For years, Victoria’s Big Build was presented as the physical legacy of the state’s Labor government: tunnels, rail lines, level crossings and infrastructure projects intended to transform Melbourne and underpin decades of economic growth.
Now those same projects will form the backdrop to an extraordinarily different exercise.
A royal commission will investigate whether corruption, criminal conduct and serious misconduct infected Victoria’s major taxpayer-funded construction projects — and what that conduct ultimately cost the public.
Premier Ben Carroll formally unveiled the Royal Commission into the Integrity of Major Public and Civil Infrastructure Construction Projects on Thursday, declaring its terms would be broad and that “nothing is off limits”.
The inquiry will cost $50 million and be led by former South Australian chief justice Christopher Kourakis.
Its final report is due no later than August 20, 2027.
That gives Victoria almost exactly a year to start answering a question that has been growing more uncomfortable with every allegation emerging from its construction industry.
What actually happened to taxpayers’ money inside the Big Build?
Carroll has opened the door Labor resisted
The political significance of the decision is difficult to overstate.
Carroll did not inherit an ordinary infrastructure program when he became Premier.
He inherited the defining construction legacy of successive Labor governments, alongside allegations of criminal infiltration, intimidation and misconduct within parts of the industry delivering it.
When he took office in July, Carroll immediately promised a royal commission, a Special Prosecutor and stronger “follow the money” powers for Victoria’s Independent Broad-based Anti-corruption Commission.
“In my Government, integrity will not be optional,” Carroll said in his first statement as Premier.
He also deliberately separated himself from his predecessors.
“I am not Daniel Andrews; I am not Jacinta Allan,” he said.
That political distancing now has institutional force behind it.
A royal commissioner with coercive powers will be able to examine what happened during the years when Andrews and Allan occupied the highest levels of the Victorian government.
That does not mean Andrews or Allan have been found guilty of anything
This distinction is essential.
The establishment of a royal commission is not a finding that Daniel Andrews, Jacinta Allan or any other former minister engaged in corruption.
No such conclusion has been made by this inquiry.
Its task is to establish evidence.
But Carroll has made clear that former political leaders will not be placed outside its reach.
The commission will have the capacity to compel evidence and documents, and current and former ministers and premiers may be called if Commissioner Kourakis considers their evidence relevant.
That makes the inquiry potentially dangerous for Labor even if it ultimately establishes no personal wrongdoing by senior politicians.
Political accountability is broader than criminal liability.
The commission can examine what governments knew, what agencies knew, what warning signs existed, how procurement systems operated and whether safeguards protecting public money were adequate.
The inquiry goes far beyond the CFMEU
Much of the controversy that led to the royal commission has centred on the construction division of the CFMEU.
But treating this simply as an investigation of one union would seriously understate its scope.
The commission can examine construction companies, contractors, subcontractors, labour-hire providers, unions and government bodies involved in major public and civil infrastructure projects.
That matters because corruption in a major construction ecosystem rarely occurs in isolation.
If somebody improperly receives money, somebody else generally approves, processes, facilitates or fails to question the transaction.
If labour is fraudulently billed, there is an invoice.
If procurement is manipulated, there is a contracting process.
If intimidation affects commercial decisions, there are companies and managers on the other side of those decisions.
If taxpayers are charged inflated costs, the money moves through an identifiable chain.
Following that chain is where the commission could become far more consequential than another inquiry into union culture.
Carroll himself has used extraordinary language
The Premier has not attempted to sanitise what he believes needs investigation.
Announcing the commission, Carroll referred publicly to allegations involving “grift” and “thuggery”, alongside violence and misogyny within the construction sector.
That is remarkable language from a Labor Premier discussing an industry intimately connected with billions of dollars of spending by Labor governments.
It also raises the obvious question.
If the problems were sufficiently serious to justify those words in 2026, when did government first have enough information to recognise their scale?
Warnings did not begin yesterday
The Victorian government was responding publicly to serious construction-industry allegations well before Carroll became Premier.
In July 2024, then-premier Jacinta Allan announced an independent review into Victoria’s construction sector following allegations of criminal and unlawful behaviour.
Her government referred allegations to Victoria Police and IBAC, sought federal review of enterprise agreements on Big Build sites and supported the suspension of the CFMEU construction division from the Victorian Labor Party.
At the time, Allan said she was “disgusted” by the allegations and promised to tear the industry’s “rotten culture” out by its roots.
Those actions are important context.
They demonstrate that the former government did respond to allegations rather than simply doing nothing.
But they also establish that serious concerns had been publicly recognised years before the current royal commission.
The royal commission can ask whether earlier action was enough
This is where the political accountability question becomes more difficult.
It is one thing for a government to say it acted when allegations emerged.
It is another to determine whether the systems that existed before those allegations became public should have detected misconduct earlier.
Were procurement controls adequate?
Were agencies properly monitoring labour-hire arrangements?
