Tuesday, 30 July 2024

Bills

State Sporting Legislation Amendment Bill 2024

Second reading

Debate resumed on motion of Steve Dimopoulos:

That this bill be now read a second time.

Sam GROTH (Nepean) (16:57): I rise to speak on the State Sporting Legislation Amendment Bill ‍2024. I know it is an exciting time in the world of sport at the moment, and I promise you that this bill will not contribute to that level of excitement, unfortunately. I know the member for Mordialloc was looking for something pretty special today, but unfortunately I cannot see that coming. The bill was introduced by the government a few weeks ago to amend the ANZAC Day Act 1958 to change the description of an area in which sports are held on Anzac Day. There are also a series of changes made to the Kardinia Park Stadium Act 2016, the Melbourne and Olympic Parks Act 1985, the Melbourne Cricket Ground Act 2009 and the State Sport Centres Act 1994. These changes are in relation to trusts, membership, leasing powers and a whole bunch of other miscellaneous amendments. The bill also amends the Professional Boxing and Combat Sports Act 1985 in relation to acting appointments and for other purposes.

The main provisions of this bill revolve around largely inconsequential changes to the various impacts of those acts, but there are some noteworthy exceptions. Right across all of these acts and throughout the bill the Governor in Council has had its powers transferred to the minister in several instances, and the bill will also see the abolition of two advisory bodies in both the Kardinia Park advisory committee and the State Netball and Hockey Centre advisory committee.

The government have advised that they intend to abolish these committees due to the onerous nature and the process of appointment due to their current statutory nature. The appointment process requires the completion of substantial documentation, including probity checks such as police and bankruptcy, disqualified director searches and the preparation of declarations of private interest. For a lot of those committees and a lot of members that are on them it is a very onerous process. Some of those people change regularly, and it is probably appropriate to make that process a little less onerous. Public board committee members are considered public officials under section 4 of the Public Administration Act ‍2004 and are bound by the legislative requirements of the Victorian public sector values and directors code of conduct. The minister and the government do not feel this reasonably aligns with the purposes and intended composition of those committees. However, there are certainly still questions around the composition and execution of the government’s sports-related policies, which will come up throughout this contribution and the process of the bill.

The bill also will amend the Melbourne and Olympic Parks Act 1985. It will change requirements relating to the resignation of members from that trust and change powers relating to the appointment of acting members. It will change requirements relating to the approval of leases over the National Tennis Centre and Olympic Park; it will permit the minister to delegate the approval of leases that are not major leases over land managed by the trust; it will provide the minister with discretionary powers related to fees, allowances and remuneration of members of the trust who are representatives of Tennis Australia and the Victorian Tennis Association, which previously was not allowed; and it will change the requirements of the trust relating to nominations made by Tennis Australia and the Victorian Tennis Association.

It will also amend the Melbourne Cricket Ground Act 2009. It will make changes in regard to the resignation of members. It will permit the minister to delegate power to make floodlight determinations, which we have seen in recent years with the rolling fixture and events changing timelines at the MCG, and I am sure that will save the minister plenty of time when it comes to signing off on those floodlight determinations. It will permit the minister to make acting appointments to the trust and it will increase the membership size of that trust as well. For the Professional Boxing and Combat Sports Act 1985, it will permit the minister to make acting appointments to that board.

It will amend the State Sport Centres Act 1994. As I mentioned, it will abolish that State Netball and Hockey Centre advisory committee, and I will come back to that. It will increase the membership of the trust from seven to 11. As we see more state sporting centres come into the fold, like we did recently out in Knox with the basketball, those board members have to sit on quite a number of subcommittees. It will actually free some of those members to have more impact in those committees that they attend, but also divide up the time of those people on the trust to make sure they are able to attend everything they need to. Again, it permits the minister to delegate the approval of leases that are not major leases, and it makes other minor and technical amendments to that act.

I just want to go into a few pieces. The State Netball and Hockey Centre is a great facility, but when it comes to hockey this government, in my opinion, continues to let that sport down. Currently interstate competition is dominating Victoria when it comes to hosting these major hockey events, and it is not because we do not have the facility to do so. These other states are getting a high return on investment on those events. When you look at the Mega Masters, the recent event in Western Australia, they would have loved to bring that event here, but the cost of renting out the State Netball and Hockey Centre to host that event did not fit. But for WA, who we have already seen start trying to poach our tourism events economy, a huge investment by Western Australia in their recent budget ‍– of course we want to see all of these things staying in Victoria – that event delivered a 20-to-one return on the investment. With the Minister for Tourism, Sport and Major Events sitting at the table here, I would encourage him to make sure we are getting many of those events here at that centre and doing everything we can to make it cost effective for those organisations trying to host those major events. While we do have some huge events and a great major events calendar, we still need to be adding ones that maybe are not as high profile but are still going to bring that economic investment back into the state. I think it is very, very important. It does not reflect a lack of quality events that we have. Of course we have a great major events calendar, but we just need to keep pushing forward with that.

The government’s work in attracting these events has been, I would say, a disaster. When you look at the Commonwealth Games, and I am sure I will touch on the Commonwealth Games a number of times during this contribution, the decision to hold the Commonwealth Games out in regional Victoria and to have to build those facilities – and I absolutely see the value in building them, yet we had facilities here in Victoria ready to go. We could have moved and hosted those sports and done it in a far more economically smart way. It would be great to see these facilities used more often. The State Netball and Hockey Centre is a perfect example. It is a little bit of a white elephant. In a government press release from October 2018, the government described it as being ‘the epicentre of hockey and netball in Victoria’, which it certainly has the ability to be, and said that the ‘upgrade will expand the capability of the venue to host big events’. The problem is at the moment it is actually not hosting any of those events. It is a $65 million centre. It sits there. It does not do very much. It delivers no revenue and very little return on investment for Victorian taxpayers. It is a world-class centre. It has the ability to draw competition and events from around the world, so not just here in Australia but actually globally, but sadly we are yet to see this government have the appetite to support that hockey centre.

It is one thing to invest in these things, but it is another thing to actually deliver the events that those facilities can deliver. We have seen this again and again from this government across a myriad of their responsibilities. They promise to throw the money around, but delivering that is another whole thing. This government presided over one of the most monumental failures of the state, falling behind its neighbours, losing opportunities, events, competition and that private sector investment, and this bill, while it has been largely described as a housekeeping bill, will not solve any of these issues around that state hockey centre created by the government. The government is focused on dollars rather than outcomes – we see that across a whole range of portfolios. The State Netball and Hockey Centre is so underutilised, it is another case of that. Given this state’s dire financial position, we want to see things like the State Netball and Hockey Centre rented at a reasonable price and actually able to be used.

I mentioned the Mega Masters event in Western Australia. When Western Australia actually announced they were going to host that major event, the Hockey Australia acting CEO at the time Michael Johnston in a press release that he put out to the WA media thanked Tourism WA for the investment and for showing a genuine appetite and interest for hosting these events. I think that is something that should absolutely ring in the ears of this government.

The advisory committee that is being abolished by this government – there are plenty of stakeholders. When you talk about the problems with that venue and its lack of leasing, the abolishment of that committee certainly raised the eyes of some of the stakeholders. Some of the stakeholders have certainly said the committee was not functional, and others have raised concerns about how their voice will now be heard in terms of their input into how that centre is run. We have heard this government say they are committed to re-establishing that committee in a less formal way, and we do wait to see what that will look like. We obviously want to make sure that hockey, netball, any other sports, small or large, that operate out of that facility still have the ability to have an input into how it is used. So we will wait for that. But for a committee that was not functional, the government’s response so far has just been to abolish it. We do want to see that that is going to be done in the right way, and we do have that commitment both to us and to the stakeholders that that committee will be established in that less formal way and will still have an input.

I will move on to the Kardinia Park advisory committee. Just like the State Netball and Hockey Centre, that is also going to be abolished, and there were some concerns initially raised by some of the stakeholders out there. The government again has addressed with those stakeholders that that committee will be re-established; again, we will wait for that. We do not know how that committee is going to look, the make-up of it. I have every trust in the government, I guess, on this one, and that they will actually put those back into place, but I think with what we have seen out at Kardinia Park in recent times, it has been a place that has had incredible investment, if I can say it, from this state government and from the federal government. More than $340 million has been put into that stadium out there over a number of years. Of course we all know in the last state budget there was another $4.1 million for a scoreboard out at that stadium. Maybe that scoreboard was going to be put out there because Kardinia Park, or GMHBA Stadium – however you want to refer to it – was going to be hosting the closing ceremony of the Commonwealth Games. I am not sure if they just forgot to pull that commitment out of the budget once they did cancel the Commonwealth Games, but it seemed to manage to stay in it. Obviously it raised serious concerns with the public at a time when another $4.1 million was going to be spent out there at the stadium in Geelong but at the same time the VCCC, the Victorian Comprehensive Cancer Centre, had its funding dramatically slashed, and we saw a lot of media reports and a lot of discussion around that and about the priorities of this government.

