and have logged 55 hrs total time with 6 hrs solo
Unfortunately this is a common event. Last year a student clocked up over 55 hours of dual based at a small country airport close to Melbourne before he twigged he was being rorted and this was with the one instructor who himself was the CFI. He attended another flying school and after one hour of dual check was sent on first solo.
There is no shortage of anecdotal evidence that some junior instructors are reluctant to put their students up for a solo check, either because they lack experience to judge when their student is ready (most common problem) - or in worst cases, they hang on to the students to milk more dual. This is not common just to Melbourne, but judging by students comments in other websites, it happens in USA and UK.
The problem is lack of close supervision of both the student's progress and of the instructor's log book by the CFI of the schools concerned. CFI's tend to be concerned with advanced training and as a result leave the inexperienced instructors to themselves. The next thing the student has clocked up 15-20 hours of dual without ever flying with a grade one or the CFI.
The responsibility lies squarely in the hands of the CFI to closely monitor every student's progress and start asking serious questions of the instructor (s) before things get out of hand. All too often the CFI hasn't got a clue what goes on with ab-initio students and unless the junior instructor puts his hand up and admits difficulty with a student (fat chance where money in the pocket and hours in the log book are concerned) the CFI is rarely fazed if students are clocking up inordinately excessive dual hours. In fact he may not be aware of it.
While new instructors have to pick up experience somewhere, it should never be at the financial expense of an innocent student who is not in a position to question his personal progress.