Were complaints acted upon?
Were contractors incentivised to ignore improper behaviour in order to keep projects moving?
Did governments receive warnings that should have triggered stronger intervention?
Were taxpayers paying unnecessary premiums because intimidation or restrictive practices distorted construction markets?
Those are precisely the kinds of questions a properly resourced royal commission can pursue beyond the daily political cycle.
And then there is the money
The supplied opinion frames the issue in the most provocative possible way: how much money was “stolen” under Labor’s watch?
That wording should not yet be treated as an established conclusion.
The royal commission has only just begun.
It has not determined how much taxpayer money, if any, was criminally stolen.
But its financial mandate is real.
The terms allow examination of the financial impact of corruption and misconduct and whether public funds can potentially be recovered.
That distinction matters.
Taxpayer losses can occur through outright theft or fraud.
They can also occur through inflated labour costs, unnecessary delays, compromised procurement, reduced competition, phantom work, coercive commercial arrangements or systemic inefficiency.
Not every wasted dollar is stolen.
Not every inflated cost is criminal.
But taxpayers are entitled to know how much misconduct ultimately cost them.
Victoria’s Big Build is enormous
The financial stakes are magnified by the sheer size of the infrastructure program under examination.
Current reporting describes the Big Build program at around $100 billion or more, encompassing some of Victoria’s largest public construction projects.
At that scale, apparently small percentages become enormous sums.
A one per cent inefficiency across $100 billion is $1 billion.
Five per cent is $5 billion.
That arithmetic does not establish that either amount was lost through corruption.
It demonstrates why rigorous examination of costs, procurement and productivity is warranted.
The Metro Tunnel and West Gate Tunnel enter a new political era
Two projects in particular loom over the inquiry: the Metro Tunnel and West Gate Tunnel.
They were once expected to provide highly visible evidence of Labor’s infrastructure achievements.
Now they sit inside a broader examination of the system that delivered Victoria’s megaprojects.
The commission will not merely be asking whether the infrastructure itself was worthwhile.
A useful project can still be delivered through a dysfunctional system.
A railway can provide public benefit while costing more than it should.
A tunnel can be economically valuable while individual contracts within the project deserve scrutiny.
Separating those questions will be critical.
Business is under scrutiny too
The commission’s breadth also prevents an easy political narrative in which every problem is attributed solely to militant unionism.
Builders, contractors, engineers, suppliers, labour-hire firms and other commercial actors may face scrutiny over what they knew, what they tolerated and whether they benefited from improper conduct.
That could prove significant.
If companies paid improper costs and simply passed them to taxpayers, the commission may want to know why.
If executives believed intimidation or criminal influence existed, investigators may ask whether they reported it.
If commercial organisations benefited from distorted procurement arrangements, their role could become just as relevant as that of union officials.
The CFMEU itself has said it will cooperate with the commission while arguing scrutiny should encompass the entire construction sector rather than unions alone.
A Special Prosecutor raises the stakes
Carroll is also establishing an Office of the Special Prosecutor to operate alongside the commission.
That means evidence of possible criminal conduct need not simply disappear into a final report and recommendations.
Material uncovered by the inquiry can be referred for potential legal action.
The government also intends to strengthen IBAC with additional “follow the money” powers.
Together, the three elements create a potentially powerful structure.
The Special Prosecutor can pursue appropriate criminal matters.
If implemented effectively, that goes considerably further than another administrative review.
Christopher Kourakis is now one of the most important people in Victorian politics
Despite the political arguments surrounding its creation, the inquiry now belongs to its commissioner.
Christopher Kourakis served as Chief Justice of South Australia and has been described by anti-corruption barrister Geoffrey Watson SC as an “inspired choice” to lead the investigation.
The quality of the commission will depend heavily on how aggressively it follows evidence.
Who is called?
Which documents are demanded?
How far back does questioning go?
How closely are government decisions examined?
Are commercial organisations scrutinised as heavily as union officials?
Does the inquiry follow suspicious financial arrangements regardless of where they lead?
Those decisions will ultimately determine whether the commission becomes transformative or merely another volume on a government shelf.
Daniel Andrews could be called
The prospect attracting the greatest political attention is testimony from former premiers.
Daniel Andrews presided over the extraordinary expansion of Victoria’s infrastructure program.
Jacinta Allan spent years in senior infrastructure roles before becoming premier herself.
Carroll has explicitly refused to place former leaders beyond the inquiry’s reach.
If Kourakis believes either former premier possesses relevant evidence, the commission has the power to seek it.
Again, being called as a witness would not imply wrongdoing.
Royal commissions routinely question decision-makers because understanding what happened requires understanding what information reached the top of government.
But politically, televised evidence from the architects of Victoria’s Big Build would be extraordinary.
Jacinta Allan’s infrastructure record may receive particular attention
Allan’s relationship with the Big Build is especially significant because infrastructure was central to her ministerial career before she became premier.
