Members statement

For some time now electricity prices have been steadily growing, and I am hearing widely throughout my community that this is causing distress.

While Victoria has initiated its own ambitious targets for renewable energy and energy security, at a commonwealth level years of political infighting and public posturing have left us with an absence of any long-term framework to support industry and consumers.

The policy vacuum means businesses who want to invest in renewable energies will not, because making a 15-year business decision on a moving feast of political whims does not make sense.

Rising costs are seriously affecting families, and as I go about my community I am hearing from people and having people come into my office who are facing cut-offs of electricity in their homes. In a country such as Australia this is an indignity that should not happen to people.

A framework for renewable energy is now on the table in the form of the National Energy Guarantee (NEG). Businesses need this security and the sustainable development for our communities, and that financial relief that is supposed to come with the NEG is desperately needed. While the NEG in its current form may not fulfil everyone’s ideals of a perfect system, there are worse positions to come from than the middle ground. Feedback from my community suggests that this is finally a way forward, and there is a keen desire to see us just get on with it. Governments are meeting tomorrow, and I would urge the government to put politics aside and make a decision.

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Second reading

I am pleased to have the opportunity to make a contribution on the Disability Service Safeguards Bill 2018.

I am aware that there are really two major tranches of reform coming through in this bill: firstly, the establishment of an independent registration and accreditation scheme for the disability workforce; and secondly, a scheme to protect the rights of residents in special disability accommodation to enable them to exercise rights and choices that they probably have not previously enjoyed.

I was a member of the Family and Community Development Committee when we undertook the inquiry into abuse in disability residential services. That was very shortly after I entered this place, and it was quite an experience to be part of an inquiry that delved very long and hard into the issues that were put before it. While we had a scheme to deal with a range of issues that arise in relation to abuse in this field, the Four Corners report in November 2014 really highlighted the deficiency — many deficiencies in fact — that existed, and no doubt that was one of the triggers for bringing on the inquiry that followed. Similarly the Ombudsman had also undertaken a very wideranging, broad inquiry into abuse in disability services and made some very scathing comments and some recommendations — all that while we did have a disability services commissioner in place.

In relation to employment issues, we had a disability worker exclusion scheme that was run within the Department of Health and Human Services, which we learnt about during the course of the inquiry, and there was a disability worker exclusion list. The list contained details of people who posed a threat to the health, safety or welfare of people with a disability living in disability residential services. The scheme had been set up within the department to deal with issues that were clearly there. There had been a serious lack of vetting of people who were employed in these sorts of services.

Some members might remember the Kumar case — a criminal trial involving a disability service worker charged with rape. During the course of the evidence, as I understand it, it was pretty clear that not many people had done any work to work out what his previous history had been before he came into it and that had they done so, that situation would not have arisen. It became very clear during the course of the inquiry that there was a need to look into ways of improving the basic safety and needs of people in residential disability services — people who are so vulnerable and who are at the mercy of the workers. Unfortunately there were too many cases of abuse that we heard about that had clearly been going on for a very long time.

I have to say that I was extremely moved during the course of hearing evidence from parents and siblings about the absolute helplessness that they felt in the face of knowing that abuse was being perpetrated on their loved one in such a service — and not only that but the absolute inability of the system to satisfactorily deal with their complaints. In some ways that was like twisting the knife in the wound for so many of those families. They became aware of the abuse that was occurring and wanted to advocate for their family member and wanted things to be better, and they found that they were hitting a brick wall with the disability services commissioner.

The issue of the employment of appropriate people within these services really arose as being a very major factor in the course of that inquiry. The terms of reference of that inquiry included the committee looking at workforce recruitment screening, induction training and supervision, and provider registration requirements. That indeed is what happened, and strong recommendations were made around that.

This very substantial piece of legislation, the bill that is before us today, goes into great detail in dealing with those sorts of issues. It will be very pleasing and very well received by many of those families out there that have those vulnerable family members who are in so many ways at the mercy of their carers, day in and day out, 24 hours a day. While so many workers in that field are to be commended and do a great job, we do have to be wary of the fact that this is an area where perpetrators will place themselves and where in some ways they can find easy targets. So this screening and registration process is not coming too soon by any means. It is just essential that we have it.

I think one of the other things that really struck me about the evidence that we heard was the number of elderly parents who had family members in care who were now adults, and their greatest stress was what would happen to that disabled family member once they were no longer there to care and advocate for them. Again, I think a piece of legislation such as this will provide some comfort that when they are gone and their adult disabled family member is still a part of the system and still in need of care, at least there will be standards in place that will be implemented to provide a greater level of protection and to provide places to complain to and places to have their complaints dealt with more effectively.

