Thursday, 12 May 2022

Bills

Justice Legislation Amendment Bill 2022

Second reading

Debate resumed.

Mr CARROLL (Niddrie—Minister for Public Transport, Minister for Roads and Road Safety) (14:57:007:): It is my pleasure to rise and speak on the Justice Legislation Amendment Bill 2022. As many of the speakers before me have acknowledged, this bill, at the heart of it, is about advancing the recommendations from the forced adoptions inquiry conducted by the Legislative Assembly Legal and Social Issues Committee. I want to put on record my thanks and appreciation to all members of that committee. Obviously it was one of those really most difficult, probably life-changing, experiences to participate on that committee, but to see the fruits of their labour with this legislation is really important. It will promote equality and also procedural fairness and clarity before the law.

The bill will introduce integrated birth certificates for adopted persons as recommended by the forced adoptions inquiry as well as make some technical changes to support other aspects of the government’s response. Also, and my predecessor I know would be very proud of this as the person who introduced and saw Victoria having a human rights charter, we are, and I congratulate the Minister for Equality and the Minister for Women on this as well, updating the Charter of Human Rights and Responsibilities with gender-inclusive language.

We will also amend the secrecy provisions in the Equal Opportunity Act 2010 and the Gender Equality Act 2020 to better reflect their operational needs. We will ensure the Judicial College of Victoria’s board is more diverse, in line with the Szoke review recommendation. We will also ensure that the Magistrates Court improves efficiency and remove unclear jurisdictional provisions, and there will be some changes to the Crimes at Sea Act 1999 to better reflect Australia and Timor-Leste. At the heart of this, though, this bill is really about ensuring that equal opportunity and our current framework around equal opportunity and human rights is where it should be and protecting some of our most vulnerable, and that is children.

The bill creates further exceptions to the secrecy provisions to enable the Victorian Equal Opportunity and Human Rights Commission to disclose information to VCAT in respect of freedom of information review applications. The review of freedom of information decisions made by government and government agencies, we know, is crucial to transparency. We know it is an important part of the mechanisms of how democracy functions as well as how government functions, and we are ensuring that when it comes to our important freedom of information laws they are as up to date as possible.

The bill also amends section 83 of the Equal Opportunity Act to include an avoidance of doubt provision which was inadvertently omitted from the Equal Opportunity (Religious Exceptions) Amendment Act 2021. The religious exceptions act already included the same avoidance of doubt provision, but we know that strengthening sections, as this will do, will ensure that interpretation and greater clarity is there within the act.

I also know that updating the secrecy provisions of the Equal Opportunity Act, clarifying the protections from religious discrimination of LGBTIQ+ students and staff, ensuring the Charter of Human Rights and Responsibilities Act 2006 has gender-inclusive terms, introducing integrated birth certificates for adopted people as well as other miscellaneous amendments to the Adoption Act 1984 and the Births, Deaths and Marriages Registration Act 1996 are really important reforms.

When you consider that the Legislative Assembly’s Legal and Social Issues Committee tabled its report on the inquiry into responses to historical forced adoption in Victoria back on 8 September 2021 and the government response to the inquiry was tabled on 10 March 2022, you see that the government has not wasted a moment. When you think about some of the debate that occurred yesterday concerning the Victorian Law Reform Commission report and the support and reform around victims rights—another key part of our legislative plank—it is vitally important that the government does take the time to ensure that when it does pass this legislation and it does amend relevant legislation, whether it be the Adoptions Act or whether it be the Births, Deaths and Marriages Registration Act, it does get it right. I am very pleased, and I do congratulate the minister, the Attorney-General, on doing what has been done here.

I think what is also very important is looking at integrated birth certificates. As someone who has dealt a bit with the office of the Registry of Births, Deaths and Marriages Victoria, they do an incredible amount of work there. Currently in Victoria the only legal birth certificate in respect of a person who has been adopted is the post-adoption certificate, which shows only the adoptive parents. This bill will allow the registry of births, deaths and marriages to issue a post-adoption birth certificate that includes the details of the natural parents and adoptive parents and can be used as a legally valid proof of identity. This is a really important reform, and we know that the inquiry noted that there are diverse views regarding birth certificates and that not all people who are adopted want an integrated birth certificate. It is really important that the office of births, deaths and marriages and the Secretary of the Department of Justice and Community Safety do have that ability to try and ensure there is a tailored approach for parents and adoptive parents but most importantly for that child.

Equally, though, there is the removal of mandatory counselling under section 87, which states that a person who has applied for adoption information must attend an interview with an approved counsellor. We will repeal certain parts of this legislation and ensure, in line with the Victorian Law Reform Commission recommendation, that the interview process when it comes to the Adoption Act recommendations is useful and is not mandatory. The amendments ensure that individuals do have the power, as the inquiry noted, to consider as part of the interview process the option of having counselling before being provided access to information. These amendments really will also bring the legislation into line with other jurisdictions around Australia.

Recommendation 56 from the inquiry states:

… restrict the use of adoption on child protection grounds as far as practicable.

An adoption order permanently severs the legal connection between the child and their birth family. Usually fully informed consent of each parent or guardian of the child is needed before this can happen. In some cases consent can be dispensed with by the court—for example, if a parent or guardian cannot, after a reasonable search, be found. This bill will remove some of the current grounds for dispensing with consent, which is really important to ensure that there is real respect for the parties involved. I can give this example: a permanent care order can be made that transfers all duties, powers, responsibilities and authority to the carers of the child and provides the child with a safe and supportive family environment. Subsequent intervention of child protection is no longer required. Importantly, this option maintains the child’s name and identity through continuity with their original birth certificate. It is imperative that fully informed consent of the natural parents be required for an adoption to occur so that the forced adoption practices of the past are never repeated. It is vitally important that the court also retains the discretion to dispense with consent where there are special circumstances by reason of which, in the interests of the child, consent may properly be dispensed with. It is really important reform.

I do want to acknowledge the many members in this place that have had a role in our reforms when it comes to forced adoption. I also want to acknowledge the previous Attorney-General, the member for Altona, and the current Attorney-General, a member for Northern Victoria, for their work. In addition to work and reform around adoption in this legislation, we are ensuring that the Equal Opportunity Act 2010 is also strengthened. This bill will promote community safety and increase efficiency for the justice system by expressly expanding exceptions to the secrecy provision in relation to the Victorian Equal Opportunity and Human Rights Commission and ensuring that where relevant all agencies and all circumstances are taken into account. The bill does reduce time when it comes to freedom of information, and I have already outlined how important the Freedom of Information Act 1982 is for a well-functioning, transparent and important part of government. We do know that under this government equality is not negotiable. All Victorians, no matter how they identify themselves, should feel safe, supported and equal, including in their workplace. These are really important reforms. The Andrews government has always been one of the leading jurisdictions in its support of equality and the rights of all Victorians and that they should all be recognised for who they are.

In my final notes I again want to commend and thank all members that have been part of the journey for this legislation. It is vitally important that the reviews take place, whether it be the Szoke Review of Sexual Harassment in Victorian Courts or whether it be the work that has gone through the parliamentary process on forced adoption and getting rid of many of the practices of the past that have done so much harm. This is really important legislation that I know will change how we feel about ourselves as a community but is most important for those Victorians that were part of the submission process to the committee inquiry into forced adoptions. So I commend this bill to the house.

Ms GREEN (Yan Yean) (15:07): It is a privilege to join the debate on the bill before the house, the Justice Legislation Amendment Bill 2022. Primarily my remarks are going to refer to the changes that relate to recommendations from the inquiry into responses to historical forced adoptions in Victoria. Firstly, I would like to acknowledge the many people who I know have been touched by the impacts of forced adoption, and I apologise if I miss any names: June Smith, Brenda Coughlan, Lyn Kinghorn, Anne Radford, the late Allan Radford, Nada Radford, Tate Radford, Mara Radford, Rhia Radford, Graeme Williams and most especially Matt Williams, born as Derek Radford, my cousin. I only met my cousin three years ago, and it is just a joy to have that connection with someone who was lost to our family through forced adoption in the early 1970s. We can never make up for the lost time for his siblings, for his birth mother, Anne and for his late father, Allan, who he never met but who was always very supportive to me when I was faced with becoming pregnant before I was married. I was on my own and being subjected to the same pressure that my aunt Anne was subjected to in the early 1970s.

It has just been part of my life story from being a little child and often from adults. I think it is something we should remember as adults—that children are always watching. We are always watching. I was a little girl in primary school, and I observed from—whatever I was—hip height exactly what happened to my aunt. I think that that whole idea of ‘Let’s keep things secret’, ‘No-one will ever know’—people do know, and there is damage. People in this place who know me well say that I have got a very good memory, and I do. I have a very clear memory of the pressure that my aunt was subjected to. She had no choice. Within the family, no matter what people say now, I never saw anyone stand up for her and say that she did not have to do what she was forced to do. It makes me very sad that she is still judged to this day and judged by moral standards that are very different to today’s—and I am so glad they are very different to today. But, you know, there are some that try to rewrite history too and try to say that she actually did have a choice, that she was given a choice and that she exercised that choice freely, and that was not to be a mother. That was never my observation, and I hope that those in the family who have put that view might reflect on that and tell Matt’s—also known as Derek—siblings that this was not the case.

