Vic govt spends $6m on E/W link houses

The Victorian government has spent $6 million on private security guards to watch empty homes that had been bought for the dumped East West Link.

Government tender documents show Wilson Security were granted a $4.2 million contract in November to provide guards until October 31 this year and a $1.8 million contract was awarded to Victorian Protection Security Services for July 2016 to June 2017.

The guards are manning homes in Bendigo Street, Collingwood, which were bought by the previous government for the East West Link.

The road project was subsequently scrapped by the Andrews Labor government and last year squatters moved into the houses, prompting violent clashes.

"I make no excuses for the fact that the government seeks to obviously protect that neighbourhood and obviously protect publicly owned assets," Planning Minister Richard Wynne told the Nine Network.

Shadow attorney-general John Pesutto said the cost would "outrage a lot of Victorians".

"Not only did Daniel Andrews waste $1.2 billion not to build a road, he's now wasting $6 million a year on security for homes no one's ever really going to want to buy," he told Nine.