Thursday, 4 August 2022

Building, Planning and Heritage Legislation Amendment (Administration and Other Matters) Bill 2022

Second reading

Debate resumed on motion of Mr WYNNE:

That this bill be now read a second time.

Government amendments circulated by Ms BLANDTHORN under standing orders.

Mr R SMITH (Warrandyte) (12:04): I rise to speak on the Building, Planning and Heritage Legislation Amendment (Administration and Other Matters) Bill 2022, and at the outset can I once again thank the minister’s staff for organising a very good briefing—thank you to Tina, and could I give also a special shout-out to Nicole, who is heading off to better things, or brighter things, however she would like to put it. As always, staff have been very helpful and courteous through this process, and again I want to show my appreciation for that.

This bill before the house comes at an interesting time. It gives me an opportunity to reflect on the last few weeks during the winter break when the Minister for Planning was appointed and the circumstances that have come about as a result of that. I do not seek to be gratuitously partisan in these comments but rather to reflect what has been relayed to me by community groups, by developers and by the sector more broadly and to reflect on some of the issues that have been raised in various parts of the media. The issue arises against the backdrop of the Independent Broad-based Anti-corruption Commission releasing the report of the Operation Watts investigation, which broadly found that the Labor Party for many decades has been mired in corruption and issues of impropriety. The commissioner reported on 3AW shortly after the release of the report that the Premier was up to his neck in those things. Against that backdrop it is concerning that a minister who has been appointed to the planning portfolio is and has been shown to be so tightly conflicted with regard to her relationship with a director of Hawker Britton, her brother John-Paul Blandthorn.

Ms Hutchins: On a point of order, Deputy Speaker, I think the member is straying from the bill. Perhaps he might want to stick to the amendments.

Mr R SMITH: On the point of order, the bill goes to pretty well every single aspect of the planning minister’s portfolio. Indeed the issues that I am raising now go directly to the reason why the opposition have taken the position they have on this bill.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Member for Warrandyte, at this point I caution you to remain relevant to the bill before the house. You may continue, but please remain relevant to the bill, as I have stated.

Mr R SMITH: Shortly after the media raised these issues of concern, Mr John-Paul Blandthorn issued a letter from Hawker Britton basically explaining that going forward—

Ms Hutchins: It’s still not related to the bill.

Mr R SMITH: The bill is about planning. This is about the planning minister. This is why the opposition are taking the position they are on this bill. Is that okay, Deputy Speaker?

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Member for Warrandyte, continue.

Mr R SMITH: Thank you. The letter from Mr John-Paul Blandthorn basically proposed to the government that any time Mr John-Paul Blandthorn—the letter was written by him, bizarrely speaking in the third person—met with his sister he would make sure that nothing was spoken about in relation to clients of Hawker Britton and if they were going to talk about portfolio responsibilities, then a planning bureaucrat would be there. That is a ridiculous proposition, because quite frankly it is impossible to police. So there are significant concerns—

Ms Hutchins: On a point of order, Deputy Speaker, I believe that the member opposite is continuing to stray from the details of the bill. He has not yet mentioned one section of the bill or any of the amendments that are being proposed in the bill.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Member for Warrandyte, I have cautioned you. I know it is a wideranging debate and contribution, but I will just repeat: please continue to speak in relation to the bill before the house.

Mr R SMITH: Once again, the reasons why the opposition is choosing to not support this bill and in fact to oppose this bill directly go to the matters I am canvassing here in the house. It is impossible for me to accurately define why the opposition is taking this position if I cannot canvass issues that have led to the decision that the opposition has made in this regard. The issue is that the minister is hopelessly conflicted, and the government agrees with that view, because the government has put in provisions to address that conflict. We are in agreement, the government and I, that the minister is hopelessly conflicted on a number of issues. What we do not have agreement on is whether the processes the government have put in place by which they hope to alleviate the conflict are adequate. They go directly to the minister’s ability to fulfil the provisions that are outlined in the bill.

Therefore the opposition is choosing to oppose this bill for those reasons, and I will go further. That the government’s processes put in place a replacement planning minister who is not allowed to speak to any of the minister’s direct ministerial staff or to the departmental staff in making decisions goes directly to many of the provisions of the bill and their implementation because of the conflicts that are involved. The conflicts go to the client list of Hawker Britton, which has over 20 clients that are related to development, construction, financing—

Ms Hutchins: Is this your speech or a point of order?

Mr R SMITH: I’m not sure I have to answer to you.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Just continue through the Chair.