I saw that as a little child, the pressure that she and Allan were subjected to and the lack of choice that they had. And certainly years later, when I lived with my grandmother in the year that I had maternity leave off as a public servant after I had my own son, Blake, I was subjected to exactly the same pressure that Anne and Allan were subjected to. But I did have my grandmother, who said, ‘No, we got that wrong in the 1970s—we absolutely got it wrong. You don’t have to do this; this is your choice’.

I also want to thank Father Ernie Smith, the founder of Sacred Heart Mission, because Mum took me to visit Ernie. I knew exactly why I was being taken to visit Ernie, because when I told my father that I was having Blake, he made it clear he was not going to speak to me again until I was prepared to discuss adoption. This was in 1982. This is not a long, long time ago. It is very clear in my memory. So my mum took me to see Father Ernie, and I thought, ‘Oh, I’m going to have some God-awful priest who’s going to judge me, who’s going to say I’ve sinned and I should go to confession and all that sort of stuff’. It was the exact opposite. Gee, Ernie was clever, and he was wonderful. He suggested to Mum and me, ‘Look, before we have lunch, why don’t we go downstairs, and we’ll help the volunteers that are preparing soup for the homeless’. And so we sat there in this very humble kitchen at Sacred Heart in Grey Street in St Kilda, and Mum and I were grating vegetables and chopping up vegetables with homeless men, making soup for others. Then we went upstairs, and I cannot remember if it was that soup or another soup, and Ernie said to Mum, ‘Go on, Wilma, go home and tell Wally he’s being an idiot. Danielle’s life has not ended. She’s a smart girl. She’s got a job to go back to. She’s got a good job now. She’s got a good job to go back to. She’s still the same intelligent, bright girl that you’ve raised, and she’ll make a success of her life.’ I just could have kissed him. There was finally someone in my corner.

Dad never really relented until after Blake was born, but when I gave birth to Blake, my doctor, the doctor that I chosen, disappeared, and I was subjected to the most abject pressure from one particular social worker who worked at the Royal Women’s Hospital. Knowing Lex de Man and others later on who worked with the Anne Hamilton-Byrne sect, I am quite clear in my mind that that woman was an agent of the Anne Hamilton-Byrne sect, so I found myself part of not just one huge injustice and story of potential forced adoption but also that horrendous Anne Hamilton-Byrne sect. This social worker gaslit me through the 11 days that I was in hospital. People might ask: why would any mother be in hospital for 11 days? And it was really the pressure that was being put on me to have my child adopted out. I did have a postnatal infection, but it was primarily this particular social worker, who was wrongly saying—was gaslighting me and saying—that I was not bonding properly with my son, that I did not know how to bath him and that he was not feeding properly, which was nonsense. Yes, I did have mastitis, but he was very well fed. He was an 8½-pound baby, and he was doing quite well—and from a family of four, the oldest of four, and a large extended family of cousins, of course I knew how to look after babies. I had practically raised my youngest sibling, and I had been changing nappies since I was about five or six. And I suppose I just saw absolutely, personally, what happened.

Since I have been in this place, every time that we have dealt with matters of forced adoption or we have been amending acts around this I have always thought of my aunt and thought of my cousin. Over the 20 years I have been in this place I would say, ‘Do you think it’s time? Do you think you might go and find him? Do you think you might tell the others of his existence?’, because I felt this burden, especially when my Uncle Allan, who I was very close to, died. I talked to him before he died, and he said, ‘I think everyone’s happy. I don’t think we need to pick the scab off that sore’.

But I have got to say, I did not want to be the one after my aunt, who is no longer with us, to have to keep that secret and not tell their siblings, so I was so delighted when Matt Williams, born Derek Radford, came into our lives three years ago and I met him at Easter. I had the privilege of meeting his adoptive father three days later when I represented the Premier at an Anzac event at the Shrine of Remembrance. It was just happenstance, and he showed me a photo of my aunt that he had been carrying in his wallet. He of course had not met my aunt until Matt had made the connection, but the photo had come with the baby. It was a photo of my aunt over her shoulder, holding this little baby, and it was such a photo of love. This beautiful man in his 80s said, ‘Danielle, we were so happy, the gift of Matt in our lives’, but he said, ‘I always carried this photo, and I thought, “It is the saddest photo I have ever seen in the world”’. And I just think, what a beautiful man to have thought that.

We need to continue to make the changes proposed by this inquiry. There are generations of families just like mine. The ripple in the pond has affected so many families. I want to thank the members of the committee who pushed so hard. I want to thank particularly the member for Altona for her beautiful speech today but also for being the one that had the courage to bring this inquiry to book and listen to the member for Macedon and me. I commend this wonderful bill to the house, and I look forward to further changes along this wonderful journey.

Ms CRUGNALE (Bass) (15:17): I feel like I should give my 10 minutes over to the member for Yan Yean to continue her story. I rise to make a contribution to the Justice Legislation Amendment Bill 2022. As noted in the chamber, this is an omnibus bill with several reform areas, all of which have at their core equality of the law. We have heard in-depth and heartfelt contributions thus far, in particular on the forced adoptions inquiry. I am speaking after the member for Yan Yean, whose story, family history and own personal experience is why we do this—to hold your grandmother’s and your mother’s words so closely and be wrapped around with Father Ernie at a time that could have gone either way, to have those solid people around you and hold that close to your heart.

I too wish to acknowledge the in-depth contributions, as I said, made so far and acknowledge the work of the former Attorney-General and the current Attorney-General in the other place and also the Legal and Social Issues Committee and its inquiry into responses to historical forced adoptions in Victoria and thank the chair, the member for St Albans, and all the committee members for their empathy and detailed work. The final report and its, as we have heard, 56 recommendations are testament to their work—their face-to-face meetings, their online meetings and their desire to do all they could to progress the inquiry through the pandemic years. The trust given over by the mothers and all who submitted was so brave and courageous—subjected to trauma, taken away, told they were unfit to be mothers, shunned from society, publicly shamed, drugged, living in silence. Recounting, reliving and even beginning to tell a story hidden for so long is and can be harrowing and traumatic, and I hope some women have been able to at least start or continue on a journey of healing.

The 56 significant recommendations were tabled last September, and in the government response, tabled on 10 March this year, 33 of those recommendations were supported by government, including plans to introduce a redress scheme, with the remainder to be further considered by government. Our committee work changes lives, and this bill makes of a range of priority amendments to enable some key recommendations of the inquiry to be swiftly implemented. Firstly, this bill makes a range of amendments to the Adoption Act 1984 and the Births, Deaths and Marriages Registration Act 1996 to implement recommendation 26 to introduce integrated birth certificates for adopted people. With so much heartbreak, one in particular speaks to the birth certificates of adopted Victorians. A woman adopted soon after birth presented her two birth certificates: two completely different names, two sets of parents, two dates of registration. The only commonalities were the place and date of birth. In the 10 days between the two registrations, she had assumed—or more realistically been forced to accept—a completely new identity, new name and new parents. The unresolved question of who she really was never left her. Which was the real birth certificate? The cruel answer to both haunted her until her untimely death last year.

I am relieved that this bill speaks to recommendation 26 made by the Legal and Social Issues Committee in that the integration of birth certificates will allow a person to obtain a legal birth certificate that includes the details of both their natural and their adoptive parents and the date of adoption—the true birth certificate, the whole picture. Consistent with the inquiry’s recommendation, there will be no cost to obtaining an integrated birth certificate, and it will be equal in status to other legal birth certificates. It will be available on application, as we know that not everyone wants their adoption made public. We are also removing the hurtful requirement that an adopted person applying for information must attend an interview with an approved counsellor before they receive information about the adoption. Comments about the interview process included words like ‘disempowered’, ‘vulnerable’ and ‘traumatised’. Others noted the slow and bureaucratic nature of the process. This was their truth, their story, and they were being required to justify and explain it and ask permission for its recognition. Lastly, we are ensuring that the fully informed consent of the natural parents is required for an adoption to proceed. So never again will we see the forced adoption practices of the past, where people other than the birth parents decided what was best for the child—heart-wrenching, horrible practices consigned to history.

When the Minister for Crime Prevention rose in this chamber for the second reading of a section of the amendment bill, she spoke to the heart of who we are as a society. It is important and customary that we speak and recount the benefits that legislative changes bring to people, to our communities and to wider society to give voice to those who may not be able to be heard in other ways. The changes in this bill may seem subtle and nuanced, but they affect every one of us. This legislation will mandate that gender-inclusive language replaces terms such as ‘his’ and ‘her’ with gender-neutral terms like ‘their’ and ‘person’ in the Charter of Human Rights and Responsibilities Act 2006. Every form we complete, every questionnaire, asks for our gender. Does it really matter if I am female, male, a doctor or married? This bill reinforces our government’s practice of many years of using gender-inclusive language when drafting legislation, always involving legal and LGBTIQA+ stakeholders to make sure we get the language right, because words do matter.

This bill also makes two changes to the Equal Opportunity Act 2010, allowing the Victorian Equal Opportunity and Human Rights Commission, as they requested, to disclose confidential information when necessary to protect the welfare of others. Changes to the Equal Opportunity Act 2010 will clarify that the Victorian Equal Opportunity and Human Rights Commission can disclose information to relevant agencies—for example, child protection or Victoria Police—reducing the time and public resources currently in place and better protecting the safety and welfare of those who need it most. Privacy is protected under the Freedom of Information Act 1982, but where there is a credible threat of harm, time is imperative.