Over the course of time since the recommendations were tabled in this house, a range of amendments have been made to the legislation that have implemented some of those recommendations. I am pleased to see here today these particular changes which do implement many of the recommendations that were made.

In Shepparton — and I represent the Shepparton district — we have the national disability insurance scheme (NDIS) arriving in January 2019. It has been rolling out across the state, starting in Barwon, since several years ago. It has been interesting to watch the implementation of the scheme. There is no doubt that there are many problems, many difficulties, associated with it. I think, given that it is now a national scheme that is in place, there will be many challenges in sorting out what is going to be dealt with at a state level and what the federal government will be responsible for. There were many recommendations around, first of all, having a royal commission into the issue of abuse in disability services, but that is pretty clearly not happening. The march is now on to get implementation and to get all of this work rolled out on the ground.

I regularly hear, even though I am a state member, complaints about difficulties people are having in their interactions with the NDIS, and I think it really is incumbent upon the government, the federal government in particular, to make sure that there is someone at the end of a phone line and that there are enough support workers out there to help people prepare their case plans to be sure that people are able to access the services they need. It is a great plan. It was a bipartisan plan in the federal Parliament and one that everyone wanted to see happen. But it is now incumbent on all of us — state, federal and at every level, including local government, which has a role in this area to some extent — to make sure that it works and that it works for the benefit of those people who are so much more vulnerable and who are unable to advocate for themselves. I have concentrated more on that side rather than the issue of tenancy and the safeguards there, but I support those too. I commend the bill to the house.

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Second reading

I rise with a heavy heart to speak on the Justice Legislation Miscellaneous Amendment Bill 2018.

It is heavy for a lot of reasons, one being that it appears that nobody on that side of the house is going to speak up for so many people in our community, and it is the same on this side.

We have got an agenda driven by the Herald Sun that is really concerning to me.

I will not touch on many aspects of what is in this bill today because I am not in opposition to much of it.

However, I am strongly opposed to mandatory sentencing and cannot countenance being a member of this place and not speaking about my concerns.

 

Let me start by saying I have great regard for emergency services workers in this state. They do very difficult and demanding work, which many of us would be disinclined to do. Indeed over the years I have known many people who have worked in these areas, particularly in hospitals, and they have been the victims of perpetrators who have been violent towards them. There are many laws in place to deal with these offenders, and they are dealt with.

I have been a member of the legal profession for over 40 years. I have read widely on this topic and spoken to many people at the coalface in our court system. Many of their views will be reflected in my contribution. Court users agree that the courts of this state are underfunded and understaffed. The Herald Sun — which I hate quoting — today refers to the fact that every cell in the state is presently full. Our prisons are full. Every cell across this state is full of people who are now unable to be dealt with. So many people are now being held on remand. Many of these people will subsequently be found innocent of any charges, but there it is.

The causes of these problems include funding cuts by successive governments but also a growing animosity among political participants towards the judiciary and its officers. This animosity is worrisome because an independent, adequately funded and respected judiciary is central to the maintenance of the rule of law and the separation of powers — two principles upon which continued peace and prosperity for our society absolutely rely.

The Magistrates Court in this state bears the burden of this animosity. Far from being in ivory towers, magistrates live and work in the city, in the suburbs and in our regional centres, where their workloads increase and where they continually face growing criticism about their ‘soft sentencing’. This is a fictitious phenomenon never actually reflected in the statistics that record their work or in the courtroom. It would be very salutary for many of the people in this place to go and sit in a Magistrates Court, look at the number of cases magistrates have to deal with on a daily basis and then continue to criticise them for the decisions they make.

The lessons of history will tell us that a degraded and politically meddled-with judiciary assures us of bad and unfair outcomes caused because sentences are imposed without thought, without regard to proportionality, without aim, without purpose and without a considered and objective mind. A Parliament that cuts and criticises the judiciary and then complains about its capacity is thinking only of using its basest instinct and about the next election. This arises from a hot and fleeting temper to do retribution to those it sees as bad.

It is not a Parliament concerning itself with what really works. Mandatory sentencing laws are bad laws, and they have proved to be so in so many other jurisdictions. They have been repealed in other jurisdictions. They will prove to be bad here.

The Law Council of Australia, the Law Institute of Victoria and the Victorian Bar Council all stand against this legislation, as do so many of our community legal services. They are the people who see this in operation every day. So many other organisations also do. Much has been written about this, and I acknowledge John McPherson from Bendigo, a solicitor who has written an excellent paper on this topic that summarises it particularly well.