The commission may therefore have reason to examine not only decisions made during her premiership but systems and projects overseen during earlier portfolios.
The legitimate questions are institutional rather than accusatory.
What information was available?
What controls existed?
What warnings reached ministers?
What action followed?
And did those actions adequately protect taxpayers?
The political humiliation is real — but it is also Carroll’s opportunity
James Campbell’s opinion describes the calling of the commission as a massive humiliation for the government.
There is an obvious basis for that interpretation.
Labor has governed Victoria since 2014.
The infrastructure program being investigated was built under Labor.
The governments whose oversight will inevitably be examined were Labor governments.
And the Premier now commissioning that examination is himself Labor.
But Carroll is attempting to turn that liability into a political distinction.
His message is effectively that whatever happened previously, his premiership will expose it.
That explains the unusually deliberate line from his first day:
“I am not Daniel Andrews; I am not Jacinta Allan.”
That strategy carries enormous risk
Carroll cannot control what the commission discovers.
Once a royal commission with broad coercive powers begins obtaining documents and questioning witnesses, political convenience is supposed to become irrelevant.
Evidence may embarrass former governments.
It may embarrass current ministers.
It may expose corporate behaviour.
It may implicate union officials.
It may reveal failures inside departments and agencies.
Or it may establish that some widely circulated allegations were exaggerated.
A genuine inquiry must remain open to all of those possibilities.
The opposition wants an even deeper investigation
Victorian Opposition Leader Jess Wilson has indicated the Liberals would pursue their own broader examination if elected, maintaining pressure on Labor as Victoria approaches the November election.
That creates another incentive for Carroll to make the current commission credible.
If voters conclude its terms are restrictive or that obvious evidence is being avoided, the opposition can argue Labor designed an inquiry to protect itself.
If Kourakis conducts an aggressive investigation under broad terms established by Labor itself, that attack becomes considerably harder.
The election will arrive long before the final report
This creates an unusual timeline.
Victorians will vote before the commission completes its work.
The final report is due in August 2027.
That means voters will probably be judging Labor while hearings, evidence and revelations are still emerging.
The political effect could therefore depend less on the final recommendations than on what happens publicly along the way.
A single witness can dominate a week.
A document can reopen years-old political arguments.
A procurement decision that once looked technical can become front-page news.
A former minister’s evidence can reshape perceptions of an entire government.
That is why royal commissions are so politically unpredictable.
The most important number is not yet known
The temptation now will be to attach a spectacular dollar figure to alleged corruption.
That should be resisted until evidence supports it.
There are already large estimates circulating about the possible cost of misconduct and inefficiency across Victoria’s construction sector.
But the commission exists precisely because those claims need rigorous testing.
The question is not how large a number politicians or commentators can produce.
It is what amount investigators can demonstrate.
How much resulted from legitimate construction complexity?
How much came from inflation?
How much came from project scope changes?
How much came from poor management?
How much came from industrial arrangements?
How much, if any, resulted from fraud, corruption or criminal conduct?
Those categories should not be conflated.
Victorians deserve an accounting, not just a scandal
The most valuable outcome of the royal commission would not be a parade of political celebrities through a witness box.
It would be an accounting.
Victorians have funded an infrastructure program worth more than $100 billion.
They deserve to know whether the procurement system obtained value for money.
They deserve to know whether criminal or corrupt actors extracted money from public projects.
They deserve to know whether companies enabled misconduct.
They deserve to know whether officials ignored warning signs.
And if recoverable taxpayer money can be identified, they deserve an attempt to recover it.
The commission could become bigger than the politicians who created it
That is the peculiar power of the decision Carroll has made.
Calling a royal commission allows a Premier to say he is acting decisively.
But once established, a credible royal commission develops a life of its own.
Carroll has promised broad terms.
He has promised access to documents.
He has promised that former premiers are not protected.
He has promised a Special Prosecutor.
And he has said nothing is off limits.
Victorians can now hold him to those promises.
Labor built the Big Build. Now Labor has commissioned the investigation
There is no escaping the political symbolism.
The Big Build was supposed to be one of the defining achievements of the Andrews-Allan era.
It may still ultimately be remembered for transformative infrastructure.
But the system that constructed it is now the subject of a $50 million royal commission into allegations of corruption, criminal conduct and serious misconduct.
That is a profound reversal.
Whether it becomes a catastrophe for Labor will depend on evidence that has not yet been heard.
Whether taxpayer money was criminally stolen — and how much — must also be established rather than assumed.
But the questions can no longer be avoided.
Who benefited?
Who knew?
Who failed to act?
What did it cost Victorian taxpayers?
And can any of that money be recovered?
For years, Labor’s Big Build was measured in kilometres of rail, tunnels and billions of dollars committed.
For the next 12 months, Christopher Kourakis will be measuring something else.
How well Victoria protected the public’s money while all of it was being built.