Mr R SMITH: Thank you. Very strange. There are so many projects that are directly related to the clients of Hawker Britton for it to be just impossible for the minister to discharge her duties. I mean, you cannot be a planning minister and not be able to talk about issues like the West Gate Tunnel Project. You cannot be the planning minister and implement the provisions of the bill when clients such as AustralianSuper have a project that they are putting forward at the Kingswood golf course, where the community is significantly concerned about the ramifications of that particular development. You cannot have a minister who can implement the provisions of the bill when there is this blatant conflict. And if those opposite cannot see the conflict or the paucity of the provisions that are put in place to deal with it, then they just do not get it. If you think that there is a conflict between the minister and the lobbyist but you put in a replacement minister and say that they do not have a conflict between planning decisions and the environment portfolio, well, again you just do not get it.

It is said that success is 10 per cent formulation and 90 per cent implementation, and because many in the development, construction and building industries have raised with me their concerns, of course the opposition cannot support this bill, because the implementation of it is by a minister who is hopelessly conflicted and whose appointment has been tainted already by several news items. I mean, the issues have been canvassed widely in the media. It is a concern for so many in this sector that of course there are going to be so many problems with the minister implementing the provisions of this bill. So that is one of the reasons why the opposition is opposing this bill.

Now we can turn to the particulars of the bill. This bill has been introduced about 5 minutes before the election. It seems to be a grab bag of everything that the former minister wanted to get out of the way before the term finished, and the problem with this particular bill is that too many of the provisions are underpinned by regulations that have not been written yet and probably will not be written before the election. So it is again impossible to support this bill in any way when so many of the provisions just do not have the supporting regulations in place. We are not aware on this side of the house of how these particular provisions will be implemented or the detail that will be implemented around them, and that is a huge concern.

I am certainly not saying that there are many issues in the planning portfolio that should not be addressed. The most recent Auditor-General’s report raised a number of issues in relation to the way the government has discharged duties around the planning portfolio, and I will quote from that report entitled Managing Victoria’s Planning System for Land Use and Development. The Auditor-General concluded that the department, and by extension the government, have not been:

… fully effective in their management and implementation of the planning system.

… they have not prioritised or implemented review and reform recommendations in a timely way, if at all. The assessments—

that the department provides—

… to inform decisions are not as comprehensive as required by the Act …

And:

As a result, planning schemes remain overly complex. They are difficult to use and apply consistently to meet the intent of state planning objectives, and there is limited assurance that planning decisions deliver the net community benefit and sustainable outcomes that they should.

Our examination—

the Auditor-General’s examination—

showed that planning schemes have mixed success in achieving the intent of state policy …

The Auditor-General went on. After eight years of administering the planning portfolio, the Auditor-General found that issues in planning included:

vague and competing state planning policy objectives and strategies, with limited guidance for their implementation, which reduce the clarity of the planning system’s direction in meeting state planning objectives

a lack of specific guidance to address key planning challenges …

an overly complex system of planning controls in local planning schemes—

and that the department’s measurement frameworks were—

unable measure whether the objectives of the Act or state planning policies are being achieved …

And there were also:

lengthy delays in the processing of planning proposals, leading to set time frames not being met and unnecessary costs for applicants.

There is a whole report around all the issues relating to the planning portfolio, and of course there is this damning assessment across a range of issues the government seems to think only just now need addressing after eight years in government. So on multiple matters, as I said, there are a number of provisions that are yet to be supported by regulation, and because of those shaky, ill-defined provisions, the opposition will not be supporting this bill for those reasons as well.

If I can go to some issues directly relating to the bill, the issue of offences is raised in the bill—the amendments to sections 16 and 16B. These provisions create offences for carrying out building work without a building permit or carrying out work not in accordance with the act, the regulations or the building permit. The issue that has been raised with me by the sector is basically that these measures are too extreme, too hard on the industry, and that the indictable offence that is being proposed is too harsh. This government have a history of demanding things from others that they will not do themselves. I refer to a report in the Age of 27 July, which says:

A leaked WorkSafe report handed to the Victorian Building Authority … last week found that the authority was placing its 40 building and plumbing inspectors at risk by demanding they finish at least three inspections a day and, in the case of plumbing inspectors, five a day.

The demand from government of others is high, and yet of the government themselves, according to this leaked WorkSafe Victoria report, the inspectors have reported that they:

… feel pressured to not complete a thorough inspection … or avoid finding risk items in order to meet performance …

targets under tight time frames. Three employees reported they had been advised by team leaders to:

… alter the inspection outcome—

that is, provide a risk rating of low risk—

to reduce administrative obligations or had been discouraged from identifying non-compliance in order to complete work at a faster pace.