Just this week, if you have read the newspaper and you follow your AFL, you will have seen the Geelong Cats have had to move out of that site because of ground issues. They have moved all of their training offsite. There were some problems in their game against the Western Bulldogs in terms of ground –

Members interjecting.

Sam GROTH: Yes, the deck was a bit of an issue; it was. But we have certainly now seen the Geelong Cats have had to move out. I saw the Geelong Cats come out and say that they absolutely appreciate the work that their ground staff do – and they do everything they can, and we have had a lot of rain. But when we are making investments in these spaces and there are advisory committees, we need to make sure everyone is working together to make sure investment goes into these stadiums and they are actually able to deliver the outcomes, and of course we want to see Geelong being able to use that stadium. This bill does not do anything to help that.

We also see in this bill the government propose an increase to the number of members of the trust for Kardinia Park from seven to 11. They are increasing the number of State Sport Centres Trust board members. It is probably not normal practice. I think anybody who deals with corporate boards would know 11 board members is a very high number. They say that is the maximum number of board members that is going to be used or be available to be used. Futureproofing, I think, is how the government are looking at this, in case they want to add people later or add new sports centres later. We just want to make sure that we still are seeing best practice from these boards and that people are not just being added on. There is a cost – there is a payment to these board directors, and that is fine – but we want to make sure those numbers are not increasing over the top.

Overall this is just a bill that tidies up a whole range of bits and pieces. It is quite non-offensive. It is a bill that is going to make the minister’s life easier, from the conversations that we have had. It is a bill that will abolish those committees, and they will be re-established. Overall the opposition will not oppose this bill. I do not see any reason why it should not be moved through, and it will tidy up those things. But I encourage the government to do more work around making sure that our state sporting facilities are used in the best capacity that they can be. There is work to be done at the State Netball and Hockey Centre, and there is work to be done with the MCG in terms of securing some of our major events. We know the government still has not secured the Boxing Day test long term. I think all Victorians want to see them lock that event in long term.

I think the point to note with all of this as well is that we have the facilities in Victoria, here in Melbourne, that can host these major events and should have been utilised when we were pitching for something like the Commonwealth Games. There was no reason to try and blow out costs, inflate the numbers and hide numbers in contingency when it came to budgeting when the event could have been held in some capacity back here in Melbourne. We have facilities sitting here ready to be used that are currently not able to be rented out by stakeholders and currently not being able to host other large events. I encourage the government to do more to make sure they are bringing these things to Victoria. Believe me, I love these events as much as anybody else. It is not just about the Australian Open; it is not just about the grand prix. There are other events in the sporting space that this government can be hosting that will deliver economic impact, and I encourage the minister to do more in this space to make sure that they can be held here in Victoria.

As I said, we will not be opposing this bill. I think I have probably eked as much out of this as I possibly can. I could have probably read almost every clause. I probably could have read through every clause and got another 3 or so minutes out.

Members interjecting.

Sam GROTH: No, I can promise you I am not going to get there. I could have read every clause, but at the same time –

Jade Benham: Tell us an Olympic story.

Sam GROTH: No, you can get those later in the week. We will not be opposing this bill, but again I encourage the government to do more in this space.

Josh BULL (Sunbury) (17:14): I am pleased to have the opportunity to follow on from the member for Nepean, who I think could have probably given us another 13 minutes. He was just starting to move from third to fourth gear and starting to wind up. I reckon he could have given us at least another 10. I am pleased to have the opportunity to contribute to debate on the State Sporting Legislation Amendment Bill 2024, to be back in the chamber with colleagues from the Allan Labor government, committed to supporting our local communities right across the state and to ensuring that all of the facilities and all of the local services and things that this government has been able to provide will continue both today and well and truly into the future.

As we have just heard from the previous speaker, this legislation contains a number of minor amendments to a number of acts. Specifically the bill amends the Melbourne and Olympic Parks Act ‍1985, the Melbourne Cricket Ground Act 2009, the Kardinia Park Stadium Act 2016, the Professional Boxing and Combat Sports Act 1985, the State Sport Centres Act 1994 and the ANZAC Day Act 1958 to promote good governance and reduce administrative burden. What I will do in my contribution this evening is go to just a couple of those changes, but before I do, I broadly want to acknowledge just how important the calendar of events is – the significant, important and many major sporting events that we have in this state – and acknowledge the incredible work that is done by so many within those events on the sporting calendars of both our terrific state but also local communities. It is a fantastic list. It is a long list. It is something that I know this government and indeed all Victorians are incredibly proud of. Whether it is the Australian Open, the F1 grand prix, the Spring Racing Carnival or the AFL Grand Final, just to name a few, we know and understand as a state that so many of these events are critical to our sporting fabric and critical to the economy of what is a very, very proud state.

Right now we know that the eyes of many Victorians – whether it be at 3, 4 or 5 in the morning – are of course on Paris. The eyes of a nation are indeed looking over at Paris and supporting the more than 90 athletes that we have sent from this state to the Olympic Games. I want to acknowledge all of those athletes and the paralympic athletes as well. There is serious and important training – a phenomenal effort – to make an Olympics. I certainly have not. Member for Footscray, I do not know if you –

Katie Hall interjected.

Josh BULL: You have been watching; very good. There has been amazing hard work and dedication and support from many. When we hear of the journeys, the stories, of our athletes, no matter the sport or the competition that they are in, the acknowledgement of local sport, the acknowledgement and support of families and friends and the opportunity to represent our nation are indeed things that we should celebrate and acknowledge, and we do that of course today.

What is important, certainly from our perspective – and it goes to some of the changes contained in this legislation – is making sure that we are an outfit and indeed we are a government that supports all of those within our sporting bodies right across the state and ensures that we are financially backing the wonderful work and the incredibly hard training that so many do each and every day. The governance around the way that sporting bodies operate is important. This goes to, as I mentioned, some of the changes that are contained in the bill before the house this evening.

I mentioned earlier some of these changes, being allowing the appointment of acting members or chairs to trusts, with a particular change to temporary vacancies on trusts. We know that often they can arise with little notice. Currently across various sporting trusts there are no provisions to permit the appointment of acting members or an acting chairperson. The bill ensures consistency across all government sporting trusts so that acting members and chairpersons can be appointed when required, a relatively minor but nonetheless important change.

On the change to the delegation of leases, what we know is that the current legislation provides that any lease granted by the trust over the land on a number of trust sites must be approved by the minister. While it is important of course that the minister controls long-term leasing arrangements over major state assets, there is no compelling reason to require the minister to approve minor leases over small areas, for example, short-term leases over a small number of areas. The amendment will give the trust flexibility and certainty and will reduce administrative burden.

There is also contained within the changes a change to the trust resignation process. Members currently across a number of trusts are required to resign by a written notification to the Governor in Council, with resignations only to be taken into effect when considered at an executive council meeting. This has presented difficulties for members whose resignation needed to take effect on the day that it was made – for example, when a member has been appointed to become a court judge. Resignation to the minister is consistent with other sports legislation, and again goes to reducing administrative burden.

Broadly, what we are doing with this legislation is amending and making sure that the governance provisions – the arrangements – within a number of these trusts are tidied up, the red tape reduced and the administrative burden lessened. I do say though, on our sporting calendar and on all of the work that has been done by relevant agencies and by the minister and the department, it is something to be incredibly proud of – that we have such a strong, vibrant, successful sporting calendar of events. In many ways the envy of so many is to know that right here in this state we are continuing to make sure that we remain at the top of the sporting fabric of the nation, and we will always ensure as a government that we work with fantastic agencies like the Victorian Institute of Sport and so many others who do incredible work to support athletes right across our state.

I do want to again say to every member of every local club and every committee: I am someone who benefited significantly from local sport. I know that when you play local sport you are part of something that is bigger than you. The most important thing about that is the mentoring, the support and the conversations that happen at footy training and at swimming – all of that makes for a great community, and when we have good communities, we have a better state. What we know and understand is that by backing so much of this work we collectively become better. We know that for many people going through challenges in their life, no matter what those challenges may be, a sporting club can often be a place of solitude and a place where individuals get support that they may not get in a more formal setting. I think sometimes, while we do not forget to acknowledge that, that is something that we should acknowledge more, because when you do that – when you provide, as I said, good support within grassroots community organisations, when people volunteer their time and when people actually support other people to be better people – that is something that we should always support and we should always be proud of.

This bill contains a number of amendments that I have gone to, and I want to acknowledge the work that has been done by everyone that has brought this piece of legislation to the house. The member for Footscray continues to write her cards here at a great pace, but I very proudly commend the bill to the house.

Jade BENHAM (Mildura) (17:24): I do take quite a bit of joy when I am able to rise in this place, in fact in any place, and get to speak about sport. It is my first great love of course, and there are no boundaries. I will watch pretty much anything, darts included.

A member interjected.