We are further ensuring that religious education institutions can only discriminate on the basis of religious beliefs, not on other attributes such as gender, identity or sexual orientation, confirming and clarifying section 83 of the Equal Opportunity Act. Equality is not negotiable here in Victoria under a Labor government. The LGBTIQA+ community has not forgotten the Liberal-Nationals coalition’s voting record on our reforms last year, voting against equality.

These changes affect our rural, regional and metro communities, and this is not the whole picture. My electorate of Bass includes the outer-metro areas, the growing suburbs of Pakenham, Clyde and Clyde North, as well as the communities in and around Western Port Bay and down towards the Bass Strait. My reason for stating this is that there can be more anonymity, as we know, in larger communities in a way. There also tend to be more resources and more connection options for the LGBTIQA+ community in areas of greater population. But in smaller towns like Grantville, Tenby Point, Corinella, San Remo and Harmers Haven they provide far fewer resources for these communities. So wherever you live, this legislation reinforces the very clear message that it does not matter—you are equal.

I will move on from the esteemed work of the Minister for Crime Prevention to the achievements of the former Attorney-General. Joining our esteemed Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, Her Honour Anne Ferguson, the member for Altona initiated the preventing and addressing sexual harassment in Victorian courts and VCAT review, giving those across the justice system the confidence to speak up without fear of reprisal and identifying ways to build a culture that calls out sexual harassment—because our government looks to the future as well as the past.

This bill deals with recommendation 7 and demonstrates our government’s commitment to equality across the judiciary. One role of the Judicial College of Victoria is to educate and support officers and VCAT members on gender equality and diversity. Increasing the number of non-judicial directors from two to four allows for a greater voice from those with lived experience, complementing the legal contributions of the board; reflects our rich diversity, including people with disability, our First Nations people and young people; and commits to the recruitment and selection of women to ensure gender equality.

Section 8 of the Judicial College of Victoria Act 2001 requires at least one non-judicial director to have academic experience, bringing this perspective to the table. There is a lot in this bill—there is the Crimes at Sea Act 1999—but all in all, I totally commend this bill to the house.

Mr PEARSON (Essendon—Assistant Treasurer, Minister for Regulatory Reform, Minister for Government Services, Minister for Creative Industries) (15:27): Thank you, Acting Speaker Richards. It is a delight to see you in the chair this afternoon. It is wonderful to see the class of 2018 start to expand their wings in this fine institution, being the Parliament of Victoria.

Members interjecting.

Mr PEARSON: I must say I am rather partial to the class of 2014, but nonetheless the class of 2018 was an outstanding intake. And as she is leaving the chamber now, I do want to acknowledge the very kind, very thoughtful and very considered contribution that the member for Yan Yean made.

This institution is a glorious institution. This place brings the very best out of all of us at times, and I think the strength and the integrity of this institution is in the fact that so many people who have had different lives and different lived experiences come here and work constructively and collaboratively. Today’s debate has been the apogee of that, if you look at what the member for Yan Yean has said in terms of her lived experience and the way in which she shared that. I listened to the member for Altona’s contribution earlier this morning, and I am reminded of the distinguished record she holds in this place as a member and as a former minister of the Crown. I note my good friend the member for Geelong is here, and one of the most heartfelt, thoughtful and passionate contributions I have heard in this place was from the member for Geelong when as a member of the committee she handed down the report that led to this outcome.

This institution is such a wonderful thing—the fact that you have got the ability to have thoughtful, considered members who have had a different lived experience come together, work together in a committee environment with the support and encouragement of the former Attorney, come forward with a plan to deal with these past wrongs, collaborate together and then shepherd that work through a cabinet process to deliver an outcome, to right a wrong. I do not think we celebrate our wins enough in this place at times. Our friends from the fourth estate are not here, and this contribution, like so many others, will be quickly forgotten, and we will move on. And you can be sure that the next time we come together for question time the galleries will be packed, the cameras will roll and maybe it might get on the news, maybe it will not. Effectively this table was constructed two sword lengths away from the opposition—the notion that this was constructed in such a way that if I had my sword, it would come to here, and if the member for Polwarth drew his sword, it would go there as well. The beauty of this institution is the fact that we can come together and we can work together and get great outcomes. And it was not that long ago that the attendants would have said, ‘Well, there’s a stranger in the house. Remove that child from here’. We have grown and we have evolved, and we are better as an institution.

Mr Riordan: I wouldn’t call the member for Mordialloc a junior.

Mr PEARSON: Well, it was not long ago, and I think the member for Yan Yean has been here long enough to know that this would not be the done thing. This would have been consternation. You could not have done this 20 years ago. You could not have done it 30 years ago. We can do it now because this grand institution, the people’s Parliament, has evolved and we are using this institution to right past wrongs. We are so grateful and fortunate that we have this institution, and we are grateful and fortunate that we have got outstanding members who through their collective endeavours and through their lived experience can work together constructively and collaboratively to right past wrongs. This is the Parliament at its best.

Again, this speech will be quickly forgotten and this contribution will be forgotten, but if people could just see now what is occurring in this place, if you had got a member of this place from the 1970s and showed them this now, they would not have believed that this was happening. We are the richer and the better for it, because we bring together in this grand institution the history, the custom, the practice and the forms of the house, and we are melding and we are modifying this and we are reforming it to reflect our modern values. But you have got to have people of goodwill, good intentions, and people who are prepared to work, people who are prepared to put themselves out there. I do not profess for a moment to understand what it would have been like to be a member of that committee and to hear the stories, to hear the experiences and to reflect on one’s own lived experience. It would have been, I think, at times really challenging and hard. But those members have worked tirelessly, and we have achieved a fantastic outcome.

The member for Yan Yean made a point that words are important, and indeed she is right. I note that in the second-reading speech it talks about gender-inclusive language. I am reminded of the work of Ludwig Wittgenstein in his work Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus, which talks about the theory of language. Wittgenstein’s thesis was that when we speak we effectively transmit pictures to the person who is in receipt of that, and that person sees that picture and then interprets what is being said to them. Now, Wittgenstein sort of walked away from that theory later in his career, but the way in which it manifested itself was in Orwell’s writing, in Nineteen Eighty-Four with Winston Smith, and the notion of trying to reduce language—reduce it to its narrowest window—to try and prevent the ability for people to think and contemplate and share ideas. I will get the number wrong, but the Inuit have something like 12 or 15 words for ‘snow’. It is a really interesting idea, and it makes perfect sense. If you are a member of the Inuit community, you are going to see all sorts of different types of snow and you are going to have different forms of words to reflect that, whereas in English it is just one word—it is ‘snow’. Maybe if it is particularly wet it might be sleet, but it is kind of snow; that is about it. It limits the way in which we regard that thing, that material, that item.

So genuine inclusive language I think is really important, because we have got to make sure that people feel that they have got their place. One of the great honours I have had as a parliamentarian has been to be the Minister for Creative Industries, and at the moment PHOTO 2022 is on. We are putting up very large photos around the CBD and other areas as well. If you leave this precinct and you go over the road to Macarthur Street, in the connection between 1 Treasury Place and, I think it is, 1 Macarthur Street, you will see an amazing photo of a beautiful woman, a South Sudanese woman—a self-portrait—Atong Atem. The photo is stunning. It is absolutely stunning. Atong Atem was the first photographer who produced photographs of African Australians that have been displayed in the National Gallery of Victoria, the people’s gallery. African Australians walked into that gallery and said, ‘For the first time we can see ourselves in this institution’. That is really important, because this grand institution—the Parliament, the people’s Parliament of Victoria—needs to reflect the community that it serves. So when you see photos like Atong Atem’s, this is a face of modern Australia, this is a face of modern Victoria: a South Sudanese woman. The reality is the majority in this state are women. Something like 25 per cent of people are born overseas or have a parent born overseas. I think 50 per cent either have been born overseas or have a parent born overseas or two parents born overseas.

It is really important that we try and use these great institutions to make people feel good about themselves and who they are. If you exclude people, if you remove people, if you make people feel like this grand institution is only for the male, pale and stale, then it diminishes this grand institution, and you lock people out. Nations fail when you have got exclusive political institutions and when you have got exclusive economic institutions. I think that when we come together, when we have got people who have diverse backgrounds and who have had different lived experiences, when they come here with good intentions—and it is across the aisle—and want to work for good outcomes, if we can find a safe way to hear those voices and to work in a constructive way, in a collaborative way, we are the better for it and the community is better for it.

A bill like this is really important and, as I said, it is the apogee of all the good work those members of that committee did and the member for Altona did, in terms of bringing forward the bill, and the current Attorney-General has done in terms of bringing it forward. This is important. This is what we came to do. This is Parliament at its finest. Again, this speech will be forgotten. No-one will pay any attention to it, but this institution counts.

Mr RICHARDSON (Mordialloc) (15:37): It is a pleasure to rise to speak on the Justice Legislation Amendment Bill 2022 and follow my good friend the member for Essendon. I am glad he was not serious in his threat to boot me out, but I reckon my daughter, Orla, might make a better contribution, so we will see how we go. I appreciate the indulgence of the house as we power through legislation in circumstances that are confronting me at the moment with the little one.

This is a really critical, important piece of legislation and builds on a number of key reforms across key policy areas. I want to place on record the appreciation of my community for the work that was done by the Legislative Assembly’s Legal and Social Issues Committee on the report that they tabled on the inquiry into responses to historical forced adoption in Victoria—critical, generation-changing recognition of the harms of the past that underpin the 56 recommendations.