This practice puts lives at risk, so when the government are announcing indictable offences for not adhering to the legislation, they should look in their own backyard and understand that pressuring people to finish work or downgrade risk assessments is extraordinarily dangerous. So the government needs to look in its own backyard before it starts telling other people how to act. But it is indeed a common trait of this government to demand standards of others that they will not and do not uphold themselves.

One of the other issues that has come to the fore as a result of this legislation are the changes to the Architects Registration Board of Victoria. Many architects have written to me, as well as the Australian Institute of Architects. The minister said in his second-reading speech:

The Bill will amend the Architects Act to ensure appointment requirements for the ARBV … reflect best practice governance standards for a skills-based board.

And further he said that the changes will:

… secure a board that has the knowledge, experience and expertise required by a professional regulator.

Despite those words, the provisions of the bill actually allow the exact opposite to occur. We have had statements from the Australian Institute of Architects and a range of other professional architects, who have expressed confusion and disbelief at a legislative approach which will have detrimental impacts on their profession. The legislation also puts the consumer at risk by removing the experienced oversight of professional standards and competency. The current Victorian Ombudsman’s investigation into the politicisation of the public service has highlighted the Victorian Labor government’s obsession with installing politically aligned figures at senior levels, and it is difficult to reach any other conclusion than that this is another way of doing exactly that. Those concerns again form part of the reason why the opposition is opposing this particular bill.

In relation to the introduction of the preoccupancy permit inspection for some buildings, the bill will require a municipal building surveyor to inspect or cause the inspection of a building or documentation and determine whether there are any items of non-compliance. Several councils have raised issues with me in that regard—about the impost on them with regard to limited resources and the added cost that that will bring. Banyule City Council, in a letter to the minister cc’d to me, said:

… this particular model was not identified in the consultation carried out to date …

which means the government may have consulted with local government but they did not raise this issue in that consultation. Rather the government sprang it on them, and the council has huge concerns. Boroondara council cc’d me on a letter to the minister, which says:

This reform … will have significant resource, cost and risk impacts on Council. It is considered unreasonable and unworkable to expect an MBS to identify non-compliance once a build is almost complete when previous documentation approval and mandatory inspections have been undertaken by a private building surveyor …

I also have correspondence from Colac Otway shire. Indeed many councils have contacted me, and I know have also contacted the minister, to raise concerns, particularly those councils in rural areas where having a surveyor who is able to do this work is not always possible. That is a very difficult issue and it is something the government will need to address, because putting those issues on councils is extremely problematic.

With regard to the state building surveyor’s powers, the industry has raised concerns about the state building surveyor issuing binding determinations and has many questions about the usefulness of allowing such a delegation in relation to the state building surveyor being able to delegate its powers. They have concerns around the building monitor. They have concerns around, as I said, the extra inspections on buildings for local government. A whole range of issues have been raised, as I said, by architects, by local government and by the sector. I mean, everyone seems to have a problem with various aspects of this bill. When you put all these different issues together, when you have not consulted properly and when you do not have the regulations to back it up, it means that it is a very poorly drafted bill with little thought put into it. It certainly raises some significant issues for, as I said, a whole bunch of different people.

If I can just move on to a few issues that were raised with me again by the sector, issues around the register of building employees. There are some concerns around that, about what will be in that register. Will it be available to the public? What is the register actually for? There are, as I said, some significant concerns from the building sector. Speaking about the building sector, and again canvassing that the bill addresses a wide range of issues, we are currently going through a building crisis. I am not sure the government knows this, but we have builders who are folding. These sorts of changes are coming at a time when they are experiencing difficulties in terms of getting builds done because of labour shortages and because of material costs. We have seen already the collapse of some builders, and the industry expects to see more. Instead of putting change and extra regulation on the sector, I do not know of any instance where either the Premier or the current planning minister have sat down with the building sector and had a conversation about where the building sector is going and the problems that are going to occur as a result. It is not just about people who may well be left without a job should these builders collapse; it is about the literally thousands of families who will find themselves on a half-completed building site. No other builder is going to take up the half-finished work of a builder that has collapsed—no-one is going to do it. I have canvassed all sorts of high-volume builders and independent builders. The chances that they are going to take that on are very, very slim.

Knowing that this issue is on the horizon and that there are going to be those thousands of families who have half-finished building sites—the industry is very clear those issues are going to come up—I do not know why the government is not addressing it. I do not know why the government is not sitting down with the sector and doing some early work to map a way out of this crisis. When these people start appearing on the news with half-completed foundations or frames that are not going any further, it will be on the government to explain why they did not get ahead of it. The government needs to get ahead of it. We need to understand how we can move through this crisis. The fact that the government is just sitting on its hands, not even alert to the fact that this crisis is about to overwhelm us, as I said, is quite an indictment of the government itself.