Jade BENHAM: Thank you. I am more than happy to rise to speak on the State Sporting Legislation Amendment Bill 2024. It has been spoken about before by the member for Nepean, who did not go through every clause, but there is quite a bit to go through with the tidying up of red tape. There are a couple of things I do want to highlight. We will start with the State Netball and Hockey Centre advisory committee, netball being one of my great loves. I have played at the State Netball and Hockey Centre many, many times. I have even competed in taekwondo at the State Netball and Hockey Centre. It is a multifunctional centre and has had a level of investment. It is a great place. I have also played and refereed state titles in netball there a number of times.

The advisory committee was a committee that offered advice to government on issues. Changes in all sorts of sporting rules – Netball Victoria have changed the rules again this year – do have an impact on things like that. When there are rule changes, which might be the run-off of the netball courts for referee safety, player safety or that kind of thing, they are the things that need to be fed back to government so that there can be changes made to spaces. This is really important stuff, but unless you are involved in playing netball at those facilities you would not know about it, so to abolish the committee, to me, does not make any sense. Fixing it, yes – there may have been all sorts of issues around the committee and getting onto it et cetera, et cetera – but to abolish it rather than to rectify those issues is perplexing to say the very least.

We know that it is a great facility, and one of the great joys when I was growing up playing country netball was that I got my C-grade umpiring badge at the State Netball and Hockey Centre. I will not give you the year, but I was 15 years old. It was quite an achievement for someone of 15 to be awarded their C-grade badge back in those days.

Sam Groth interjected.

Jade BENHAM: Yes, eight years ago. That is exactly right. Thank you, member for Nepean; I appreciate that. But the training for that happens on our country courts, and when you get there you see these facilities that are like ‘Wow’. Meanwhile our home courts, the courts at John James Park in Ouyen, for example, have needed resurfacing for years and years and years. There are complications around the committee of management at a grassroots level which also perhaps need to be and could have been looked at in this bill. When it gets down to councils, committees of management, different clubs and associations that might use these facilities and who is responsible for what, it ends up largely being the volunteers that do the work in maintenance, that do that resurfacing work if it is for netball. I know the Ouyen football–netball club did a huge amount of work to make sure their courts were safe. These are volunteers in a town of around a thousand people. They are a magnificent community, but there is a very stark contrast when we talk about grassroots level facilities and things like the State Netball and Hockey Centre.

Kardinia Park is one that many constituents have come to me post budget about, when the $4 million scoreboard was talked about. It is now not very affectionately known as ‘Pork Barrel Park’ in my electorate because of the rigmarole that many clubs have had to go through to get new digital scoreboards. When I was growing up the footy score was changed by kids up in the scoreboard on freezing cold winter days, changing the scores manually for a can of Coke and a packet of chips. That was reward aplenty for us, but we have evolved – it is 2024. The rigmarole that many clubs have had to go through to get simple scoreboard upgrades, because volunteerism, as we know, is dropping off and it is hard to find volunteers. They do a magnificent job. Every sporting club in the state and the country and the people who volunteer for them does a magnificent job, but it is hard to find volunteers. Even trying to run a canteen these days is really, really hard.

So you can understand the contrast for those of us out in the most isolated parts of the state. I was in Murrayville last week having a look at their new clubrooms and their new facilities, which are fantastic, but their league is in South Australia – just to give you some perspective on how isolated some of these clubs are and how much they rely on volunteers. Just a little fraction of that money that goes into places like the State Netball and Hockey Centre and Kardinia Park I know John James Oval would have benefited from greatly.

The Hattah Desert Race – I spoke about that in my members statement earlier – is a magnificent event. It has been going for 26 years now, but the security of this event centres around land. They do it on private land at the moment. What happens with succession planning in farming when that might change hands? There is no security, so an investment from the state government to support such a huge event – and events like it in all disciplines of sport, which bring such huge economic value to smaller regional and rural towns – is vitally important.

The Mildura Harness Racing Club is another one. The Minister for Racing was in Mildura a couple of weeks ago and was kind enough to give the Mildura Harness Racing Club time to meet and discuss with them their options for upgrade. Their building was affected by floods during the heavy rains in 2022, and also there are also some issues around scheduling and whatever. But it was great of the minister to come and discuss that with the harness racing club. That is another shared facility. You have got two footy clubs that play there and two netball clubs, you have got cricket clubs and you have got harness races. Trying to manage a venue like that is difficult to say the very least – and it is the local showgrounds.

The Mildura Racing Club, which I also mentioned in my members statement earlier, were inundated for six weeks in water taller than me and managed to run their 100th Mildura Cup a couple of weeks ago, but it took over 12 months. They were 18 months without racing, and that hurts clubs that rely on those facilities to be able to hold events like the Mildura Cup, which was a fantastic event. It really was. The minister also attended that, which was fantastic. These are the sorts of grassroots clubs, when we talk about sport being the backbone and the spine of country Victoria, that really are. So when it comes out in the news that Kardinia Park has had a $4 million investment, or the MCG and things like that, you cannot blame regional people for getting a little bit frustrated when there are so many volunteer hours that go into the maintenance and improvement of local facilities.

The Mildura Lawn Tennis Club is another one that was inundated during the floods, and they have done a magnificent job – tennis clubs do do an incredible job – to bring that back to the state that it is in. They had their pro tournament earlier this year, which was fantastic and which I believe the member for Nepean won a long, long, long, long time ago. He is ignoring me, and that is fine.

The Hopetoun go-kart club is also another fantastic community club which is managed again through volunteerism. A lot of speedway and motorsport local clubs rely on their own funds, running raffles, sausage sizzles at Bunnings and things like that.

Just to finish up – I could go through and name every single sporting club in my electorate, but I would be here for the entire 10 minutes – I also need to mention the Birchip–Watchem Netball Club, another club that needed upgrades to their court, which have been completed, but for safety reasons they have been unable to play on it. Councils are trying to manage this as well, particularly small rural councils, who are already stretched for resources. That is not often the remit of councils, which is why it lands in the lap of volunteers.

For the Nullawil and Wycheproof–Narraport footy clubs, it is their last year this year, both of those small clubs. As I said, it is getting harder and harder for grassroots clubs to remain, so it is their last year. I wish them all the best and all the best in their venture as an amalgamated club next year, which will be the Lions. I look forward to being able to support them next year.

John MULLAHY (Glen Waverley) (17:34): It is a pleasure to rise to speak in favour of the State Sporting Legislation Amendment Bill 2024. From the outset I would like to thank the Minister for Tourism, Sport and Major Events and his team for the immense effort that has been put into this piece of legislation, and I trust that it will make a positive impact on Victorians. I take great pride in knowing that Melbourne and Victoria are the sporting and major events capital of Australia. There is no doubt that people from across the world find Victoria to be a destination state, whether it be for the concerts, for the Australian Open or to visit the biggest stadium in the Southern Hemisphere, and this is only possible thanks to this government’s continued investment into this sector to both attract talent to perform in our state and ensure that major events stay right here in Victoria.

Not only are these events a source of great entertainment and enjoyment, but they also provide a significant boost to Victoria’s economy. Take the Australian Open, for example, where we are privileged to host the best players in the world in one of only four tennis grand slams. More than 1.1 ‍million fans passed through the gates across three weeks, which created some 1700 jobs and contributed more than $387 million to Victoria’s economy. As anyone who has been to Melbourne Park knows, we host some of the most modern, clean and up-to-date facilities in the world. This government made a significant contribution of close to $1 billion for the Melbourne Park redevelopment, and over the past 10 years the Australian Open has returned that investment threefold. A thriving Melbourne and Olympic Park complex means that the Australian Open will remain in Melbourne until at least 2046, and we will continue to attract performances to the Rod Laver Arena. This area has generated more than $740 million in visitor spend alone in the past 12 months, with it hosting nearly 100 concerts and 50 other entertainment events and welcoming more than 3 million visitors in total. A clear indication of the economic success of this government’s investment is that some 1.2 million bed nights were booked in hotels as more than 900,000 visitors from other parts of the state flocked to Melbourne. From Robbie Williams, Dua Lipa and Billie Eilish the precinct brought some $880 million in revenue, forming 6 per cent of Australia’s sports industry and 9 per cent of the country’s live entertainment industry. This cumulatively has created 4200 jobs, with an additional 1600 jobs supported indirectly across precinct activities.

Our commitment to strengthening Melbourne as the events capital of the country is good for jobs, good for opportunities and good for the economy. Another example of Melbourne’s sporting prowess is the Formula One Australian Grand Prix, which had an estimated attendance of more than 450,000 ‍people. Hotel occupancy averaged more than 91 per cent during the week, and networks recorded the biggest ever live stream audience.