I think, listening to the contribution of the member for Geelong, it really brought home just how much heart and soul and how many contributions witnesses made, the vulnerability that was shown and the trauma that that brings, but then the care, support and nurture that came with that as well. We appreciate their work and efforts. It really is a great example of how committees can underpin great legislative reform and change, and it has been a really nice feature to hear just how that is being implemented and how that will deliver and support those outcomes.

These recommendations, in the context of that inquiry, go to a few key recommendations, for example, the integrated birth certificates. Currently in Victoria the only legal birth certificate in respect of a person who has been adopted is the post-adoption certificate, which shows only adoptive parents. The example that has been provided in this bill is that the adopted person may not wish to disclose that they are adopted when using their birth certificate for everyday purposes, but it provides people with choice. That was a key recommendation as well.

A member interjected.

Mr RICHARDSON: The Minister for Women is an absolute superstar in this space. Thank you very much—absolute star.

There is the removal of mandatory counselling. We heard in evidence at the time that some participants in the inquiry reported that they felt disempowered, vulnerable and traumatised. So that will go from being mandatory to optional, rather than slowing down certain bureaucratic processes.

There is also repeal of the child protection grounds, and this is an important circumstance that acknowledges the complexity in these family circumstances and arrangements, particularly the situations that exist for parents who do not agree to the child being adopted and the complexities that have been outlined by members of this place in that arrangement. It is very delicate when we are thinking of the very best interests of children but then also the rights of parents and then the complexities around adoption. That is covered off substantially in the inquiry and the review, and it is imperative that we have informed consent. The fully informed consent of the natural parents is absolutely required for that adoption to occur so that the forced adoption practices of the past are not repeated. That is a critical underpinning in the work that was done as well.

There are a couple of other things I want to cover off. The strengthening of the Equal Opportunity Act 2010 is a really important element, and this change, which is underpinned by the Victorian Equal Opportunity and Human Rights Commission, will make it clear where there can be disclosure of confidential information held by relevant agencies, including child protection and Victoria Police, to protect the welfare of others such as where there is a serious threat of harm to a person or a mandatory reporting obligation.

The bill puts beyond doubt that section 83 of the Equal Opportunity Act—I think this is a really important provision—only permits discrimination within religious educational institutions on the basis of religious belief or activity, not on the basis of any other protected attribute such as gender identity or sexual orientation. That is something that has been covered extensively nationally. We have seen how traumatic that is for a number of people in our community, some of the discrimination that we have seen. It is a low road to take. It is a massive impact on vulnerable people who should be loved, cared for and supported rather than isolated and targeted.

There is really, really important work here on the removal of gendered language in the Charter of Human Rights and Responsibilities. I am really keen on this provision for my local community because it removes some of that gendered language around the charter of human rights. Of course the charter of human rights is the opening note to absolutely every bill that goes through this place. It was a substantial Labor reform that was delivered, and to remove some of that gendered language is something that the Public Accounts and Estimates Committee has been working on in terms of gender responsive budgeting. That is a really amazing inquiry. The Minister for Women is a champion in this space, an absolute superstar in the promotion of equality and women’s rights in our community, and gender responsive budgeting is truly a Labor reform. Acknowledging the impacts, particularly the disproportionate impacts on women, of some budgeting decisions over time is a really critical element. That builds on a number of key recommendations in that space and brings a more equal and more inclusive element to our legislation to make sure that we do not have some of those elements.

I will finish with one final thing and then I will probably sit down. I will just go to court services and the really important reforms, and this is something across our jurisdiction and our legal profession as well, to help eliminate sexual harassment in Victorian courts and tribunals. There have been substantially concerning reports and findings on the treatment of people in the workplace, particularly in Victorian courts and particularly women in that environment, which should be one of the absolute institutions of equality and justice before the law. It has been deeply concerning to see some of the impacts that have happened in that space. Some of the recommendations that were underpinned in a recent review go to the diversification that we see on the Judicial College of Victoria board. It goes to some of the principles that you see in company director boards and non-profit boards—not necessarily having everyone from the same industry or profession but having that diversity of skills and that diversity of industry experience, knowledge and understanding. That is a really big change and underpins recommendation 7.

Just finally, there are massive reforms that are being delivered to deal with the backlog in courts, particularly around the $41 million that has been funded in the 2022–23 Victorian budget to deal with some of the backlogs from the pandemic. I have talked about that before, how critical that is, and we give a big shout-out to all our court staff, our magistrates, the judiciary and everyone that underpins our judicial system. It has been a really hard slog. There have been substantial backlogs and challenges, and we are coping and working through that as well. That is about it from me. Thank you very much for the indulgence of the house, and thanks to the Minister for Women, who is an absolute superstar, for her help as well. I commend the bill to the house.

Ms CONNOLLY (Tarneit) (15:45): It is an absolute pleasure to rise to speak on the Justice Legislation Amendment Bill 2022. It always leaves me with big smiles, following the member for Mordialloc. He always gives a great contribution, and it is even better today that he has brought in his daughter—absolutely gorgeous.

This bill includes several minor but really important amendments to legislation in the Attorney-General’s portfolio as well as one act that sits in the Minister for Women’s portfolio. Sometimes in this place we talk about bills, make contributions to bill debates and talk about minor amendments, but some of those amendments can actually change lives and be life changing. I know that many colleagues in this house will agree with me: lots of the main amendments in this bill will change people’s lives and are very positive indeed. That is what good governments do when they come to government.

The Justice Legislation Amendment Bill 2022 absolutely showcases our Labor government’s commitment to getting on with implementing the recommendations of the forced adoptions parliamentary inquiry and making our justice system fairer and more efficient. Just on the forced adoptions parliamentary inquiry, I spoke on that a couple of sitting weeks ago, I think it was—such an amazing inquiry that was undertaken here in Victoria, with some really important recommendations and findings. Again I would like to thank the many mums and their children that made contributions to that inquiry—some very harrowing stories indeed.

The last time I spoke about this inquiry in this place I talked about my uncle, my mother’s eldest brother, who was adopted. My nanna was unable to have children for 10 years and did not think she would be able to have children. I remember my nanna told us that she had never actually left her town, bar once—and that was to go and pick up her son Ian when he was six weeks old in Sydney. Very sadly, my Uncle Ian was never able to be reunited with his biological mother. I think he did indeed look for her but was unable to find her. But my nanna always said and always thought that his biological mother was a very young woman in very sad circumstances and had to give up her baby. I know Nanna, who has passed away now, very much loved my Uncle Ian. As life takes you on many amazing twists and turns, after adopting him and bringing him home, a year or so later she fell pregnant with my mother and then my mother’s sister and my mother’s brother, after 10 years of not being able to have children—just remarkable.

Back to the bill, these amendments are going to help streamline and modernise the operation of our justice legislation. The bill is going to help support our investment in courts and justice agencies to get through the backlog left by COVID, and I do not think there is anyone in this house that would not acknowledge that there is a significant backlog in our courts and justice agencies that the COVID pandemic has left behind. Also, amendments in this bill are going to implement some more consequential and symbolic changes which are going to promote equality and clarity, most importantly, before the law. The amendments in this bill do actually complement the investments that we have made in supporting our courts to recover from COVID, and I want to take a little bit of time this afternoon to talk about that, because they are significant investments that we have made. We have injected more than $340 million since the start of the pandemic to ensure that our courts could continue, most importantly, to hear cases and also to speed up the resolution of matters.

I know that many constituents over the past couple of years, particularly if they have been before VCAT, have wanted to speed up their cases and have been stuck in the backlog. I know that this significant investment of the $340 million will go a long way to helping ensure that those cases and the many others that are just like them will continue to be heard and we will clear that backlog. This investment included bringing on more remote-hearing services, upgrading technology, appointing more judicial officers and staff and providing legal support to help resolve matters—most importantly before they get to court. If you can resolve a legal matter before having to get to court, yes it does save you time, but for people that are paying for legal fees it does save you a significant amount of money.

In our recent state budget that we have just handed down, we provided more than $41 million in funding to help, again, clear case backlogs caused by the pandemic—by a number of in-person court services that were deferred to keep the community safe. But in addition to this year’s budget funding, we have been going hammer and tongs, continuing to invest in our justice and court system. Almost $81 million worth of investment that we made in 2020 and 2021 for justice system recovery went towards initiatives to resolve matters before they get to court, including expanding pre-court legal services and reforms to Victoria’s fines system to reduce the number of infringement matters that actually end up in court; initiatives to provide safe and secure court access for all Victorians, including upgrades to court technology; and providing better court infrastructure to support the digital transformation of court and tribunal case list filing and management.

In the 2021–22 financial year, we allocated $210 million to continue justice recovery, help drive down court backlogs and bolster resources in courts across the state. Funding went to reducing our wait times in courts by providing for extra resources. We funded further expansion of the online Magistrates Court, ensuring cases could be heard and finalised again very quickly. This included two new magistrates to preside over the court. Money went towards enabling VCAT to transition more of its hearings online—which again was very important for many constituents in my electorate—and provide for quicker and easier case resolution for the community. More than $22.9 million went to continuing successful measures such as active case management at the Supreme and County courts, which reduced the load on judges and helped to resolve matters earlier. Most importantly a lot of funding also went towards Victoria Legal Aid, Victoria Police, the Office of Public Prosecutions, Corrections Victoria and victim services because they needed to have the necessary funding to roll out the resources to play their part in backlog reduction.