I also briefly want to talk about some aspects of the bill which we do support, and I have made some public statements in that regard. The introduction of green wedge management plans and the changes to the distinctive areas and landscape processes we do support. We think they are sensible. As I have said in this house before, green wedges are a Liberal legacy from the 1970s. We have been avid supporters and protectors of that legacy for the decades that have followed, and we will continue to be so. Had the government brought in those changes unencumbered by these other provisions, then they would have had enthusiastic support from the opposition. But unfortunately the mess that surrounds these particular provisions is again too great for us to support the bill in its entirety.

Just to sum up a little, I guess, the portfolio is replete with problems—it has been for eight years. You only have to get out and talk to the sector to understand that, whether you are talking to a developer, a builder, the end consumer or anyone who has tried to get a planning approval done in any sort of reasonable amount of time. We have had issues around cladding, and this bill seeks to again buck-pass some of the responsibilities there. There is the issue of orphaned permits, which no-one seems to want to take responsibility for. It has taken me nearly a year to assist just one person with an orphaned permit.

Heritage issues—I am having regular conversations with constituents out in Hawthorn, Kew and Malvern about heritage issues. As an aside, I guess, I am speaking to a group of heritage activists in Hawthorn. Their local member will not speak to them. The member for Hawthorn will not speak to these people. It is extraordinary. It is just extraordinary the member for Hawthorn will not speak to these people and has not done for the best part of a year. I said to them as I was sitting at a cafe, ‘Why does the member for Warrandyte have to come across town to speak with you because your local member just refuses to?’. It is extraordinary.

A member interjected.

Mr R SMITH: I am happy to talk to them. It is unfortunate that the members opposite just will not. There has been a lack of consultation across a range of areas across Melbourne and indeed further afield. We only have to look at the new Union station and the Surrey Hills and Mont Albert level crossing removals. The government told them quite clearly—the member for Box Hill included—that there would be two stations. There is now going to be one. It is going to be just about 4.5 metres from residents’ front doors. They have been asking for designs for so long. They have been asking for a decent design so they can understand what is actually going to happen. The government has really been so disrespectful to them in offering them pictures—mere pictures. They are not even trying to hide that they are not real in terms of what is actually going to happen there: at the bottom of the pictures it says ‘Dimensions are approximate and subject to change’. They have got a measure here of 5 metres which is completely different to this other measure of 5 metres. It is just so disrespectful to these people.

Again I say the member for Box Hill refuses to meet with these people and absolutely refuses to discuss these concerns. It is great that they do have an advocate, the Liberal candidate for Box Hill, Nicole Werner, who has been out with these people, advocating for these people and making sure their issues have been raised. But the state government refuses to answer the question: when will Beresford Street residents have access to their driveways, garages and on-street parking in front of their homes? You would not think it would be a state secret, but the government will not tell them when they can get into their own driveways. You would not believe it. Beresford Street has been closed since April 2022, and an end date for the closure has never been communicated—another example of secrecy. I mean, you do not want to tell people about the station opposite their homes, 4.5 metres from their front door. I have been there. I have been there because the member for Box Hill will not go there. I have been there and the candidate for Box Hill, Nicole Werner, has been there, and we have seen it. But the fact that the government will not even say to residents when they can get into their garages is just bizarre. I have never heard anything like it.

As I said before, over in Dingley Village the residents have been sitting on this issue regarding Kingswood golf course for so long now. They are stressed, they are concerned. Again, their local member will not speak to them about it, will not give them any direction and will not get the minister to come out and make a decision straightaway. And of course the minister now cannot make the decision because the proponent for that development is a client of Hawker Britton. So it is going to be passed to the Minister for Environment and Climate Action, who knows nothing about the issue, has never spoken to the residents and does not understand anything about it. The member for Keysborough actually has opposed this particular project in public statements and in writing, so if you want to get someone to assist the planning minister with her conflict, then maybe we should get someone who actually knows about it and actually represents that community. That might be a smarter thing to do, but of course that is not going to happen.