While mandatory sentencing may be great for electoral politics, it is simply bad policy. All of the organisations I have mentioned regard it as bad policy and say that it leads to individual unfairness and negative outcomes. It fails to make the community safer — there is no evidence that it does that. Mandatory sentencing brings about unjust and anomalous, disproportionate sentences. Why should judges not have discretion? They have all the facts before them. They are the only ones who can make a considered decision on an individual basis that will provide justice for the people involved. I do not doubt that sometimes they might get it wrong. Who doesn’t? Who does not make mistakes in our society? Is there anyone here who can say they have never made a mistake in the role and duties that they undertake?

Mandatory sentencing results in higher imprisonment levels. Our prisons are full. New beds are coming online, and they were announced recently, but mainly for the worst offenders. Again, our prison cells are full. All the cells at our police stations today are full. This is just a situation that a law like this will do nothing to help. It will increase the load on the prison system, and it will not improve. In Victoria nearly 45 per cent of prisoners released from jail return within two years, while 25 per cent of people within the community corrections punishment system come back within two years. The difference between the two is amazing, and I think a properly functioning community corrections system is actually shown to be much more effective. It is much more likely to be able to bring into place rehabilitation and hook people into the services in the community that they need. In a situation where people are spending a mandatory six months in jail they are unlikely to get any access to rehabilitation in that time.

Imprisonment is extraordinarily expensive. In the 10 years to June 2017 the Victorian prison population increased by more than 70 per cent. This may not sit well with many in this house and the tabloid press, but what it represents is that instead of being soft on crime, magistrates and judges are doing the opposite and putting away people in great numbers. Mandatory sentencing does not do away with the discretion in the judicial process; it transfers it to the police and to prosecutors. So instead of judges now exercising the discretion knowing all the facts, the police will decide what charges they will lay. They will become the masters of the decision about what charges are laid, and I find that a very concerning and pretty scary prospect. It is absolutely inappropriate that they should be given that level of discretion.

Mandatory sentencing undermines public confidence in the justice system generally and in judges in particular. Why should judges be given the discretion in every other case but not in this particular situation that we are legislating on today? They have shown themselves for so long to be able to exercise their discretion appropriately, and let me tell you that evidence shows that community members, when they are informed of all the relevant facts, when they consider what the appropriate sentence should be and what is fair, often consider that what judges do is over the top. The Sentencing Advisory Council has run a number of tests on this and they have found each time that people actually are more lenient out there in the community than are our judges.

Mandatory sentencing disadvantages the most vulnerable members of our society: young Indigenous people, people with mental illness, disabled people and those more sinned against than sinners in our society. There is a serious risk that a law such as this will deter people in our community who may have family members with mental illness from actually calling an ambulance. It is just an awful situation to think that you may be dealing with someone in your home who is extremely unwell, who is impacted in some way and who might lash out, but you are too afraid to call emergency services in this state because they might lash out, because something might happen — and not because they are deliberately intentionally being violent but because they simply cannot help themselves; it is their condition. We do not live in a society where we want people treated like that.

On family violence, here we have had the Royal Commission into Family Violence. It is totally counterintuitive to now have a law such as this which will make people who are the victims of family violence anxious about calling the police, about calling others to come to their home to assist them. Why would they? So many times the last thing that person wants is for their partner to be jailed for six months mandatorily. It takes away the discretion. It is bad law; it is bad policy, and I am opposed to it.

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Second reading

I am pleased to rise and make a contribution on the Victorian Industry Participation Policy (Local Jobs First) Amendment Bill 2018.

I welcome this legislation and the direction it takes.

The purposes of the bill are to provide for governance, compliance and enforcement of the policy behind the bill.

It requires reports to be made to Parliament regarding implementation and compliance, and it mandates local jobs wherever possible.

This is such an important thing for my electorate, because never before have we seen so many projects either getting underway or being about to get underway. I note, first of all, that the new Shepparton courthouse has recently been completed. It is a major five-storey building, which I can tell you, in the middle of Shepparton, really stands out. It is an excellent facility and, as a practising lawyer, I have been in the old one for many years and bemoaned the fact that it did not suit the purposes or the needs of the local community, the local legal profession or members of the judiciary who visit on a regular basis. It is wonderful to see that building completed.

Today the new Koori Court in Shepparton is being opened, and what a wonderful thing that is. We have actually had a Koori Court in Shepparton, but it was a very tiny little room that made it very difficult for families and all of those people who need to be in a courtroom during the hearing of a case to be present. The newer, bigger facilities, with the latest technology, are truly outstanding. That was a project where a certain amount of local content was required and was used.