In the time that I have got left I wanted to give a big shout-out to the Legal and Social Issues Committee and the members that sat on that inquiry for the work that they did in relation to historical forced adoption in Victoria. I know that would have been a very difficult inquiry to sit on. Having spoken to some of the members of that committee, I felt really proud of their absolute commitment to not only sit through and listen to some of those really harrowing experiences that survivors shared with committee members—and some of those experiences were incredibly private and traumatic to relive—but also make sure that something was going to be done and change would be made. I know that this bill before the house is certainly something that is introducing that change.

Part of that change is an integrated birth certificate—a legal birth certificate that will include the details of both a person’s natural parents and adoptive parents and the date of adoption. The inquiry also made recommendations around removing mandatory counselling requirements, which is really important, and also deleting some of those grounds for dispensing with consent to adoption. These recommendations will all be progressed through this bill. As I said at the beginning, it is made up of various minor amendments, but no less extremely important amendments, that go towards creating a fairer, more equal Victoria but also to addressing some of those things that Victorians have experienced that they never, never should have experienced in the first place. I commend the bill to the house.

Mr TAK (Clarinda) (15:55): I am delighted to rise today to speak on the Justice Legislation Amendment Bill 2022, and it is so good to follow the hardworking member for Tarneit and other previous speakers. This is a very important bill and one that makes several amendments, the first of which importantly advances the recommendations from the forced adoptions inquiry of the Legislative Assembly’s Legal and Social Issues Committee, of which I am a member. The member for Geelong also is on this committee. Most importantly we remember how difficult it was just to participate and listen to the witnesses that made contributions as part of this inquiry.

Over the last 3½ years the Legal and Social Issues Committee has done some really important work, none more so than the forced adoptions inquiry. The committee was referred an inquiry into historical forced adoptions in May 2019 and tabled its report on 8 September 2021. Again, I would like to thank every person who courageously provided evidence to the committee to help us fully understand the devastating impact of historical forced adoption. I would like to also acknowledge those for whom the pain and the trauma of the past prevented them from sharing their experiences, and I hope the inquiry and the report were able to begin the process of addressing the trauma and also the injustice of the past. Hopefully the process will continue in a small but significant way here with this legislation.

The members of the committee heard that in Victoria around 40 000 adoptions were arranged between 1958 and 1984, and the evidence received indicated that many mothers who gave birth around this time were subject to the policy and practices of historical forced adoption. These included sending mothers to maternity homes with harsh conditions; pressuring or coercing mothers into signing a consent form; immediately separating newborn babies and mothers, often against their will; and forcibly restraining mothers when they gave birth.

The committee heard of policies and practices that were illegal, unethical, immoral and negligent, in effect. The committee reported on the experiences of and ongoing effect on mothers, people who were adopted and others, such as fathers and extended family members. The committee also discussed the issues of acknowledgement and redress, lifting the statute of limitations and birth certificates—which are a focus of these amendments here—as well as accessing information and family reunification, access to mental health and emotional support services and concerns about the practice of adoption today. As we talk about mental health, I also would like to once again welcome the Venerable San Sochea and his followers and also Dr Sary Seng, who is here visiting Parliament for the first time, but most importantly acknowledge Venerable San Sochea’s hard work during the lockdowns to connect the disconnected and also to connect our senior citizens in Victoria.

114 submissions were received, and 11 days of public hearings were held in Melbourne, Kangaroo Flat, Geelong, Wodonga and of course online during that time. Most of the evidence was received from mothers, people who were adopted, organisations who were involved in historical forced adoption practices in the past and organisations who provide help and support services. Again, thank you to everyone who made a submission and gave evidence. Thank you for your courage. I know that the word ‘thank you’ is an understatement.

To work toward reconciliation and healing the committee made 56 recommendations, including the acknowledgment and increased recognition of the issue of historical forced adoption, the establishment of a redress scheme for mothers and the consideration of a similar scheme for people who are adopted, the waiving of the fee for mothers and adopted people to access their medical and adoption information, the establishment of an inquiry into the experience and effect of adoption on people who are adopted, the implementation of integrated birth certificates for current adoptions, the mandating of the use of an adoption plan, the retention of original birth certificates and the removal of adoptions from the permanency hierarchy in Victorian child protection legislation.

As such, I am proud to see the recommendation around the introduction of integrated birth certificates being advanced here today. An integrated birth certificate is a legal birth certificate that includes the details of both the person’s natural parents and their adoptive parents and the date of the adoption. Throughout the inquiry a recurring theme in the evidence was the need to reform birth certificates. The committee acknowledged that this is an area of ongoing frustration for many people who are adopted, particularly given the past inquiries on adoption legislation in Australia, including the Senate inquiry and the Victorian Law Reform Commission’s review, which recommended their development. The need for reform was outlined in recommendation 26 of the inquiry report, which recommends:

That the Victorian government implement integrated birth certificates without delay, issued to people who are adopted upon request and that they be legal proof of identity of equal status to other birth certificates.

So it is very positive to see this being actioned here. The inquiry also made recommendations around the removal of mandatory counselling requirements and the deletion of some grounds for dispensing with consent to adoption. These recommendations are progressed through this bill, which I am very happy to support.

There are also a host of other amendments which I would like to touch on in the remaining time. These are minor but important amendments. The bill updates the Charter of Human Rights and Responsibilities Act 2006 with gender-inclusive language. There are also amendments to the secrecy provisions in the Equal Opportunity Act 2010 and the Gender Equality Act 2020 to better reflect their operational needs. The bill will also fix an error from the reform last year to prohibit discrimination against LGBTIQ+ students and school staff. These are all very important changes that will promote equality and clarity in the law. There are also amendments regarding making the Judicial College of Victoria board more diverse, in line with the review recommendations. Again, this is a positive change that promotes equality and clarity. Also there are further amendments to help the Magistrates Court improve its efficiency and to remove an unclear jurisdictional provision. With that, I am happy to support this bill, an important bill that delivers on some of the important recommendations of the forced adoptions inquiry as well as making a range of other amendments that help to promote equality and clarity in Victoria’s justice legislation. I commend the bill to the house.

Ms HALL (Footscray) (16:04): I am very pleased to make a contribution to the Justice Legislation Amendment Bill 2022. I would like to begin by acknowledging the very considered and thoughtful contributions of many people in this place, in particular the member for Altona. When I reflect upon her contribution and her reforms in this place, she is really someone who is just an enormous inspiration for many of us. It is hard to think of anyone else who has helped shape Victoria in such a remarkable way as the member for Altona. The member for Frankston as well—I heard part of his contribution, and that was another really remarkable reflection on the impact of forced adoptions. Of course the member for Yan Yean has been generous in sharing her story with many of us and the impact across generations that forced adoption has had. The member for Yan Yean is always someone who is willing to share those personal stories in this place. I know it takes a toll, so I would just like to acknowledge her beautiful contribution today.

This bill contains a vital and wideranging series of amendments to acts, including the Crimes at Sea Act 1999; the Equal Opportunity Act 2010; the Charter of Human Rights and Responsibilities Act 2006; the Judicial College of Victoria Act 2001; the Magistrates’ Court Act 1989; the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal Act 1998; as we have spoken about extensively today, the Adoption Act 1984 and the Births, Deaths and Marriages Registration Act 1996; and of course the Gender Equality Act 2020.

I will not discuss in detail every single change that this bill will make as an omnibus bill, but there are a few amendments that I would particularly like to acknowledge and focus on. The first is the Equal Opportunity Act and the changes to the secrecy provision. The existing secrecy provision has a vital function in protecting the confidentiality of people who engage with the Victorian Equal Opportunity and Human Rights Commission through its functions. This bill will expressly expand the current exceptions to the secrecy provision to allow for the provision of information to relevant agencies in appropriate circumstances. These agencies could include child protection or Victoria Police and circumstances that include protecting the welfare of others, such as where there is a threat of harm or under a mandatory reporting obligation.

The bill will also reduce the time and public resources it takes for processing FOI applications by clarifying that the commission can use or disclose information to the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal for the purposes of FOI review applications. In order to protect everyone’s reasonable right to privacy, there will be threshold requirements that must be met before the commission can disclose confidential information. For instance, the threat of harm must be credible and imminent before confidential information can be disclosed to relevant agencies, such as Victoria Police. Disclosing information in breach of the secrecy provision will remain an offence and carry criminal penalties. This alteration balances the need for transparent and open decision-making, especially in the instance of FOI requests and an individual’s right to privacy. I am pleased to share that the commission was consulted on these reforms and supports these amendments.

I would also like to reflect on the amendments to the Charter of Human Rights and Responsibilities Act. Language contained within the charter will now be gender inclusive, which is an important step in modernising our laws. I would like to acknowledge the Minister for Women at the table and her important work, and the member for Mordialloc spoke about her work in relation to the budget. I would like to also acknowledge that. The charter holds deep symbolic and legal importance to Victorians. It is the foundational human rights law in Victoria. By using inclusive language throughout it does not exclude anyone, nor does it diminish anyone’s rights. For many years it has been a standard practice of this government to use gender-inclusive language when drafting legislation and amendments. We will continue to examine ways to modernise our legislation and justice system to ensure that it is inclusive of all Victorians regardless of their gender. Laws that apply to everyone should be written in a way that includes everyone, and it is as simple as that.

