Jacinta Allan made the comment at Wangaratta railway station on Wednesday during her first visit to the North East in charge of the transport portfolio.

Asked by The Border Mail what would be an acceptable date for new rolling stock on the line, now served by 1980s trains, Ms Allan said she could not say without the outcome of research into suitable carriages.  

“I can well appreciate the desire for a date to be pinpointed right now, but frustratingly because that planning work has not been done that needs to be done. I’m not wanting to pluck a date out of thin air,” Ms Allan said.

“That would only cause further frustration for the community.

“We need to do this planning work, that’s why we’ve laid it out in the regional network development plan, it’s why we’ve provided funding for it in the budget, so we can come back in hopefully a shorter period of time and communicate and consult with the community about both the work that needs to be done and give some clarity … on those timelines that people are looking for.”

Ms Allan said the possibility of VLocity rail stock being modified for use on the Albury line, an “off the shelf” product and consulting with NSW about a joint tender to replace the XPT would be considered.

She also talked up a plan to run buses between North East centres and Seymour station.

Ms Allan said the idea of buses from Wodonga, Wangaratta and Benalla had been raised by her upper house Labor Party colleague Jaclyn Symes.

"We want to explore with the community further the opportunity to have express shuttle buses, if you like, along the corridor down to Seymour which would connect with the more frequent train services into Melbourne," Ms Allan said.

"(It's) something through the consultation, something that Jaclyn has raised with us and we're very keen to have those further consultations with the community."

The Victorian Opposition's public transport spokesman David Hodgett dismissed the bus proposal.

“Passengers do not want to have to change from trains to coaches at Seymour, or travel all the way to Southern Cross on a road coach,” Mr Hodgett said.

“Labor should be funding and ordering new long distance trains with buffet facilities and first and economy class seats.

"All Jacinta Allan can offer is a vague ‘consultation’ process'."

Ms Allan said refurbishment of existing train sets had begun, but she accepted the "most important" issue was new rolling stock.

The regional rail plan released on Monday flagged five daily services for the Albury line, but Ms Allan said it was dependant on more modern train sets.

Unreliability was also cited by Ms Allan who noted 40 per cent of services were cancelled because of faults.

Unsurprisingly V/Line services in both directions on the line were delayed by train and track problems on Wednesday.