To ensure that Melbourne and Victoria continue to thrive in hosting sporting and major events we must proactively work towards improving legislative frameworks, and this bill seeks to do just that by improving consistency in governance provisions and reducing red tape as well as modernising legislation. This will ensure that important decisions can be made with greater efficiency. Necessary amendments will be made to five state sporting acts: the Kardinia Park Stadium Act 2016, the Melbourne and Olympic Parks Act 1985, the Melbourne Cricket Ground Act 2009, the Professional Boxing and Combat Sports Act 1985 and the State Sport Centres Act 1994.

The change to the Kardinia Park Stadium Act will allow for the minister for sport rather than the Governor in Council to make event management decisions. This will cut waiting periods, increasing efficiency. This bill also abolishes the Kardinia Park advisory committee and the State Netball and Hockey Centre advisory committee. The reason for this decision is that both committees are advisory bodies with no decision-making authority. Considering that the appointment process is arduous, these changes will facilitate a similar process in which advice is received, albeit without the delays and administrative difficulties.

Further red tape is cut by allowing the minister to delegate floodlight determinations for the MCG to the department, as well as reducing the administrative burden for the Melbourne and Olympic Parks Trust. Consistency will be applied across both trust and advisory committee applications and resignation processes by empowering the minister to appoint acting chairpersons and members and receive resignations directly. Additionally, this bill removes outdated provisions which prohibit Tennis Australia and Tennis Victoria employees from being eligible for payment as members of the Melbourne and Olympic Parks Trust and increases the maximum number of members on both the MCG and the State Sport Centres trust.

Changes will be made to the ANZAC Day Act 1958 to update language choices and modernise the legislation such that it is fit for purpose. Amendments will be made to update measurement terminology and remove outdated gendered language – I think we are going from miles to kilometres, finally.

As a sports fan myself – go Cats – I know how much of a privilege it is to have excellent and accessible sporting facilities in your community, whether they be there for major events or for local community sport. I say that as a proud representative of the Glen Waverley district, which is home to some of the best community sports infrastructure in the state. It is always a pleasure to be invited down to visit clubs and learn more about the incredible work they do. Although there are too many to mention I would like to give a special shout-out to some of the local sporting heroes in the Glen Waverley community.

Firstly, congratulations to the Whitehorse United Soccer Club on its incredible success over the last 30 years. It went from one team to 48 teams, and it is truly a thriving community club. It was an absolute pleasure to join the committee members Enrico Marrone, Amanda Armstrong, Karen Foreman, John Parisella, Kim Marrone, Andrew Findlay, Terry Howse and Maria Mavrogiannis at their annual president’s lunch last weekend. From meeting with life members, sponsors, supporters and families to learning about the possible improvements the club could undergo, it was a special day. I would like to again acknowledge the ongoing issues of drainage on the ground, and I look forward to working with council to address this issue to ensure that the club has a viable pitch to train and play on.

I would also like to take a moment to reflect on the incredible life of Paul ‘Bluey’ Tierney, who was a stalwart of the Blackburn baseball club. A member of the inaugural team from some 61 years ago, he devoted so much of his time to the game he loved and the club he served. I want to acknowledge Bluey’s work in being an instrumental part of the rebuild and success of the Blackburn baseball club. Without Bluey’s passion and tireless commitment the baseball community just would not be the same, and I offer my condolences to his family and friends.

And of course a special shout-out to the amazing crew down at the Mazenod Panthers. The Panthers, who play at Central Reserve, which has received $300,000 in the latest budget for resurfacing the south oval, are a kind and nurturing club. Just this past weekend the Panthers played against the Monash Demons in the George Soles Memorial Cup, in recognition of his service as a committee member and timekeeper for more than 20 years. This weekend after a remarkable record-breaking 20 ‍years of playing in Mazenod colours, Mark Vanderven and Simon Pollock will be playing their 200th games for the mighty Panthers. This is an incredible achievement, and I know their loyalty and courage is an inspiration to all.

It is an honour to have so many amazing community sports clubs in my electorate, and to see the smiles on everyone’s faces as they learn and grow is a joy. A special thankyou to all the players, coaches, staff, parents and volunteers who make it happen, and I look forward to joining our community at more of these events soon. Local sport is the backbone of our community, and whether it be funding to resurface the oval at Central Reserve south or building a new pavilion at Brandon Park Reserve, this government is backing in the next generation of superstars that will hopefully one day play in the precincts that this legislation changes.

Briefly, best wishes to the Australian Olympic team competing in Paris as we speak now. A special shout-out to Marena Whittle in the women’s basketball team, Nicholas Lum from the table tennis team and William Petric from the swimming squad. Marena, Nicholas and William are all residents of the Glen Waverley district, and they are all doing us very proud, representing the best in our district.

I am proud to be part of an Allan Labor government that backs our state’s position as the sporting and major events capital of this country. Our continuing investment will ensure that we receive the economic and social benefits, as well as giving Victorians an opportunity to be the best versions of themselves. I strongly believe that this bill, by making these minor amendments to the state sporting legislation and the ANZAC Day Act, will have a positive impact on cementing our place as a thriving sports and major events hub, and I commend the bill to the house.

Cindy McLEISH (Eildon) (17:43): I too rise to make a contribution to the State Sporting Legislation Amendment Bill 2024, which interestingly enough is about state facilities rather than grassroots sport. I think a lot of the members in the chamber have absolutely just confused that. This is about changing things at the higher level to make it a little bit better and to streamline things. The bill implements a number of reforms to several acts: the Kardinia Park Stadium Act 2016, the Melbourne and Olympic Parks Act 1985, the Melbourne Cricket Ground Act 2009, the Professional Boxing and Combat Sports Act 1985 and the State Sport Centres Act 1994. If you actually read the bill and go through it, clause after clause after clause is about removing gendered language. Anything with ‘she’ or ‘he’ is now ‘the commissioner’, ‘the participant’, ‘the promoter’ – all of that sort of language is being removed, first and foremost. There are also some changes in relation to trust membership and leasing powers, and I am a little bit concerned about some of the things around leasing powers and acting appointments for trust and board members through the acts that I have just mentioned.

I am actually going to start with the changes to the State Sport Centres Act 1994. One of the things that this does is abolish the State Netball and Hockey Centre advisory committee. Now, this worries me. We do have this gold-plated facility out in Parkville, known to me probably as the state hockey centre rather than the netball and hockey centre. There has been an advisory committee. Feedback from stakeholders says that this has not been working effectively, so the government are moving to – rather than fix it and have proper mechanisms for feedback – abolish it altogether and try and put in something new. I am not sure that that is always the right way to tackle something that there are issues with.

What it is also looking to do is increase the maximum membership of the trust, which is seven now, to 11. I worry when membership of these sorts of boards and trusts increases to a certain level. I referred to the Australian Institute of Company Directors to get a rule of thumb idea about appropriate board sizes. As I expected, this is on the upper level. A large ASX-listed company would have eight to 12 members, and here we are looking at seven to 11. Eight to 12 for a large ASX-listed company – that is talking about BHP, Westpac; it is not talking about the state sport centre. A small ASX-listed company might have four to six members. I just worry that the bigger they get the less effective they become, and people may not participate to the same degree. Of course some small charities and not-for-profit boards have five to eight members, but then again public sector boards might have six to 12. I know in a lot of public sector boards they are actually on that lower end. So I am a little bit concerned about the reasons why they are looking to increase the membership.

One of the other elements here is permitting the minister to delegate approval of leases that are not major leases over certain land managed by the trust. Major leases are big 21-year leases over large infrastructure. I worry that changing the delegations or the authorities may remove the minister from knowing exactly what is going on. If you are a good minister and you have got a good secretary of the department, that information is being fed to you. But there is that possibility that they become removed, and we cannot have them removed from what is going on.

One of the other areas that is being amended is the Professional Boxing and Combat Sports Act 1985. They have had problems in the past, and you do not want the minister not knowing what is going on there. So I am a little bit concerned about the delegations. I understand why – that it might be trying to streamline it – but at the same time we could be increasing the risk.

While I am talking about the State Sport Centres Act – and as I said, it covers the State Netball and Hockey Centre out at Parkville – I do want to mention that we have two Victorian hockey players in the Olympics. Even more exciting is those two players belong to Southern United Hockey Club. I have belonged to Southern United Hockey Club since 1991, and I have played there every year since, except when I was pregnant.

A member interjected.

Cindy McLEISH: Only until 16 weeks. So I have watched these players grow and develop. It is so exciting for our club to have Amy Lawton and Nathan Ephraums representing Australia at the Olympics. Amy made her debut in Tokyo, and it was obvious from a young age that she was an exceptional talent. You do well at juniors and you move through the senior teams and get into the state league team fairly quickly, and Amy was one of those kids. It has been really exciting to watch her. Her sister Josie also plays. I know her parents Julie and Oliver are so excited. In fact on Sunday night the club had a function down there to watch the first of the women’s hockey matches. They expected maybe 40 and they got 140, and Channel 9 covered it, so it was all very exciting. Also Nathan got the late call-up, and he was training initially. Nathan, when he played in the under-9s, one year got 100 ‍goals, and I thought this was pretty amazing. I spoke to the coach, who I knew quite well, Chris Abaniel. Chris said, ‘It’s amazing. He can find the back of the net. He knows where the goals are.’ So it has been no surprise for us at Southern United to see Nathan go on and do what he has done. It is so exciting that he has now had this opportunity to represent Australia at the Olympics. His parents Dave and Petra will be so excited, as will his brother Josh. Dave hung up the stick a few years ago, and I know how much of an inspiration he was for Nathan. I cannot tell you how proud Southern United is of both Amy and Nathan.