The bill will also increase the number of members appointed to the Judicial College of Victoria board under the Judicial College of Victoria Act 2001. This was recommendation 7 of the Szoke review of sexual harassment in Victorian courts and VCAT, which outlined that the number of appointed directors of the judicial college board should be increased to allow for three and up to four appointed directors who are not judicial officers. Appointing additional community members who have a broad range of life experiences beyond the judiciary will improve the board and how it directs judicial education. These appointments will follow the diversity of government board guidelines and reflect the rich diversity that Victoria already has. This includes gender diversity, people with a disability, Aboriginal people and young people.

The bill also includes a range of changes to governance processes that will help streamline the operations of the judicial college. These include removing a requirement for the Attorney-General’s approval to acquire and dispose of personal property, allowing the board chairperson to approve absences of appointed directors from meetings, allowing the board to make resolutions out of session and allowing the chairperson to appoint an acting chairperson—so some very commonsense reforms there.

Since its enactment in 2001 the judicial college act has not been substantially amended. This is despite the patently obvious fact that in the intervening 20 years a number of relevant factors have changed. Perhaps the most obvious among them is that when this bill was introduced, Court Services Victoria had not yet been established. It provides a level of oversight that was not originally envisaged when the legislation was introduced. This is why so many of the accountability requirements in this act require the Attorney-General’s approval.

I also want to acknowledge the changes that this bill will make to the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal Act 1998. For some time now there has been uncertainty around whether VCAT can hear certain matters such as disputes between parties who live in different states. While the extant legislation can be interpreted broadly to include referrals about matters involving federal jurisdiction, this bill will clarify the matter once and for all. It will also clarify that VCAT’s rules committee may make rules about the procedure for or in relation to referral matters involving federal jurisdiction.

Finally, I want to acknowledge the changes the bill makes to the Adoption Act 1984 and the Births, Deaths and Marriages Registration Act 1996. This bill will make a range of priority amendments arising from the inquiry into responses to historical forced adoptions in Victoria. That report contained 56 recommendations. The government has indicated its support in principle for 33, and the remaining 23 will be considered further. The bill will implement recommendation 26, which relates to the introduction of integrated birth certificates for adopted people, recognising biological and adoptive parents. No fee will be charged for the first issue of an integrated birth certificate. These integrated certificates will not be automatically issued to people, as there are diverse views regarding birth certificates. The reality of this diversity is that not everyone who is adopted will want an integrated birth certificate; they will not be forced to have one. But it is the right thing and a good thing that the recommendations of the committee have been acted on so quickly. For the people who shared their experiences with the committee and for whom this is a very important aspect, it is great that they can now get one. I commend the bill to the house.

Mr HALSE (Ringwood) (16:14): It is always wonderful to follow on from the member for Footscray. I firstly want to get to some of the components of the bill and then focus on two particular aspects of this wideranging bill. To quickly go through some of the particulars, the bill will introduce integrated birth certificates for adopted people as recommended by the forced adoptions inquiry; update the Charter of Human Rights and Responsibilities Act 2006 with gender-inclusive language; amend the secrecy provisions in the Equal Opportunity Act 2010 and the Gender Equality Act 2020 to better reflect their operational needs; support last year’s reforms to prohibit discrimination against LGBTIQ+ students and school staff; make amendments to ameliorate efficiency in the Magistrates Court; and update the Crimes at Sea Act 1999 to reflect a treaty between Australia and Timor-Leste.

Though varied in its achievements, this is a good bill. Across a number of minor yet significant amendments this bill responds to recommendations made by inquiries which include, as has been mentioned, the Legislative Assembly Legal and Social Issues Committee’s inquiry into responses to historical forced adoption in Victoria and the review of sexual harassment in Victorian courts and VCAT. As a collective these amendments promote equality and clarity in the law of our state.

To the theme of gender inclusivity, there is a longstanding problem within almost every law that has been written in this state and beyond, in the country, that laws historically have been written to provide for a ‘him’ or ‘he’. Though recent times have seen a general correction to ‘he or she’, a very valuable group of people remains unrepresented in the law. This bill will finally take a very important initial step to correcting this exclusion by replacing the language of ‘his or her’ in the Charter of Human Rights and Responsibilities with language that does not denote gender, such as ‘person’, because a person’s gender should be the last thing relevant to how the law applies to them, and the language of law itself should reflect this. Although we have long had conversations within the legal system to ensure that laws written to apply to a ‘him’ are extended to those who go by ‘her’, the language itself remains as a reminder that society was built largely to serve half of the population. When we consider the even greater shortcomings of legislative language to cater to people in the trans community, that number decreases again. By beginning to adapt important acts, such as the charter, to adopt inclusive language we place a requirement on ourselves as lawmakers to consider how every law applies to every kind of person. In a society where more than two kinds of persons exist, in law only two have been provided for, and thus a lacuna in the law has evolved. This bill will save courts time; more importantly it will save so many people heartache. Finally, it will send the message that no person should ever have been worth less under the laws which govern them.

To the theme of forced adoption, I turn to the bill’s vital amendments of the Adoption Act 1984 and the Births, Deaths and Marriages Registration Act 1996 in the implementation of recommendations made by the inquiry into responses to historical forced adoption in Victoria. Under the bill, as we have heard, adopted persons over 18 years of age will be able to request that an integrated birth certificate be issued. This certificate will include the names of both adoptive and birth parents and will serve every purpose that a birth certificate does, and it will be free for first-time applicants, a very good thing. This change responds to, as we have heard, Victoria’s dark and shameful history of forced adoption, which has caused generations great degrees of both grief and trauma, and I send thanks to the committee for the work that they did in the process of the inquiry and to those who provided testimony bravely to that committee. While we cannot reverse the mistakes of the past, we can commit to meaningful practices which support those impacted and to preserving this part of our past, remembering it so that it may never be repeated again.

On a slightly different point, it seems somewhat absurd to consider that today, in this day and age, our society may ever be at risk of repeating such an egregious social policy that inflicts intergenerational pain, but here—in May 2022—we are. To look abroad with the landmark Roe v. Wade decision under threat in the States, we find our world in a position where one of its most powerful and important nations may overturn half a century of federally protected abortion rights, leading each US state to decide whether to restrict or ban the termination of pregnancies. The current situation in Texas tells us how dangerous this is, where a trigger law would disallow abortions 30 days after the potential overturning of Roe v. Wade. Doctors could face life in prison for providing women-centred health care. Legislators are declaring that a focus on adoption is the solution to every issue arising from this profound regression in social policy. Though this may be taking place on the other side of the world, what this threat indicates is the perpetuation of shame and hatred around the decision of pregnant people who have or have not had a baby. What is consistent across the threat to overturn Roe v. Wade and our history of forced adoption is a blatantly incorrect concept that a pregnant person is not qualified to make what is ultimately a medical decision with the potential to impact the rest of their life. Both are transgressions of the human rights of a person who falls pregnant. Both should be considered unequivocally unacceptable in 2022.

So this bill, in holding responsibility for the wrongs of the past, reinforces that every person’s heritage, no matter who they are born to, deserves recognition. It awards choice to the people impacted rather than arbitrarily placing decisions upon them without regard for personal circumstance. It reminds us of the importance of safe and accessible family planning, which as we know and we continue to debate, can save so many people from so much pain in our society.

Mr DIMOPOULOS (Oakleigh) (16:24): It is a pleasure to speak on such an important bill and add my remarks to those of my colleagues on the Justice Legislation Amendment Bill 2022. It is a bill that, as colleagues have said, does a number of things, but I am particularly interested in the clause in relation to the Judicial College of Victoria. I remember fondly my time at the then Department of Justice, in the courts in fact, and the judicial college—I cannot remember which government established it, but it is a very important institution in terms of ongoing training for the judiciary. I reckon there was a time and a place when—and I say this very respectfully—society and governments thought judges did not need continuing training and education. That is not the case, and the judiciary, in my experience of all the courts, were absolutely behind the work, purpose and mission of the judicial college. It is important for a range of reasons—because society changes; social values, social mores, technology and a whole range of things change; and everything comes before the judiciary in every part of public policy and life. I think it is an important institution, as in fact is the judicial complaints commission. What those two bodies have in common is that they are made up of members of the judiciary—retired members and existing members of the judiciary—which makes eminent sense, because it is a very specific work profile. But one of the things we are seeking to do with this bill is expand the work of the judicial college in a way that actually makes it better and makes it more relevant, with a holistic educational approach, for the judiciary, inviting and making room through the bill for non-judicial members to join that college.

I think if you look at our government over the last 7½ years, we have done that in many, many government agencies. I hesitate to call the judicial college a government agency, but you know the concept of state agencies—boards, committees, courts. We have expanded the remit of those organisations. It is fortuitous for me, not for her necessarily, that the Minister for Women is in the chamber, because one of the hallmarks of this government in that approach of making boards, committees and agencies of the state relevant to the entire community is gender equality across all of them. We are the first government to have lived our values in that regard—in many regards, frankly—but just on boards and committees, almost all of them, I think, on last briefing were 50 per cent women. The judiciary takes a longer period because judges are appointed on different terms and many are appointed for life, but it is a similar concept—that it should reflect the community—and the fact is that an enormous number of new appointees are women, as they should be. This judicial college approach has been replicated across the board.

