury said projects such as the western section of the East West Link and a new school in the Wyndham area showed that the state government was not just investing in its own electorates.
Mr Elsbury said Werribee Secondary College had missed out on funding because other schools, such as Sunshine College, had greater need.
“Get the worst buildings in Werribee Secondary College, move them to Sunshine and they’d [Sunshine] have a better school than what they’ve currently got,” he said.
“That was the decision we had to make. The maintenance for that school was costing absolutely millions of dollars and we needed to fix that school.”
