November 2026

Victoria’s infrastructure program has become one of the greatest examples of government mismanagement in Australian history, with extraordinary cost blowouts, allegations of widespread corruption and organised crime infiltration, and billions of dollars of taxpayers’ money squandered.

And the revelations keep getting worse.

We’ve repeatedly highlighted the appalling management of major infrastructure projects across Australia, where politicians announce grandiose schemes with specific budgets, only for the costs to explode and completion dates to disappear into the distance.

But what has happened in Victoria takes this incompetence to another level.

The Victorian Government’s massive Big Build program, involving more than $100 billion in road, rail and other infrastructure projects, has become engulfed in allegations of corruption involving the construction union CFMEU, organised crime figures and questionable labour-hire arrangements.

According to an ABC News report, corruption investigator Geoffrey Watson SC estimated that misconduct associated with the CFMEU may have cost Victorian taxpayers as much as $15 billion.

Yes, $15 billion.

Watson’s estimate, which the Victorian Government disputes, covers inflated contracts, delays and arrangements allegedly benefiting criminals at the expense of legitimate businesses and workers.

The figure remains an estimate, not a proven accounting of losses, but its magnitude is extraordinary.

Earlier reporting by Channel Nine indicated that Watson believed the eventual cost could be even higher, potentially reaching $30 billion.

These are staggering accusations involving public money.

Investigations have uncovered allegations of intimidation, criminal infiltration, questionable subcontracting arrangements and the manipulation of major construction projects.

Report suggest 11 major Victorian infrastructure projects, including the Suburban Rail Loop and North East Link, were the subject of 56 separate allegations involving fraud, corruption, theft and criminal conduct.

The Suburban Rail Loop is already a monument to questionable political priorities, with its enormous projected costs and disputed economic benefits.

Now the broader infrastructure program has become synonymous with allegations of misconduct and administrative failure.

Perhaps most disturbing are revelations that government officials had received warnings about criminal infiltration of major construction projects years before the scandal reached its present proportions.

Jacinta Allan, who oversaw much of the Big Build as infrastructure minister before becoming Premier, resigned in July amid the escalating controversy.

Her successor, Ben Carroll, announced a royal commission into the construction industry, which was formally established in August. The commission is investigating corruption, criminal conduct and serious misconduct, with findings still to come.

The fundamental question is how governments responsible for spending such extraordinary amounts of taxpayers’ money could allow these problems to develop.

Where were the controls? Where was the oversight? Where was the accountability?

Every billion dollars wasted on inflated contracts, delays and mismanagement is a billion dollars unavailable for hospitals, schools, housing, roads and other essential services.

And Victoria is a state already confronting enormous financial pressures.

Governments cannot keep blaming inflation, labour shortages and international events for every infrastructure cost blowout.

We need genuine transparency, independent scrutiny of project costs and serious consequences wherever wrongdoing is established.

The purpose of infrastructure spending is to deliver essential facilities for the community, not to create an endless river of public money flowing through poorly supervised projects.

Victorian taxpayers deserve to know how much has been wasted, who was responsible and what will be done to prevent it happening again.

Because the greatest scandal isn’t simply that these projects cost billions more than expected.

It’s that governments can preside over financial disasters of this magnitude while ordinary Australians are expected to keep paying the bills.

Meanwhile, the Herald Sun reports that the West Gate Tunnel, which opened late in 2025, three years late and $4 billion over budget, still has more to pay.

The Herald Sun reported: “Victorian taxpayers will have to cough up for another $250 million on the trouble-plagued West Gate Tunnel project, despite the government promising no more blowouts.

“An agreement is in the works to resolve a long-running dispute between the state and builders CPB and John Holland over project costs, which have already ballooned from the $5.5 billion original estimate to about $10.2 billion.

“Taxpayers have been put on the hook for the latest new bill by tolling giant Transurban after its builders submitted a final claim on blow-outs they said were not foreseeable when the project began.

“The Herald Sun revealed last June that Transurban had written to then-transport infrastructure minister Gabrielle Williams warning about potential legal action on the ‘close-out’ claims, which are not unusual on a mega project.

“At that time a spokesman for the government said the toll road would be finished with ‘no further cost increases to taxpayers’. But two senior Carroll government sources have confirmed the state will have to pay out more.”

Industry sources said that closing out a mega project always included final claims by builders, and the complexity of multi-billion dollar deals meant costs were often disputed.

The West Gate Tunnel has been a particularly troubled project, dogged by a series of crises during construction, the largest of which involved a dispute over toxic soil that halted progress in 2019 and saw the builders try to walk away from the job. That matter was settled in 2021, with that deal blowing out the budget from $6.3 billion to $10.2 billion.