Back to the bill, I want to touch on part 6, which is amending the Professional Boxing and Combat Sports Act. A lot of this is changes around gendered language, but it also gives the minister an opportunity to appoint a member of the board to act as chairperson, and it outlines the functions and delegations that that person has. I understand that this is important because you do need to have that continuity, that something can continue to flow, and I think it is important. In the past this area has had some difficulties, and I think it is good that it is being looked at here. The Professional Boxing and Combat Sports Board are the regulating authority, and they issue some 800 licences. The minister can act here to make these acting appointments, and the bill outlines some of the duties and functions.

We have also got some amendments here to the ANZAC Day Act which change the description of an area where sports are held on Anzac Day. We know things have moved in this space quite a bit over the last decade or so from when sport was not played on Anzac Day, then we had it at a certain time on Anzac Day and then we had more sports getting in on being able to play, but we have had to have legislation around that.

The amendments to the Kardinia Park Stadium Act permit the minister to make event management declarations rather than having, I think it was, the Governor in Council do that, which is something that you would like to see. It abolishes the Kardinia Park Advisory Committee, and again I have spoken about the abolition of advisory committees. As long as there is a mechanism in place – what can happen without that mechanism in place is that things can become slack. You might expect to have meetings every two months, maybe every three months, and then you miss a month and then it is four months, then once every six months, and, before you know it, it is once every two years. That is not effective. We need to have good processes and systems in place. I urge the government, when they are abolishing such committees, to ensure that they do have good processes in place.

The minister here also can delegate the approval of leases that are not major leases over certain lands that are managed by the trust, as I mentioned previously with the State Sporting Centres Act. I reiterate my concerns that the minister can become too disengaged, and they must have appropriate mechanisms in place to work effectively with the trust and with the department to make sure that things do not fall between the cracks, because we do need the minister to understand what is happening. Sport is an integral part of the way we live our life in Victoria, whether that is as participants or as spectators.

There are changes to the Melbourne and Olympic Parks Act changing the requirements relating to resignation of members from the trust, changing the powers relating to the appointment of acting members to the trust and approval of leases over things like the National Tennis Centre and Olympic Park – such important and valuable assets to the state of Victoria. I think everybody agrees that the use of the tennis centre and Olympic Park is really wide. It is well beyond sport. We have all sorts of exhibitions, and we have had some great world championships in different areas and lots of concerts. It is important that we do have good mechanisms for management in place.

Paul EDBROOKE (Frankston) (17:53): I take from the member for Eildon’s speech that she just got knocked off the Olympic list by that young’un in hockey. I know you were there, I know you are passionate about hockey, but it might be a case of the older we get, the better we were. I can speak personally from that perspective.

I want to start out by mentioning a Frankston High School student Brock Batty, who is very talented. As I said, he is attending Frankston High School at the moment, but right at this point in time he is in Paris, and he is competing in the trampolining. I find that pretty frightening. I see the trampolining, and the skill required is amazing, but the heights those people jump to are just crazy.

A member interjected.

Paul EDBROOKE: Jumping out of planes is different: you cannot see the ground. While I am on that segue – thank you, member – I want to say congratulations to my speed skydiving coach or mentor Mervyn O’Connell. He got the silver medal in Germany a couple of weeks ago for speed skydiving, ISSA Speed Skydiving, and he crushed it by diving out of a plane and reaching 512 kilometres an hour I think, so Mach 0.5. The guy is a crazy Irishmen. He lines himself up in the door of the plane and he actually uses the door to leap out of the plane so he can get as much grunt into his jump as he can. I just look on with amazement.

It is with that kind of amazement that I watch the Olympics at the moment and I see the high level at which our performers take these medals. I would argue to anyone that this is not about grassroots sport, because those people are role models. When they come back to Australia, we will not just be seeing them on TV; we will be seeing them in real life, and many of those people are Victorians.

I do not want to offend anyone at the department, but while we might find this bill a little bit boring – it is about the constitution of boards; it is about crossing some t’s and dotting some i’s – it is very important that we have these functions and tools in place and operating effectively so that we can actually grow these athletes from teeny-weeny little Auskickers to people that are performing at the Olympics.

With that I would say also that Melbourne and Victoria are the sporting capital of Australia, and that is consistent with government investment. We have seen so much growth in major events over more than 25 years of focusing on the major events calendar. Research commissioned by Visit Victoria in 2023 found Victoria’s major events calendar contributed $3.3 billion to the economy and generated more than 15,000 jobs for Victoria every single year. Those major events drive interstate and international visitation and put Melbourne and Victoria on the global stage, filling hotels and supporting Victorian jobs. If you want to see Victoria on the international stage, you can watch the Olympics now. When some of our Victorians take home medals, often they will be speaking about their home, they will be thanking their local coach and they will be thanking their local clubs, and that is again Victoria on the international stage. Again, it is bills like this that make it easy for clubs to run, for boards to run, and to spend time focusing on the actual sports themselves.

One of those sports that we have heard other people talk about is obviously the 2024 Australian Open. We smashed attendance records this year with more than 1 million fans passing through the gates over all three weeks, including the opening week as well, which was a sight to behold. I went there for one day and wanted to get back for more, but unfortunately, alas, we have got to work. We have shown through analysis that the 2023 event created more than 1700 full-time jobs and contributed more than $387 million to Victoria’s economy.

Whether it is a sporting event, which might be the cricket at the G, or a music concert – whoever has played most recently, Tay Tay or whoever – these kinds of events actually contribute so much to our economy. If you think of a major band or a major artist coming and filling up the MCG, you might be accurate I think if you are talking about tens of millions of dollars generated over one single night in hotels, in hospitality, in ticket sales and in all the other things that people do when they come and visit Melbourne, which is amazing. The other major event we have had obviously is the 2024 Formula One Grand Prix. We have heard other people talk about that, but 452,000 people attended this year’s event, which is a record-breaking figure, I think.

This bill will go on to change the constitution of and numbers on some of our boards, and this is seen as a good thing by people on this side of the house. We have heard that it could make boards a little bit too big, a little bit too unwieldy, but I think what you will hear is that it makes things more fair, more efficient and easier to get across the line. One of the other changes in this bill is about making sure that if someone needs to resign from a board, whether or not that be to take up a job immediately ‍– one example might be as a judge – they do not have to wait for that to be signed off or they do not have to wait for the board to actually meet again to do that, and that is really important.

The delegation of leases is another issue that has been brought up a few times, and basically what this bill does is introduce efficiencies so the minister does not have to approve or oversee very minor changes to these leasing arrangements which we might see as fairly trivial things. The minister will have absolute control over whether to make a delegation and the scope to approve a lease, which may be narrower than the delegation power, but despite making a delegation the minister may choose to exercise a statutory approval power at any time with respect to any lease.

As far as event management declarations and floodlight determinations go, events which are commonly subject to an event management declaration at Kardinia Park or the floodlight determination at the MCG include AFL and AFLW matches, Big Bash League cricket matches and A-League soccer matches. During COVID we saw these events move to floating schedules that were more flexible around what we were seeing in case numbers of the day and things that were popping up at the time. It makes it difficult to have these declarations and determinations made at the time, and it can be frustrating. This enables the minister to make event management declarations at Kardinia Park and the secretary of that department to make floodlight determinations at the MCG and will provide greater flexibility and allow these orders to be made more quickly when events are announced.

We have touched on resignations, and I think this is just a very non-controversial, commonsense way of doing things. In the past people have had to wait; it has held up some of their career moves and their life. It makes sense that if someone puts their resignation letter in then as quickly as possible that can be made official and put out there into the public sphere.

As far as membership levels go, we heard the member for Eildon’s opinion on this, and what I got out of that was that I am not sure that the member for Eildon really saw a point to it, I guess. The current membership provisions of the Melbourne Cricket Ground Act 2009 require the Melbourne Cricket Ground Trust to consist of a chairperson and not less than six and not more than eight members. Increasing the maximum membership by one member will enable greater diversity and skills on the board to strengthen management of this important state sporting asset, and it is not required that all nine positions be filled. I think what we are trying to do here is expand on the equity and diversity piece on our boards. I think that is really smart. I also think that, at times, people are often on a few boards or they have got their own business or their own work commitments. It is smart to be able to make a quorum of five people out of nine, perhaps.