If I go across to Burwood, the Markham estate, for those who do not know, is a social housing project that has been started in that area. It has been a long-running issue for those residents there, who have no problem at all with social housing going there, but the manner in which the development is being done is just extraordinary. They just alerted me, members of the Ashburton community, about this particular site. The community is devastated that a manna gum has been killed by the irresponsible actions of the construction workers. So to add insult to injury, not only is the government’s development working across the planning provisions and ignoring height restrictions and all those sorts of things that come to it—there is no screening, nothing of the sort—but now they have gone and killed a hundred-year-old tree. Of course they will probably go and plant a couple of saplings and say, ‘Everything is done. That’s fine’.

If you go across to the Cairnlea development over in the west, again residents have been particularly concerned that they have had no movement from the government in actually telling them what is going on and addressing their concerns. Cr Maria Kerr and I will be going out there shortly to continue the conversation that we have had with those residents. I have had many conversations with those residents. In every place across metropolitan Melbourne there are issues about a lack of consultation with the community. They keep telling us time and time again. It is not the opposition making this up; there are so many concerned communities that just cannot speak to their local member or are not getting any action from the government in relation to the concerns that they raise. All of those issues are really serious issues, because you cannot have a government that is spending most of its time trying to make things look as though they are legitimate without them actually being legitimate.

The government has no time to consult because it is too busy trying to explain why the Commissioner of the Independent Broad-based Anti-corruption Commission is saying that the party is mired in decades of corruption and impropriety. That is the important thing for this government. It is not about talking to community. It is not about understanding their concerns. It is not about addressing those concerns. It is not about Victorians anymore. It is about trying to explain away all of these issues—explaining away why the Premier has been to IBAC three times and trying to explain away why ministers are leaving left and right. It is just extraordinary. When the government starts thinking about itself in that way, it stops thinking about Victorians, and that is exactly what has happened with this government.

This bill is full of holes. There are regulations that underpin provisions that have not even been finished—or probably even started. There are provisions that have intent but not the defining words that are needed to give assurances to people about the meaning of those provisions. And we have got a minister who has become infamous in a very short space of time for all the wrong reasons. For all of these reasons we cannot support this bill; we flat out oppose it. Because of the conflict of interests that arises because the minister’s position has been tainted we do not think that she can implement the provisions of the bill without that impropriety and that conflict being addressed properly. With that, we oppose this bill.

Ms HALFPENNY (Thomastown) (12:33): Thank you, Deputy Speaker, and congratulations on becoming Deputy Speaker.

I rise to make a contribution to the debate on the Building, Planning and Heritage Legislation Amendment (Administration and Other Matters) Bill 2022. This bill has a number of elements to it and makes changes to various and numerous acts. The overall purpose of the proposed legislation we are talking about today is to deliver priority reforms stemming from the stage 1 recommendations made by the expert panel leading the building system review together with government election commitments to strengthen legislative protection of Melbourne’s green wedges, to streamline the process for endorsing a statement of planning policy and also to make some changes to the Heritage Act 2017.

I do not know what legislation the member for Warrandyte was speaking on, but I do not think he said the words ‘consumer protection’ in any of the 30 minutes he was talking. This bill is actually about providing protection to consumers because we do know—and there have been very recent experiences—that we get many complaints about building defects that have not been rectified on people’s homes that are being built. We also have situations where developers do not fulfil their obligations, and of course, which this legislation is further addressing, the tragic situation that we have had of the combustible cladding that has been put on many buildings around Melbourne and beyond, such as on the Lacrosse and Neo200 apartments, which has actually resulted in fires. Luckily no-one was killed in those fires. Of course we can go further afield to the Grenfell Tower in London. That was a tragic situation where many people sadly lost their lives.

I will talk about two aspects of the legislation we are talking about today, which are around the building industry stuff and then the Heritage Act. I will be concentrating on those two aspects. I will just go through a little bit of the history. I guess another thing to note about the contribution made by the member for Warrandyte is there was not really any talk about the fact that these changes are the result of recommendations that came from an expert panel working on and looking into the industry. It is not legislation that just sort of came into someone’s head, or the Minister for Planning’s head, just popped in to become law. It comes after very considered and deliberated-on views and recommendations of a panel made up of experts to provide recommendations to the government. This is what we are doing: (1) fulfilling our election commitments and (2) strengthening the legislation so that those that purchase buildings or purchase land and home packages can have further confidence that their views and voices will be heard when it comes to what is often the biggest investment a family or a person will make in their lifetime—that is, the investment in owning their own home.

Just going back into a bit of the history, in 2017, after the Lacrosse and Neo200 apartment fires and, as I mentioned earlier, the Grenfell Tower tragedy, the Victorian government established the Victorian Cladding Taskforce to investigate the use of non-compliant or non-conforming external wall cladding. That task force found there was widespread non-compliance and use of combustible cladding and made a series of recommendations to improve the building regulatory system. Our Andrews Labor government has led the world in its response to this combustible cladding problem, banning many of the high-risk claddings on multistorey buildings. We have also established the Cladding Safety Victoria group and removed dangerous cladding from a number of at-risk buildings in the community.