There are many projects that have been funded during my short time in Parliament by working with the government of the day. The Shepparton district had suffered such neglect for such a long time across a whole range of areas. Just to start with, the redevelopment of Goulburn Valley Health, which is our major regional health service, has been funded for the first stage and the works are now underway. That is such an important project for our region. It had languished for years. There had been master plan after master plan on the table and lobbying to try to get the funds to make it happen, so I was very pleased when the government announced in its second budget the funding to proceed with the redevelopment of Goulburn Valley Health. Lend Lease have been awarded the contract for that, the overarching major contract for that project, and it has been a pleasure to meet with them and the project managers at the hospital to see the works commencing, and to be sure that local content is being used.

Over the course of the last three weekends the whole hospital has had to have its electricity supply shut down. Something like 18 major generators have been brought in to keep the hospital functioning. It is a major piece of work, and the electricity contractor that is doing that work is a big local Shepparton firm. It is so good to see that happening. It is a firm that employs apprentices.

Part of the mandate for the development of this hospital is also that there be a percentage of Indigenous employment. That is so important in my electorate because it has the highest Indigenous population outside of metropolitan Melbourne. We have very high unemployment rates. We still struggle with young people completing education and, on that note, I would just like to mention a college in Shepparton, the Academy of Sport, Health and Education. This was set up some time ago as a collaboration between the Rumbalara Football and Netball Club and the University of Melbourne, and it has taken young students on board, assisting them all the way through their secondary education and also through their engagement with the local TAFE college. There are young people now coming out of that college and taking up jobs in our communities. It is a project that is so well worth supporting.

I might add that just in relation to our Indigenous community, the government funded this year approximately $23 million for the Munarra Centre of Regional Excellence. That is to be a very big sporting, educational and cultural building. I have seen the plans for it and they are truly impressive. Schools such as the Academy of Sport, Health and Education will move into that facility when it has ultimately been built. It will hopefully develop sporting people throughout the region a bit along the lines of the Michael Long Learning and Leadership Centre in Darwin, which is there to promote sporting opportunities for young Indigenous people. I have not had the chance to visit the Michael Long centre, but I really look forward to an opportunity to do that just to get the feel of how that operates and how we might replicate the parts that will work in Shepparton as we go forward.

Shepparton Art Museum has been housed in the civic centre for a very long time, and while it is a very lovely gallery it is unable to do justice to what we have in our community. The basement there has one of the best ceramics collections in Australia, but so much of it is just hidden underground and not on display. There is funding for the new Shepparton Art Museum, which is going to be a multistorey building on the banks of Lake Victoria as you drive into town, and those of you have been into Shepparton will know that as you drive in from Melbourne, on the left is Victoria Park Lake, which is a very beautiful part of our environment, with walking tracks and indigenous flora and fauna. On the edge of the lake the old Shell service station has now been demolished, and we are about to see the commencement of the new Shepparton Art Museum, which will be an absolute treasure and will give the old gallery the opportunity to actually bring out and display this incredible collection that we have. It is something that will cater to the whole community, with a whole range of coffee shops. There will be an Indigenous area, and there will be all these opportunities to display what we truly have in our collections in the Goulburn Valley.

Three hundred and fifty-six million dollars has now been invested in the upgrade of the rail between Shepparton and Seymour. I know all of you in this place have heard me go on and on and on about that for a very long time. It was a passion of mine long before I came to the Parliament to try and improve our rail services from what were four old, shabby services a day on the 1960s classic fleet of trains, which we will still have for a few years before we get the VLocity trains, but the work had to be done on the tracks before we could ask the government, really, to deliver the next stage, which will be the trains. That has very much been seen as part of the overall project. There are something like 58 level crossings between Shepparton and Seymour. Many of those will have to be rationalised and dealt with, but there will be a passing loop for freight trains, so our passenger train can go through, and a stabling at the Shepparton station for the trains to be able to park overnight, leading to nine return services a day. Again, this is such a great opportunity for local contractors to be able to engage in so much of the work that will be undertaken — local content, local work and local young people having job opportunities.

We saw youth unemployment as a real issue in the years before I came to this place. Together with the new Shepparton education plan and all these works that are being undertaken, there is a real opportunity for much greater employment. I hope we will attract many more people to come and live in a place like Shepparton. It is the fifth largest regional centre in Victoria and is truly a wonderful place to live and has a lot to offer, cheap housing included.

A Shepparton bypass has received some funding to undertake some of the basic work that will be needed to plan and go forward. That will mean the building of a second river crossing. That is something that I will, if re-elected to this place, work very hard with the government of the day to see happen, because it is a major project of about $300 million to get highways built and to bring in that second river crossing, which is so important. We only have one major river crossing between the east and west, and when it comes to fire, ambulance and emergency services, that becomes a real issue for us. So to have that river crossing for convenience but also for our emergency services will be excellent.

I believe that an industry participation office is going to be set up in Shepparton, and I am really pleased about that because with all of these projects underway to have our own office in Shepparton, working with contractors to help them gain work, is wonderful.

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