The other thing I would say here is it is adding one person to these boards. I do not think that is going to create any kind of mess that we heard elucidated before. I do not think adding one person to a board to make it nine instead of eight is going to cause many problems, but if it does increase our equity and diversity and if it does bring more diversity to our boards, just like we have done with our state boards, I think that is a really good thing. I think people throughout the house will appreciate that. I do not think it is controversial at all. The State Sport Centres Act 1994 really has the same focus. It has got part-time members, and it is going to see a small increase as well.

With that, good luck to our Olympians, good luck to our local Olympians and Brock from Frankston. I commend this bill to the house.

Martin CAMERON (Morwell) (18:03): I rise to speak on the State Sporting Legislation Amendment Bill 2024, and at the start I would like to thank the member for Nepean for the work that he did. I note that we do not oppose this bill, and as everyone has got up and spoken about, it is a very bland bill. We have to dot some i’s and cross some t’s and set it all up. But sport is a passion of mine, and if it has to do with some housekeeping, well, so be it. The bill has been introduced by the government to amend the ANZAC Day Act 1958 to change the description of an area in which sports are held on Anzac Day. There are also a series of changes to the Kardinia Park Stadium Act 2016, the Melbourne and Olympic Parks Act 1985, the Melbourne Cricket Ground Act 2009 and the State Sport Centres Act 1994 in relation to trust membership, leasing powers and other miscellaneous amendments. The bill also amends the Professional Boxing and Combat Sports Act 1985 in relation to acting appointments and for other purposes.

Heading back to the ANZAC Day Act 1958 to change the description of an area in which sports are held on Anzac Day, I remember, going back over a decade now in our junior football league in Traralgon where I live, the Southside Junior Football Club decided to be proactive and have an Anzac Day match. The complications of going through and working with the RSL to allow junior sport to hold an Anzac Day match were fairly long and drawn out, but on the flip side of getting it up, it was not only a fantastic event for the Traralgon & District Junior Football League – and I note there are some other leagues around our area that have followed suit – but it was also good for the kids. It was an education for them to attend the dawn service and lay a wreath on behalf of the clubs that were participating, to the extent where we had the bugler come down and do the last post before the under-16s actually took the field.

Also it is, as I said before, to amend the Kardinia Park Stadium Act 2016 to permit the minister to make event management declarations and abolish the Kardinia Park advisory committee – we heard the member for Eildon have a few concerns about that; I think with the housekeeping that needs to go through there are going to be a few concerns with a few bits and pieces, but in totality I think these are things that we can work with – and change the membership and procedures of the trust and permit the minister to delegate approval of leases that are not major leases over certain land managed by the trust.

I note that in the budget, and it was spoken about before by the member for Nepean, $4.1 million was put out for Kardinia Park to get a new scoreboard. Harking back to my local football club, Traralgon, that I played for, back in June 2021 the club was inundated by floodwaters, and to this day – I was lucky enough to be able to do my bit for the club and umpire the reserves for them so they could get a game up last Saturday – no works have been done on the club amenities. It is over 1100 days since the flood, and still both male and female footballers and our netballers are in change rooms that are not acceptable, which have been put back together virtually by the club with the help of the local council. The away teams are in portable amenities.

We see Geelong get $4.1 million and the Traralgon Football Netball Club waiting. They have a certain amount of money to build. The council has come back with a plan. It is a plan that I think both the sporting users and I would suggest the council themselves are not really happy with, but they do not have the money to be able to build what they want to build for the next 10 generations of people moving forward. It would be great to be able to get some money come towards the club so they could achieve that. As I said, it is over 1100 days since that flood went through, and they still do not have any rooms. To president Kev Foley, vice-president Nat Jaensch and also a good mate of mine Andrew Quenault, who are in negotiations and trying to get the club up and going with the best facilities, kudos for being so patient.

The bill amends the Melbourne and Olympic Parks Act to change requirements relating to resignation of members from the trust, and we just heard the member talk about that as well; change powers relating to the appointment of acting members to the trust; change requirements relating to approval of leases over the National Tennis Centre and Olympic Park to permit the minister to delegate approval of leases that are not major leases over the land, so it is just tidying up stuff there; and change the membership requirements of the trust relating to nominations made by Tennis Australia Limited and the Victorian Tennis Association.

I know we talk about the tennis at Melbourne Park, but all our regional areas that have major tennis tournaments in the lead-up to our Australian Open come under this as well. This will permit the minister to delegate the power to make floodlight determinations and permit the minister to make acting appointments to the trust. As we heard from the member for Frankston before, if someone wants to get off a board and puts in their resignation, they should not have to wait for a long time for it to be ratified. So hopefully this can fix that up. People do the right thing and go on boards. In the city that is on boards of the Melbourne Cricket Club or Kardinia Park or the tennis centre, but it is the same thing when it flows down through our regional clubs, as we do that. This will also amend the State Sport Centres Act 1994 to abolish the State Netball and Hockey Centre Advisory Committee, increase the maximum membership of the trust and permit the minister to delegate approval of leases that are not major leases over certain land managed by this trust.

As everybody else has been talking about, we get caught up in an Olympic year, especially when the Australians are doing so well. We have a few people out of my area down in the Latrobe Valley that are representing Australia and in part are also representing their home towns in the Latrobe Valley and the state of Victoria. Jade Melbourne is one. Jade is playing for the Opals. She is a very unassuming young lady who has done fantastic things. I am able to talk with her mum and dad, who are from my area. Her dad, Brett, and mum, Sharyn, sent a photo. They are over there supporting their daughter. They did not get the result they wanted last night, but I think they will bounce back and hopefully be able to move through the competition. She has Brett and Sharyn and I think her two sisters over there supporting. It is amazing how many people go over to watch. Well done to Jade. We have got another Olympics before they come to Brisbane. I am tipping Jade will not only be playing for the Opals but will probably be captaining the side as they go through. She is a very special talent. I think the main ones that are happy that she is playing basketball are the junior footballers that she used to play against. She used to get pulled up for tackling the boys too hard. She is an absolute warrior. Well done to Jade.

Another young girl from Traralgon is Emily Beecroft. Emily is in the Paralympics in the swimming. Her dad will be the one with the T-shirt on with Emily on his chest, very proudly. This is I think her second Olympics, so now she is a seasoned veteran. She comes from the Traralgon Swimming Club. Brian Ford is the head of that, seeing these young ones come through. Michael Mihaly works behind the scenes there on timing. Every time there is an actual event with the Traralgon Swimming Club he is there. We wish them all well. We are all going to be in here over the next few days weary-eyed – but go the Opals! As I said, we do not oppose this bill.

Dylan WIGHT (Tarneit) (18:13): It is a pleasure to rise this evening to contribute on the State Sporting Legislation Amendment Bill 2024. Before I get to the bill, I thought I would just pick up on a couple of contributions that I have heard this evening as I have been listening intently. Firstly, I think it is important to note the member for Nepean’s contribution at the beginning of this debate. For the lead speaker from the opposition – and if you are to believe the Melbourne tabloid the future leader of the opposition – to come in here and speak on something in his portfolio and something that is incredibly important to him, as he tells everyone, which is sport in this state, and not quite be able to reach the 30-minute threshold I think was a little bit embarrassing straight off the bat.

I have also heard several contributions from those opposite, including the member for Mildura when she was contributing to the government business program debate, speak about community sport and how, whilst they do not oppose this bill, speaking about these things and not speaking about community sport is just not quite right. Let me say that there are no greater supporters of community sport than those on this side on the government benches, the Allan Labor government. The investments that we have made in community sport in this state are absolutely unparalleled.

If you will indulge me for a moment to just go through some of the contributions that this government has made in my electorate of Tarneit: new lights for Tarneit Titans Football Club, and a new scoreboard for the Tarneit Titans Football Club in the previous budget; new lighting for Goddard Street Reserve – of course where the Wyndham Suns play; and a new scoreboard for the Wyndham Rhinos down there at Mossfiel Reserve – and it gave me great pleasure to go down to Mossfiel Reserve in April, before I played a game of football myself with the Tarneit Titans on that very same day, to announce that money was included in the budget for the Wyndham Rhinos at that reserve to put up a brand new electronic scoreboard. On the very same day on the very same reserve I also got to announce new lighting for the Hoppers Crossing Netball Association. These are sporting clubs, community groups, in my electorate that provide so much to the social fabric of both Tarneit and Hoppers Crossing. I am always incredibly proud to go and engage with those clubs and talk about the fact that it is the Allan Labor government that is providing the community sporting infrastructure that they need.

Along with that, we have been able to provide smaller amounts of money for things like coaching courses and equipment to some different clubs. The Hoppers Crossing Football Club, for their Auskick program, received a smaller amount of money – I think it was $1000 – to be able to provide equipment for their Auskick program. Good News Power Basketball Club in Tarneit received the same amount of money, as did Hoppers Crossing Soccer Club. That is just to name a few.

