MS TIERNEY (Minister for Training and Skills) — Last month the excitement of the Timboon P–12 School community past and present was absolutely clear as we turned the first sod of the long-awaited $5.2 million rebuild. This school community has laboured for years, never giving up, to realise a project beset by promises only to end in disappointment. Their persistence and passion is finally rewarded. The Andrews Labor government has honoured funding promised on the eve of the last election to renovate a school which had been allowed to fall into serious disrepair.
The previous member for Polwarth described the Timboon stalemate as ‘an anomaly’, yet his government did nothing about it until the very last opportunity. Unlike the Baillieu-Napthine governments, which rescinded the 2010 budget funding and then failed to deliver for the next three years, this government meets its commitments.
I acknowledge the efforts of past principal Rosalie Moorfield, current principal Sean Fitzpatrick and the school council in obtaining modern learning facilities for Timboon’s students. These young people of Timboon are long overdue for state-of-the-art facilities.