Similarly concerning incidents resulting from poor building compliance that have arisen, in 2018 the Building Ministers Forum—which was a nationwide forum, not just in Victoria—commissioned an independent expert panel comprising Peter Shergold and Bronwyn Weir to undertake an assessment of building regulatory compliance and enforcement systems across Australia. These assessments resulted in the publication of the Building Confidence report, and again a number of recommendations were made from that.

The reforms that are contained in this bill respond to those findings, and this is what we are very proud to be talking about today in terms of the government’s commitment to Victorians to make sure that people have a good experience when purchasing that very important home or home and land package that is going to set up them and their families for the future. One of the key recommendations that we have put into this legislation is the establishment of a building monitor. The building monitor will finally be a monitor that will overview or oversee the building industry and also take into account the views not just of the building industry—those that are making the profit out of this, which the member for Warrandyte seems to be only concerned about—but also of consumers and listen to their experiences and the problems that they are having in order for that to be taken into account when we are looking further into the system and making it more accountable.

I will give some examples. The Thomastown electorate now includes parts of the growing outer suburbs, especially the areas of North Epping and Wollert, and it was not that long ago that, due to requests from residents, we actually put together a forum to talk to them about some of the problems that they were having. There were massive problems with developers not fulfilling their obligations—not maintaining the more common areas of space, reserves and parklands and just leaving them to go to waste, with rubbish strewn all over the place—and the developers refusing to do anything about it. We also had concerns about building defects and problems with sunset clauses and also a number of other issues with those. The consumer was in a powerless situation. Apart from maybe taking legal actions for hundreds of thousands of dollars and years in court, there was really no comeback for them. So the building monitor is another step in trying to make sure that there is better accountability. Of course not all builders and developers are like this. Some are very good, and of course this legislation will not hurt them in any way because they are doing the right thing. Therefore they will continue to do as they do.

It is really good that the Victorian government has also provided so much investment into the TAFE system in order to increase the skills, hopefully, of particularly our young people so that they can work in these areas and have the skills that are needed to provide the home building and meet some of the demand that we have.

Now, the heritage amendments are the other thing I quickly will talk about. I have not got much time, but there is so much to say about this legislation. One aspect I want to talk about, because it relates to the Thomastown electorate again, is the Peter Lalor Home Building Co-operative Society, which was established just after the Second World War and which provided housing for working-class families built with voluntary labour on the estate. It does not have state-level recognition; however, these heritage amendments would also allow for non-state-recognised heritage or important historical places in an area to be recognised—not at the level of state recognition but of course recognised within the planning system of an area. I know a lot of residents will be really looking forward to the Peter Lalor estate being elevated by being recognised and also being acknowledged when planning around that Lalor area is conducted. Again, this bill will implement reforms to improve the regulatory landscape in the building system, and— (Time expired)

Mr McCURDY (Ovens Valley) (12:43): I am delighted to rise and make a contribution on the Building, Planning and Heritage Legislation Amendment (Administration and Other Matters) Bill 2022. We have heard from other speakers that the purpose of the bill is to recognise and strengthen the role of the state building surveyor and create a building monitor. It will also change building approvals and quality assurance processes in various ways but specifically by requiring a building surveyor to inspect the building before an occupancy permit can be issued and also by providing a process for the requirements relating to the preparation, maintenance and updating of building manuals. Furthermore, it will require the relevant building surveyors to provide owners with an information statement setting out the role and functions of the relevant building surveyors.

Other main provisions include clarifying the power of the Victorian Building Authority, the VBA, to issue restricted plumbing work licences and strengthen information sharing between the VBA and other building system entities, including the building monitor. We all know the building industry needs to remove any barriers or obstacles that may exist between bureaucracies to ensure a smoother, a more efficient and most importantly a faster process. I do have concerns that that will not happen under this bill. It will also expand the categories of builders who will need to be registered when their work is prescribed by regulation, amend the distribution of the cladding rectification levy, support the implementation of the national automatic mutual recognition scheme and improve the governance arrangements for the Architects Registration Board of Victoria.