As I said, the Allan Labor government and those on this side of the house value community sport, and we understand the infrastructure that community sport needs and the integral role that it plays in our communities. But in saying that, as a government you have to be able to walk and chew gum at the same time. Of course we recognise the absolute importance of community sport, but what we are speaking about today with this bill are facilities that make up some of the state’s most valuable and greatest assets. The MCG, Olympic Park, Kardinia Park and the state sport centres provide a significant amount of economic activity to this state. They hold some of this state’s, some of this country’s and in fact some of the world’s greatest major events. It is incredibly important that we protect and we administer those assets – some of the state’s greatest assets, as I said – properly, diligently and in the best way that we can, and that is what this bill this evening goes to.

Just to pick up on that point and on some of the major events that these facilities hold but indeed some of the major events that this state holds, Melbourne, Victoria – make no mistake about it – is the major event capital of this country. There is no debating it; there is no questioning it: Melbourne, Victoria, is the major event capital of this country. Consistent government investment into these events, into our sporting infrastructure and into our major event infrastructure over the past 25 years and indeed by this government over the last 10 years has been significant and has allowed us to be or to continue to be the major event capital of this country.

Research commissioned by Visit Victoria in 2023 found Victoria’s major events calendar contributed $3.3 billion to the Victorian economy – $3.3 billion. A significant amount of that economic activity is household income, because those major events generate more than 15,500 jobs every single year. That major event calendar and the supporting infrastructure around it contributes a significant portion to this state, to this economy and indeed to this job market. I will reiterate, as I have said in here before, that Victoria has one of the strongest jobs markets in the country. Major events drive interstate and international visitation and put Melbourne and Victoria on the global stage. It is not just having the fantastic events that we do – being able to see all the hundreds of thousands of people attending things like the Australian Open, the grand prix and the AFL Grand Final – but it also is supporting that hospitality and hotel industry. If you come into the city on the Australian Open weekend, the streets are flooded. You cannot get accommodation and you cannot get restaurant bookings because the economy is going that well from all the interstate and international travellers that are coming here to see our fantastic state, our fantastic city and the fantastic events that we put on and that we support.

Major events are also part of our broader strategy to brand and market Melbourne and Victoria nationally and around the world. Our key major sporting events in the last year obviously included the Australian Open, which was significant. We had record crowds at the Australian Open. Over a million fans attended over that period. We also have the Formula One Australian Grand Prix. This is an event that in Australian terms is unique to Melbourne. There are no other Formula One races in Australia. Over the last two to three years – I think, frankly, with the help perhaps of a Netflix series, Drive to Survive, which everyone is pretty keen on, but also with the investment and the time that we have put in as a government to advertising this event around Australia and around the world – it has become one of the most significant events on our sporting calendar. Indeed almost half a million people attended that event last year. That is absolutely massive. So investment into our sporting infrastructure over that time has been absolutely critical.

Just to finish off, I want to make mention of a former Melbourne Cricket Club Trust member, the late Linda White. Linda was not just an amazing advocate for working people and an amazing senator, she was also, between her time with the union movement and the Senate, an amazing sports administrator with the MCC Trust. I did not think that it was fitting to not give her a mention in this contribution. I commend the bill to the house.

Annabelle CLEELAND (Euroa) (18:23): I rise today to speak on the State Sporting Legislation Amendment Bill 2024, a bill that we do not oppose. This piece of legislation is largely uncontroversial, with several housekeeping changes being made to existing acts. They include the ANZAC Day Act ‍1958, the Kardinia Park Stadium Act 2016, the Melbourne and Olympic Parks Act 1985, the Melbourne Cricket Ground Act 2009, the Professional Boxing and Combat Sports Act 1985 and the State Sport Centres Act 1994. While this piece of legislation is largely set to deliver housekeeping changes and administrative updates, sport is still a matter that is deserving of some debate in this place, particularly when it comes to the condition of our regional sporting clubs and the support that they require.

To start on a positive, I want to congratulate the Longwood Football Netball Club and club president Ricki Shiner on their recent funding windfall. The club is set to receive just under $700,000, which will allow the club to finally complete their long-awaited female-friendly change room upgrades. The funding comes through the Regional Community Sports Infrastructure Fund alongside club and council funding. This fund was established to deliver projects in regional towns following Labor’s shambolic failure to deliver the 2026 Commonwealth Games, and it is pleasing to see some of this finally reaching my electorate. While I have been advocating for this for the last couple of years, I have been on Ricki Shiner’s frequent caller list, with weekly calls advocating to make sure that I am raising it here in Parliament, so I genuinely am thrilled for the community that we were able to pull this off.

The project in Longwood will include a change room area with adjoining toilets and showers, umpire change facilities with an administration area and a publicly accessible all-abilities bathroom with ramp access. Building female-friendly change rooms will be of great benefit to not just the local sporting club but visiting teams and the entire community. Improving accessibility for women in sport is a crucial part of growing participation and increasing the health, wellbeing, safety and comfort of girls and women across our region. This project has been the result of dedication and perseverance by all involved, and I do look forward to seeing the benefits this project brings to our region. I have been incredibly proud to advocate for, sponsor and support this club; answer the countless calls from Ricki; and write letters of support to the local council, encouraging them to apply for the Regional Community Sports Infrastructure Fund on Longwood’s behalf.

Our local sports clubs are providing people with a strong sense of community and belonging and an active lifestyle, and they deserve all the support that they can get. Unfortunately they are not always so lucky to receive help from this government. Many of our region’s clubs are still in desperate need of new and fit-for-purpose equipment, as well as amenities that can best serve our communities. While I am thrilled that Longwood was the beneficiary of this grant funding, many other deserving projects were not even considered.

In Euroa the Memorial Oval sought upgrades to allow for improved female facilities critical to the growth of their female clubs, but this never progressed in the funding process. In Violet Town it was a similar story: proposals to upgrade the netball surfaces did not receive funding, despite a detailed and beneficial proposal that would help improve the conditions for local women and girls that are seeking to take their sporting career to the next level. In Rushworth, despite considerable advocacy, their bowls club was sadly not chosen for much-needed upgrades to their surface. I do want to thank Sid Sprague and Jean Sprague for all they did to advocate for improved facilities, and I remain committed to making sure we get the results that this club deserves. Seymour Football Netball Club was also ignored for funding, as was one in Murchison. Seymour Football Netball Club players were at the forefront when the floods hit our community in October 2022, sandbagging local businesses and protecting our community. It is necessary that this club have adequate facilities to play the game that they love and support our community in health and wellbeing. It is a similar case for Murchison and Toolamba. It is the heartbeat of the community, with players, volunteers and support coming from right across the Goulburn Valley to cheer on their team. But to ensure that this club keeps kicking goals, it desperately needs major upgrades to the facilities.

It is a shame that it seems there is only room to fund one thing at the time under this government, and while I welcome funding at Longwood, many of our neighbouring clubs continue to struggle. When you invest in our sporting clubs, you invest in the health and wellbeing of our communities. While it is disappointing that these clubs missed out on funding, I will be back again to advocate for them when new opportunities arise.

When it comes to other grants available, I was pleased to see four local sporting clubs among the 400 ‍selected statewide in round 2 of the Victorian sporting clubs grant program, following on from the nine recipients recognised in round 1. Euroa Junior Football Netball Club, North Eastern Archers in Benalla, Pyalong Netball Club and Rushworth Football Netball Club all received minor funding boosts in this round. These funds, mostly around $1000, allow for clubs to produce uniforms and buy crucial equipment for their facilities. Round 1 recipients included the Benalla Scout Group, Avenel Bowling Club, Broadford Cricket Club, Heathcote Cricket Club, Nagambie Bowls Club, Samaria Suns Sports Club, Tabilk Junior Football Club, Kilmore Junior Football Club and Nagambie Lakes Sailing Club. It is fantastic to have such a diverse range of sporting groups selected, all dedicated to bringing down the costs of being involved in sport.

With the cost of living pinching household budgets, now more than ever it is great to see community groups sourcing initiatives to make sport easier and more accessible for everyone. I hope these grants will work to remove barriers and boost engagement in our vibrant regional sporting scene by increasing participation. These grants are not always available. Young athletes have come to rely on the generosity of our local communities and local initiatives such as the Benalla Young Sportsperson Trust. It is a privilege to have been associated with this program, a program that supports young people to go on and achieve their dreams, bridging the divide between small-town sports and the major leagues. In past years this trust has provided funding to elite junior athletes, helping cover costs that could potentially be a barrier preventing them from reaching the heights that they are capable of.

For our regional communities, sporting clubs and the volunteers that support them are a crucial part of the local fabric, and it has been so disheartening to see them ignored by this government for so long. The cancellation of the Commonwealth Games was a slap in the face for regional communities across the state, and the need for more funding at a local level remains a major issue. Many of the clubs I have mentioned today have been campaigning for years to get these upgrades, and despite some receiving funding, the vast majority remain in desperate need of support. These are clubs that have been regularly overlooked at budget time and are often forgotten about when it comes to grant opportunities, but this has not stopped them from being incredibly determined and remaining a crucial meeting place for so many in our towns. Our local sport clubs are providing people with a strong sense of community and belonging and an active lifestyle, and they deserve all the support that they can get.

