Matt Johnston From: Herald Sun November 05, 2009 10:38AM
VICTORIANS are the “envy” of other Australians and Melbourne is the most liveable capital city in Australia by a “long, long way”, Premier John Brumby says.
A new Roy Morgan poll of 1200 Australians shows Melbourne is more liveable than Sydney and other Australian capital cities.
Mr Brumby trumpeted the results at a major economics conference at the University of Melbourne today, saying that Victorians’ willingness to get involved in events has helped secure us the number one position.
“This research shows we are the envy of the rest of Australia,” Mr Brumby said.
“What it shows is that we have got the liveability edge, whether you are talking about arts, whether you are talking about sport, whether you are talking about… romance.
“If you go back to the 1990s that was very different, where Sydney was miles ahead in all of these areas.”
Mr Brumby pumped up his government for putting in place infrastructure and major events that were the envy of other cities.
But he said the survey, which was commissioned by the government and carried out in June, showed every Victorian should get credit for their willingness to get involved in large-scale events.
“We have got this enormous enthusiasm and participation by Melburnians, by Victorians, in public events,” Mr Brumby said.
He resisted the temptation to take a swipe at the other states, however, saying they still had “great cities”.
“I think we are lucky in Australia, we have got great cities. What this story says is that all of the work that has gone on (in Victoria) building events, building the arts, building sport… the vibrancy of our nightlife, cafes and strreetwalks and so on, all of these things come together and just give us an edge in Melbourne. It’s not to say that other cities are bad.”
Mr Brumby said population growth because of our surging population would be a challenge, but insisted we could manage the growth.
“Because we are such a great place to live, because we have got that liveability edge, people are moving to Victoria in record numbers,” he said.
“There’s a challenge there to accommodate that in terms of our new hospitals, new schools, our $38billion transport plan, I believe we are doing that.”