I had the good fortune to work with the Minister for Mental Health, better known as the Minister for Education or for both portfolios and better known as the Deputy Premier. We established, or the government established, the ministerial advisory committee on the implementation of the findings of the Royal Commission into Victoria’s Mental Health System—74 recommendations, all extraordinarily impactful for root-and-branch change of the mental health system in Victoria that will be felt through the ages. In 10, 20, 30, 40 and 50 years people will still be feeling the positive impact of these changes. We understood the value of having that. While the royal commission went through an enormous consultation process—thousands and thousands of Victorians having a say, multiple submissions, experts—we still felt it appropriate, and the minister and the Deputy Premier felt it appropriate, that a community committee help steer the implementation or help guide the government’s implementation of those recommendations.

On that committee we have an enormous diversity of people. We have people with lived experience, we have clinicians, we have a gender balance, we have got people of different sexual identity and gender identity—and that is just on the ministerial advisory committee. Side by side with that there is the lived-experience group itself, which is a separate group which has, I would say, even more diversity on it—people with lived experience, both those who have cared for people with a mental health condition and also people who have actually lived with a mental health condition. That is the importance of having an entire array of structures across state agencies, across decision-making that is diverse and that is representative of the community. One of the biggest things we all need to guard against is groupthink. I am not saying it necessarily follows that if you have people who have lived the same experience sitting around a table, they are going to have groupthink, but it is probably more likely that if you do not have diversity you are probably likely to miss pretty big issues. That is why I am very proud of this government.

While this is one part of this bill, the judicial college, it is an important one because the judiciary impacts every aspect of our lives. At any point in our lives we will probably end up—normally without notice, or involuntarily—in front of a judicial process, whether it be—

Mr Edbrooke: Speak for yourself.

Mr DIMOPOULOS: The member for Frankston said ‘Speak for yourself’—I do not mean it has to be criminal. It could be VCAT, it could be a tenancy issue, it could be a number of different issues. We expect those decision-makers who hold extraordinarily important office to be people who are trained and have continual training and education, and they are open to that; they are an amazing group of professionals. But then you have to look further afield and go, ‘Well, the organisation that is charged with that training, what do they look like? What is the demographic profile of that organisation? What is the professional profile of that organisation?’. That is why I think, consistent with everything else we have done in government in terms of the appointment and the composition of boards and committees, this is an important step.

Other colleagues talked about the changes in relation to gendered language, which I think are really critical and important changes. I cannot resist the temptation: if you look at bills like this when we talk about issues of gendered language, we talk about it in the sense of ‘Let’s get rid of things that impact negatively on the quality of life of Victorians’. When the federal government looks at language like that, it literally looks at it and says ‘How can we weaponise this for a political gain?’. Call me what you will, but I am going to call it as I see it with this, despite the fact that I am the Premier’s Parliamentary Secretary. One of the most eloquent contributions that I have heard the Premier make, and there have been many, was in response to a question by a journalist three weeks ago when she asked him something to the effect of whether he thinks it is appropriate for a trans boy to run in a girls race at school, or something to that effect. The Premier said, ‘Before I answer that question, let me ask you one. What problem are you trying to fix? What’s the problem here?’. She responded, ‘Oh, we’re just trying to clarify’, and he said, ‘No, no, you’re not trying to clarify anything. This is divisive’.

With bills like this our entire ethos is not to divide; it is to collaborate, to be collegiate, to allow every Victorian to live the best life they can live. Removing obstacles like this and making state structures, agencies, committees and boards more reflective of our community is all part of the same value set, which is: we want governments to be supportive and help people live their best life, not to detract and not to cause community division. So for all these reasons the justice portfolio is important, this bill is important and I commend the Attorney-General on shepherding it through.

Ms RICHARDS (Cranbourne) (16:34): I am very pleased to have the opportunity to add my voice and make a contribution on the Justice Legislation Amendment Bill 2022. Like many of us, I will be reflecting a little bit on the contributions I have heard. There are so many people for whom this bill has been part of the journey of their career in some ways—making sure that we do have such important legislation to consider and to contribute to and actually making sure that people do have a voice in the formation of legislation and policies like the really profoundly life-changing legislation we have today. So I am delighted to have the opportunity to add that, to have some chance to thank those people, and I will do that in a little bit more detail.

Like many of the thoughtful contributions from this side of the chamber and across the chamber as well, I want to focus on the amendments made in response to the inquiry undertaken by the Legislative Assembly Legal and Social Issues Committee into historical forced adoptions in Victoria. This bill does demonstrate that the Andrews Labor government is getting on with implementing the recommendations of the forced adoptions inquiry. I also do want to just take one moment, I suppose, to acknowledge the work undertaken by Dr Helen Szoke AO on the review of sexual harassment in Victorian courts. I know that that is also a really important part of the omnibus elements of this bill and again part of the important reform of recognising change that needs to be made and taking action.

This is, as has been recognised, an omnibus bill, and whilst there are some amendments that may seem subtle, they do make differences in people’s lives. I think the member for Oakleigh summed that up well when he talked about different people being touched in so many ways. I have been listening to the contributions today, and to channel the member for Essendon, this bill probably does show the best of us—the best of the Parliament—in the way that the Parliament and committees actually can work together to really respectfully consider the changes that need to be made. I am going to start by acknowledging the Attorney-General for her work and the Attorney-General’s office for their work in bringing this here, as well as the many people who have been involved in the department as well. Also, like others have, I acknowledge the previous Attorney-General and current member for Altona not just for starting this and not just for her contribution today but for always being a person who does not just observe a problem but does use the levers of government with often great effectiveness and urgency to start processes that are important to people, recognising that many of the people who are affected by this are older and we need to make changes quickly. I would like to thank the Minister for Women, who is at the table, for the work that the minister has done in bringing forward so many of elements of this bill and also for the focus on women.

I do want to take a moment though. The member for Geelong has been fighting for and promoting the issues that we have become much more aware of, forced adoptions and other social issues, that have caused so much stress and duress in the lives of people. And the member for Carrum and the member for Macedon I know have been tireless in their advocacy. I do want to very much say how grateful I am to the Legislative Assembly Legal and Social Issues Committee and for the work of the member for St Albans as well. I think maybe even the member for Caulfield as well is on that committee. On that day when the committee tabled the report you could see how profoundly moving it was to be able to receive this incredibly precious information and go forwards with recommendations to government.

Back to the more technical elements of this bill, it does update the secrecy provisions in the Equal Opportunity Act 2010 to clarify that disclosures may be made in additional circumstances, such as serious safety threats, mandatory reporting or cooperating with freedom of information reviews. It clarifies the protection from religious discrimination of LGBTIQ+ students and school staff; I thought the member for Bass did articulate really beautifully how important those elements are. It updates the Charter of Human Rights and Responsibilities Act 2006 with some gender-inclusive terms, and this has been one of the great reforms of this government, really recognising and acting on those recommendations that we do know make a difference to people’s lives. The introduction of integrated birth certificates for adopted people as well as other miscellaneous amendments to the Adoption Act 1984 and the Births, Deaths and Marriages Registration Act 1996 has been very much at the forefront of our thoughts as we have considered debate after this bill was introduced, and I do want to take a moment to reflect on that. It amends the Judicial College of Victoria Act 2001 to increase the diversity of the college board and improve governance arrangements. The member for Oakleigh acquitted those discussions and the arguments for why that was important and really did reflect on the change that happens over time.

The bill clarifies the Magistrates Court’s jurisdiction to determine referred VCAT matters involving federal jurisdiction and streamlines the approval processes for making Magistrate’s Court rules. It updates the Crimes at Sea Act 1999 and amends the Gender Equality Act 2020 to allow the public sector gender equality commissioner and other permitted persons assisting the commissioner to disclose information gained through the dispute resolution function in appropriate circumstances.

As has been acknowledged—I certainly heard the member for Clarinda talk about this—in September 2021 the Legal and Social Issues Committee tabled its report. Again, I look across to the member for Caulfield—I am conscious of that inquiry into historical forced adoptions in Victoria. It was a really important and profoundly state-changing inquiry. The report made 56 recommendations, and the Andrews Labor government has expressed its support for many of these recommendations. The bill responds to several previous reviews and calls for reform such as the recommendation to introduce these integrated birth certificates.

I am aware that there are many people who have made important contributions and of that trust that they have given to the institutions of Parliament in providing their experiences and those recommendations. It must have been incredibly difficult but it is so important if we are going to have a piece of legislation that we know is the beginning of the process for the acknowledgement of the pain caused by these forced adoptions. But I do want to acknowledge the work of VANISH, the Victorian Adoption Network for Information and Self-Help. VANISH have made the time to speak to me, and I hope that I gave them justice in really beginning to understand and do some more reading and really trying to comprehend the contributions that VANISH make.

Beyond the primary role of supporting people to search for adoption information and families, I do want to place on the record that VANISH does provide other support, and that does include mental health and emotional support services and counselling. It also very importantly provides referrals, the importance of those referrals being to clinicians or those with expertise in properly supporting people who are sometimes living with trauma or in other ways having to respond to historical forced adoptions. So I am going to, with great emphasis and gratitude, thank the staff at VANISH as well as those extraordinary committee members who again trusted me with that insight into their experiences but also their highly professional view of what it means for them to have this government, our government, consider those recommendations.

This is a piece of work that will continue. It started with this inquiry, but there have been many inquiries. The inquiry report was tabled. We are taking action and this is one of the steps forward. I do commend this legislation but particularly acknowledge that this legislation is a watershed moment and does provide for the best of us.