The bill also makes changes to the Planning and Environment Act 1987 relating to Melbourne’s green wedges and distinctive areas and landscapes by introducing a requirement that local government authorities prepare green wedge management plans, enabling the Minister for Planning to issue directions in relation to their content preparation. The bill also updates provisions to streamline the process that will help to gain the endorsement of responsible authorities for declared distinctive areas and landscapes, which should ensure the protection of these valuable assets. But the minute I talk about local government authorities, I know there are concerns—I will get onto those in a moment—about cost shifting and workload shifting towards local governments. The bill will also provide online access to hearings and notices and allow applications to exclude places and objects from the Victorian Heritage Register if they are not of state-level cultural heritage significance, which is a step in the right direction. It will also make sure agencies delivering major infrastructure projects can confirm the heritage significance of a place or object in approval pathways during the planning stages.

The building industry in Victoria is in a very tough space at the moment. I suppose all business is. It has been a difficult time, as we all know. But certainly in the Ovens Valley—and every other electorate, I am sure, has the same concerns with not being able to get timber, trusses or fittings and fixtures—it really is a difficult space, and we have got to be careful that when something does not come to fruition, when you cannot fit something in a house, that domino effect does not go all the way down the line and just slow the whole process up. That is predominantly out of the hands of any regulator or anybody else, and that is why we have got to make sure any legislation that we introduce reduces red tape and does not allow bureaucracies to slow the process down or rely on somebody else to make a decision before something else can happen, because without any of that in place it is already a difficult space.

I spoke to a builder last week in Myrtleford when I was in my mobile office up there, and he said if it were not for the goodwill of the tradies at the moment, the building industry would be in whole lot more pain than it currently is. He gave me the example where obviously when someone decides to build a house, they put the deposit down and the builder gets going. The next payment is at lock-up stage and then there is another payment further on or a final payment, and what we are finding is that a builder cannot get benchtops, cannot get internal doors or cannot get something that makes it to lock-up stage. Through the goodwill of the tradies they can actually still get it to that lock-up stage, that second payment can then go ahead and then all of a sudden that domino effect does not happen. Some of the tradies have got to come back two or three times, where they would prefer to just come and do their job once. But out of their goodwill they are making sure that it happens, that lock-up stage gets done, that second payment is triggered and away they go, because otherwise you would find builders going to the wall because they are just not getting paid that second payment. It is all within the boundaries of the contract, and I get that. But as I said, it is the goodwill of the tradies that is actually helping us, and because it is in on a knife edge this collaborative approach is what is needed in the industry at the moment. So any streamlining that we can do is essential, but certainly any more layers of bureaucracy simply are unhelpful.

One of the concerns I have got is that I am not sure there is justification to have the site supervisors registered as building practitioners. I have also got concerns around the expansion of the practitioner licensing scheme to include new categories. This was recommended for those involved in complex buildings. But in the absence of actual regulations it is unclear to me how this will impact on the domestic building industry, and as I said, it is an industry that is already operating on a knife edge. The state building surveyor’s ability to delegate their power to make binding determinations is always a concern. Victorians have lost trust in this government’s ability to use power, and any room for corruption or room for decisions that we are not sure about is a concern, because of that lack of trust. The amendments to sections 16 and 16B capture binding determinations made by the state building surveyor. It means non-compliance with a determination would be an indictable offence. To me that is a very heavy-handed response. To me this should be a separate summary offence, not an indictable offence.

I understand that significant resource strains will be placed on councils to identify non-compliance on builds, which may contribute to further time blowouts. Again councils have made their voices heard by saying they are concerned about whether it is just a cost to them or maybe resources will be required by them in this whole process, because they are strapped as well in terms of the people they have got, and it is just not that easy to go and find somebody to do those jobs in council. Again, anything that is going to push this whole time frame back is of concern to me. We have to be really careful. We probably do not know what it is going to really look like, because until we can see how this all rolls out and the regulations and the guidelines are completed we will not know what the full effects of this legislation will be. The proposed changes to section 47 of the Architects Act 1991 will result in unregistered and inexperienced architects being appointed to the Architects Registration Board of Victoria. It seems inconsistent with other Victorian professional boards. As far as I can see, it will place some consumer protections at risk.

In conclusion, there are many unanswered questions about this bill and, as always, questions that will not be answered, as I said, until the full regulations and guidelines are completed, and that comes obviously after this point. You would not sign a blank cheque for this government to fill in the gaps because nobody would ever be held to account and nobody would resign or even recall what happened, so it is really important that these regulations and guidelines provide for smooth sailing to make sure that we can speed the process up rather than do anything that slows it down again.