Mr SOUTHWICK (Caulfield) (16:44): I rise to make some comments on the Justice Legislation Amendment Bill 2022. I also want to acknowledge the contributions from all sides of the Parliament today—this is particularly around the forced adoption piece within this bill. This is very, very important to many of those that have been traumatised in their lives by what happened in the past and have had to relive those moments and have had to live with those moments every day of their lives. As we have heard, I was on the Legal and Social Issues Committee with a number of members from the Parliament, including the committee chair, the member for St Albans; the member for Clarinda; the member for Geelong; the member for Buninyong; and also the member for Brighton for a period of time and the member for Gembrook for a period of time.

This particular inquiry was looking at the response to historical institutional forced adoptions. It was just traumatic to hear many of those witnesses recount what they went through in their lives. Mums, dads, grandparents, children, relatives, friends—it was horrific, and we hear many times in Parliament people recounting experiences. When you do committee work, quite often it is the committee work where you are working in a bipartisan way to come up with recommendations that ultimately change things for the better and in the long term, and you are working—your politics you are leaving at the door—and looking at what you can do to actually ensure you invoke that change.

We saw lots of work that has been done on this, including apologies that have been given in the past. Former Premier Ted Baillieu made an apology I think back in 2012; Prime Minister Gillard also made that apology. So there have been prime ministers and premiers that have acknowledged the wrongs of the past, and that has been really, really important. I acknowledge both of their work in terms of what they did. What this inquiry also did was it kind of shined a light for many of the victims that said, ‘Yes, the apology’s important, but what is going to be the rubber that hits the road to actually invoke the change?’. There were 56 recommendations that the report came up with, some of which are in this legislation here in terms of acknowledging parents, adoptive parents and all those that are connected to that family member on the birth certificate, which is an important change. Things might appear little, but they are actually quite significant. Even when you go searching for information from agencies, particularly through government, there have been in the past fees that you would pay to get historical records. We acknowledge certainly that that is just something that needs to be dealt with. Somebody that is trying to track back information about their lives and what had happened during that time should not be then having, for access, to pay those additional charges . So we wanted to ensure that that was something that was changed, and that is covered certainly in this bill.

The situation in terms of what those witnesses presented to us, and something that really stuck with me during some of those accounts, was the fact that many that went through this process were completely unaware. Many that went through the process once the child was taken away were unaware of their legal obligations, and some were even drugged as a management tool back in the day. We heard many that were from a whole range of different groups give accounts—that went through that process, particularly from religious backgrounds—give that apology in terms of what had happened in the past and acknowledge that what happened in the past was absolutely unacceptable at all levels, and what many of those agencies that work with families and work with children are doing today.

One of the things that is important is that there is a lot of information that still sits today and how that information is protected and how that information is accessed for those children and those families. That was part of ensuring that those records are kept and managed and they are made available. That was certainly something that I think is really, really important in terms of managing that information and making that information accessible to many of those family members.

As I say, there are many things that happened in the past that we must learn from, we must make good and we must certainly apologise for, and we must ensure that these things do not happen again. Of those families that are being traumatised, some of them will never recover. Some of them are living their life every day in these traumas. Some of them were talking to us about reunification and meeting up and how they had a good day but then they had a bad day and then they did not speak again; about how they deal with their siblings; how they deal with other family members; what happened in their journeys; what it has done to their lives; other issues in terms of drug and alcohol and family violence; and all the things that have followed on from what happened in the past. So it has been a horrible journey for many of those families. I know, as other members of this chamber have said, when we delivered the report just how many emails and calls and conversations we had with so many people, that this is their life, this is their story, this was their opportunity to tell their story.

One of the things when we first started this inquiry was the fact that we thought that a lot of people would not come forward and tell their story because they had told their story on other occasions in other inquiries at a federal level and a state level. We thought maybe people would not want to recount it again and have to go through the difficulty of telling their story again. But in fact one of the things that we found was that in many of those cases it was important for them to tell their story and to share their story and to have that publicly recounted. I want to put on record my thanks to many of those victims—actually not victims, many of those survivors, because they have survived. They should be supported, and they should be acknowledged, and we do need to apologise to them for what happened in their lives leading up to all of this.

This legislation that we are talking about—particularly around that—is very important, and I am glad that we are seeing some of the recommendations now taken on from the inquiry. I look forward to other recommendations being implemented to ensure that we right the wrongs of the past and we acknowledge the horrific, traumatic experiences that many of those children, mums, parents, dads, family members, Victorians have gone through—their horrific ordeal.

In the 1 minute or so that I have left, there is another separate part that I just want to acknowledge: the area around religious discrimination within schools. Again, this is really, really important. No-one should be discriminated against on whatever basis—their race, religion or sexual preference. No-one should be discriminated against. I think that is really, really important, and we need to do whatever we can to support those that are being targeted. I do acknowledge that certainly within my community we had a targeted attack on AUJS students—the Australasian Union of Jewish Students—at Melbourne University. This student group was demonised on campus, victimised on campus, targeted by the student union on campus. Since then, the vice-chancellor has apologised publicly and come out in support of the AUJS. I acknowledge the great work that many of the AUJS students did in tackling this issue. It is an issue that we should be standing up for no matter what.

Freedom is really important. Freedom of speech, I acknowledge. Freedom of religion, I acknowledge. Freedom to live your life the way you want to live your life is really, really important, and no-one should be coming after you because of who you are and what you believe. And with that I will conclude my comments.

Mr FOWLES (Burwood) (16:54): It is my pleasure to see the week out in 6 minutes or so by way of a contribution on the Justice Legislation Amendment Bill 2022. There have been a bunch of terrific contributions over the course of this debate, but to my great disappointment, perhaps none of them focused on the update of the criminal jurisdictions in the Crimes at Sea Act 1999. Now, I was dared to use a bit of pirate talk for my submission in this very late part of the week, and arrgh it is tempting to be sure, but perhaps not on this occasion.

I did want to just bring the chamber back to a bit of the controversy that surrounded the settling of the permanent maritime boundary between Australia and Timor-Leste. I was one of 150 000 people who attended a Timor rally in 1999 on the corner of Bourke Street and Elizabeth Street, and it was an incredible event. The ‘Viva Timor-Leste’ chants were ricocheting off the buildings around us. It was then with great disappointment that we learned a few years later that the Howard government had negotiated a set of petroleum rights-sharing deals that were grossly unfair to the then fledgling nation of Timor-Leste. This bill updates the Crimes at Sea Act as a result of the 2018 treaty between Australia and the Democratic Republic of Timor-Leste, which established their maritime boundaries in the Timor Sea.

It is interesting to cast our minds back a bit to what was going on at the time that Timor-Leste finally won its independence from Indonesia. That actually resulted just recently in the release of some cabinet documents. The independent Senator Rex Patrick, and I commend him for this work, has done terrific work in trying to obtain a bunch of the material that relates to the issues that were litigated at the time between the then Howard government and the government of Timor-Leste—or really more properly the government-designate of Timor-Leste, because it was immediately prior to their independence formally taking place. It was extraordinary. The documents that have been released just recently, still heavily redacted, show that cabinet was concerned that Timor-Leste’s independence process—this was the Howard cabinet—may disrupt access to the oil and gas reserves in the Timor Sea because Australia’s prior agreement with Indonesia for a 50-50 revenue split would be void. They said that they should urgently seek an agreement with the UN transitional administration in East Timor to avoid discontinuity and to assure and guarantee access to those petroleum assets. There is a Timor-Leste expert professor at the University of New South Wales, and he is reported as saying that:

… Australian officials had misrepresented the attitudes of Timor-Leste’s leaders, who had made it clear repeatedly that their principal interest was in a maritime boundary, not agreeing on revenue shares of oil and gas.

Their ‘principal interest was in a maritime boundary, not agreeing on revenue shares of oil and gas’, and here we find ourselves some 22 years later finally giving effect to an agreement—that admittedly is four years old—that settles that maritime boundary. That is an extraordinary effluxion of time to settle a maritime boundary between Australia and its, I guess, second-nearest neighbour. That is an extraordinary amount of time. There can be just no doubt about that. Fernandes went on to say that it was:

… a striking departure from Australia’s normal policy of settling permanent maritime borders. As such, it is a public policy failure of scandalous proportions, putting the interests of oil and gas corporations above the national interest.

‘Putting the interests of oil and gas corporations above the national interest’—it sounds a bit familiar. It is almost like this is the Liberal go-to strategy, that in fact the interests of oil and gas corporations would be put above the national interest. So there it was way back in 2000, the Howard cabinet busily bullying Timor-Leste out of their assets in the Timor Sea, putting the interests of oil and gas corporations ahead of the national interest. Boy oh boy, didn’t COP 22 in Scotland demonstrate that that was on once again. Once again, there was the coalition with Australia’s official representation at that conference, at that critical climate change conference, sponsored by an oil and gas company. Santos sponsored the official Australian stall at that conference. It is absolutely a tenet of faith inside the coalition that the interests of oil and gas corporations will always and forever be put before the interests of their constituents and the national interest.

The SPEAKER: Order! The time set down for consideration of items on the government business program has now arrived, and I am required to interrupt business. The house is considering the Justice Legislation Amendment Bill 2022.

Motion agreed to.

Read second time.

Third reading

Motion agreed to.

Read third time.

The SPEAKER: The bill will now be sent to the Legislative Council and their agreement requested.