Again I say local government is opposed to the cost shifting. The architects are opposed to the changes to their registration board and the building industry is opposed to a range of the provisions. I still think we have got a bit of work to go with this, and the devil will be in the detail of the guidelines and the regulation. I just hope this does not turn out to be another government stuff-up that will send many tradies to the wall or slow up the building process because, despite the Premier’s claims that he governs for all Victorians, the facts are that unless you are in a union you really do not count in Victoria. We have seen that time and time again. As I say, this legislation—we will see the detail in time, and only then will we know what effect this will have on the industry.

The building industry is hurting, as I say, because they cannot get access to timber, fittings, internal doors, all sorts of things that they are struggling with. I hear it time and time again, and the domino effect—people cannot even get into the new houses, the rental market is at the crossroads as well. This whole industry needs support, not barriers and blockades. That is why I want to make sure of the guidelines and the regulations when they come out. We will go through them with a fine-tooth comb, but I do have concerns that if it is not here in the legislation, that could go anywhere. With that, I will leave my remarks there.

Mr KENNEDY (Hawthorn) (12:53): This has been an interesting debate so far, and I would just like to offer a few thoughts prior to lunch. The member for Warrandyte offered the observation that the Premier is up to his neck in trouble. That was helpful. He referred to ‘looking at the confusion’ and ‘disbelief’ and all these other words that were used. However, I would just like to, in a little bit of time, take up his—well, there were very few specifics, but there were a few specifics, which means that we have something to respond to.

The good member talked about the lack of consultation and gave me a free plug as the member for Hawthorn. He said that in fact there are all these people wanting to see me on heritage and that I was refusing to see them. Well, here is news. On Monday, 1 August—that is, four days ago—I sat down in my office—

Ms Ward: You’ve been misrepresented.

Mr KENNEDY: Misrepresented—with the people from Wattle Street, Roseberry Street and a number of others. We got together with about eight or nine people—that was a very good occasion—I think at 1400 hours on Monday for the whole hour, in which we were able to share a whole range of opinions and views about the problems that can exist with heritage listing. I just think the glib dismissal of that by the good member for Warrandyte does not help us on that path, can I say with due respect, of trying to see the subtleties of this. Of course as you know, the problem is that there are some people who want to preserve it and then there are others who perhaps want to sell their properties, and the last thing they want to see is themselves saddled with one particular classification or another. I just wanted to get that going, because I believe that the consultation has been very good.

But it is that time of year, so they are running around with the shadow member for Hawthorn, John Pesutto, and various other people who are standing for election. Of course they are all agreeing to everything, including contradictory things. Anyway, poor, pitiful me has to put up with this, but I just needed to be very clear about Monday, 1 August. Remember that day, please—Monday, 1 August—when a whole hour was spent with all those groups, two from each group as a matter of fact. It was a very fruitful conversation.

I think it is important that we really focus on how this bill will strengthen protection for domestic building consumers. The opposition did not mention consumer protection at all. Too many times we hear devastating stories about people who have been left with building defects—and they are the ones we get to hear about at Hawthorn as a matter of fact, and I am sure other members do as well—things that were not completed or were not made safe or whatever. Nothing is perfect, but I think any attempt to try and improve the legislation surely is something that we want to support and not pick holes in for the sake of it.

I just want in the next couple of minutes to just say a couple more things about the Building, Planning and Heritage Legislation Amendment (Administration and Other Matters) Bill 2022. It is something that is dear to my heart. My late father was an architect, and we were always talking about these sorts of issues. I just say that in the last decade we have seen the tragedy of the Grenfell Tower in the UK as well as the Lacrosse and Neo200 fires in Melbourne. In response we created the Victorian Cladding Taskforce to investigate how widespread non-compliant or non-conforming external walls were. As we all know, this task force found widespread non-compliant use of combustible cladding and made recommendations in response to this. Similarly in 2018 we saw poor building compliance resulting in safety incidents, so the Building Ministers Forum had independent experts assess compliance and enforcement systems across Australia. We also have a further building system review currently underway. This bill is a response to these reviews and will ultimately improve our building system.

I think it is important to acknowledge the work that has been done in regard to cladding safety. There have been a few issues of course, but nobody doubts that work has to go on and that hopefully one can get the right sort of balance in terms of who pays and whose fault this is and that is and so on. We are building to ease traffic, we are building public housing, we are building quality housing but we are not building necessarily for the developers. We have got the priorities right, and we all think that I am sure. Deep down both houses think we have to get priorities right when it comes to who we are serving in this place.

I may have an opportunity to come back after 1 o’clock or at some other time for 3 minutes and 21 seconds, but otherwise I think I will leave it for the moment.

Sitting suspended 1.00 pm until 2.01 pm.

Business interrupted under standing orders.