Sarah CONNOLLY (Laverton) (18:31): I have to say I definitely will not be brief on this one because I have absolutely so much to say. I will need more than 9 minutes and 45 seconds to get through it if I am talking about local sporting clubs in my community. I have been down with my local clubs in my community a lot over the past couple of weekends with winter sport. I feel like we are in the midst of winter sport, so rising to speak on the State Sporting Legislation Amendment Bill 2024 comes at a really good time because it does enable me to give a big shout-out to my local clubs.

I agree with the member for Euroa. She was just talking about the great work that is happening with female participation in sport and saying that we need to do a whole lot more to get girls and women into sport, and sports that traditionally they never felt were for them. When I think about local clubs in my community who are absolutely kicking goals – no pun intended – in that regard, that would have to be the Williams Landing soccer club. I was just down there to watch a training match – it must have been on a Thursday night, when soccer trains – happening between Western United and the Williams Landing soccer club. I cannot remember what age group it was, but it was just an incredible opportunity to watch young kids – they were young boys in this case – play a sport that they absolutely love and absolutely excel at.

But it also gave me time to talk to a lot of the mums – as a soccer mum, I know a lot of mums turn up day in and day out to see their kids and enable their kids to play sport. I was talking to a whole lot of mums there on the sideline, but I was also talking to the president of the club, the secretary of the club, the social media person of the club and a lot of people on the club’s committee. The great thing about Williams Landing soccer club is that the committee members are mostly women. I am very proud to say that there are quite a few women of Islamic faith on that committee as well, because their daughters are playing for the club.

I was talking to one of the mums there; I think her name was Robyn. She is Muslim, and she was telling me about the importance of women and mums there at the club participating in their children’s sport – not just being a bit like me and turning up and maybe sitting in the car, because it is cold or it is raining or it is windy, for kids’ training, but becoming a coach. She was telling me that she had gone and done the course to become a referee and she was refereeing quite senior games. She was talking to me about some of the barriers that she was facing as a woman and as a woman of faith who wears the hijab. One of them – I am sure she would not mind me passing it on here – was about going into the change rooms and there not being female change rooms and male change rooms for refs. Some of the men were getting changed in front of her, which was quite confronting and made her feel quite uncomfortable. But she is a pretty amazing woman. She stuck with it, and now she is actively encouraging other women – other mums at the club whose kids are training two or three times a week and then playing on weekends – to get involved, and that means showing leadership, in local sporting clubs. It was a great example of women running the club and girls’ participation increasing.

The other great thing about Williams Landing soccer club, I have to say, is they are also enabling their young girls to undertake more serious athletic training to get them fit for soccer and also reduce injuries that they know quite often young girls and women get in soccer. We are talking about quite intensive training, almost CrossFit-like exercises. It looked absolutely incredible – young girls around that sort of age of 13, 14, 15, 16 having the opportunity to train like an elite athlete. I am intending to invite the Minister for Community Sport down to check it out and to go down myself and hopefully try to give those young girls a run for their money – or they might give me a run for their money with how fit they are versus me.

Sport in this state matters. Although, as we have talked about, this bill makes a number of small changes, they are important changes to the legislation that governs our major sporting administrative bodies. When we talk about sport in this state, people have incredible memories going right back into their childhood of being at the G with the AFL.

I was looking around on the weekend when I was at Albion footy club and they were having this really competitive – I am talking about really competitive – game with their arch rivals, which unfortunately for me was Sunshine footy club, which is also in my electorate. As I said to the boys, these grown men who were feeling pretty feisty about which club was the favourite of their MP, ‘Boys, MPs are just like any good mother – we don’t pick our favourites. We wish you all the best. We’ll still be here for you at the end of the game no matter whether you win or lose.’ They were not particularly happy about that; they wanted me to choose. I am very pleased to say that Albion won that match, and from what I have heard it is a prelude to the grand final, so I will most certainly be there to again do the coin toss.

What struck me about being there at that game – and it is just on a smaller scale than being at the G really – are the fans, who are locals, who are either going for Sunshine or Albion. Lots of them have generations of their family, past and present, that still play or have played for the club. On Saturday they had the past players presentation and also a barbecue for them. The clubhouse and outside were absolutely packed. Anyone who is sort of like me in having to turn up on a drizzly Saturday morning to activities in their electorate would remember it was absolutely pouring and absolutely freezing on Saturday, and these guys were out there playing in mud like I have not seen. All I could think about was who was going to be washing their uniforms at the end of the game, because God knows they would never get the mud out of these uniforms. But they had a great game – it was a great match – and the community spirit on both sides in coming together in the most appalling, freezing, typical Melbourne weather was absolutely awe inspiring, and that really is what community sport is about. You had kids running around that were about this high. You had players. You had mums, dads, grandparents and great-grandparents there at the club, with the history of the club all over the clubhouse walls – all there to watch a game but also to socialise and have fun together as a community. I actually had a really good time. It surprised me, not having one of my kids playing there. It was a great moment, so I am looking forward to a rematch, which will hopefully be Sunshine and Albion versus each other in a couple of weeks.

We know on a larger scale – and the member for Tarneit has talked about this really well, as have other members in their contributions this evening – Melbourne has an incredible history with sport on such an elite level. If you think about some of the most iconic places in Melbourne, folks who may come to visit, like my parents from northern New South Wales do every now and then – they want to go and visit. I took my parents to watch an AFL match at the G, and they were, I think, actually quite overwhelmed. I know my dad felt overwhelmed that he was watching AFL – he loves NRL, being up there in northern New South Wales – but he was also completely overwhelmed by the size of the G and also the crowd and the atmosphere. It is one of the great things about Melbourne – you hear the cheering at the G and all of those sorts of things. It is such an iconic thing about Melbourne, and it makes it a great city to live in. But regardless, if it is not AFL, it is cricket, it is tennis, it is soccer and indeed it is also netball. Melbourne is home to Australia’s Diamonds, and we know netball is one of the favourite sports that is played by girls and women right across the world – it is a fantastic sport – and Victoria is considered their home.

There is so much to talk about in relation to this bill and major sports, but at the end of the day it is really important to make changes, no matter how small – or mechanical amendments if you want to call them that. They are still amendments that need to be done to help make a piece of legislation like this one much more efficient and streamlined. I commend the minister for making the changes, and I most certainly commend the bill to the house.

Kim O’KEEFFE (Shepparton) (18:41): Today I rise and stand to make a contribution on the State Sporting Legislation Amendment Bill 2024. The bill is, in all practical aspects, a spring-cleaning bill; however, there are one or two noteworthy clauses that appear to go somewhat beyond legislative spring-cleaning – namely, the abolishment of two advisory committees in the legislation and some changes to the delegation of lease management. The State Sporting Legislation Amendment Bill 2024 amends the ANZAC Day Act 1958 to change the description of an area in which sports are held on Anzac Day and makes a range of amendments to the Kardinia Park Stadium Act 2016, the Melbourne and Olympic Parks Act 1985, the Melbourne Cricket Ground Act 2009 and the State Sport Centres Act 1994 in relation to trust membership, leasing powers and other miscellaneous amendments; and amends the Professional Boxing and Combat Sports Act 1985 in relation to acting appointments and for other purposes. Clause 3 of the bill amends section 4 of the ANZAC Day Act 1958 to modernise the description of an area in which sports are held on Anzac Day by substituting a reference to distance in miles with a reference to distance in kilometres.

My office actually was contacted by a president of one of the many sporting clubs across my electorate inquiring about the possibility of playing their respective home games – football and netball sides – on Anzac Day this year, instead of the Saturday on which the match was originally scheduled to be played. They worked very closely with the RSL club and the guidelines. However, the sporting and major events requirements for playing sports on Anzac Day need the written approval of the minister, which needs to be submitted by 24 February, a timeline that they did miss this year. However, hopefully they will have that arranged for next year. With the popular and well-attended Anzac Day AFL match, a wonderful acknowledgement of those who have served our country, these requests may continue to grow.

Another major provision in the bill is amendments to the Kardinia Park Stadium Act 2016. As such the State Sporting Legislation Amendment Bill 2024 permits the minister to make event management declarations, abolishes the Kardinia Park Advisory Committee, changes the membership and procedures of the trust and permits the minister to delegate approval of leases that are not major leases over certain land management by the trust. Clause 5 of the bill amends section 3 of the Kardinia Park Stadium Act 2016 to insert a definition of ‘major lease’, which means a lease that is for a term of 21 ‍years or more or over the whole of the Kardinia Park stadium land. The effect of this amendment is to differentiate between the types of leases for the purposes of the minister exercising power to delegate the approval for leases that are not major leases under new section 31A inserted by clause 9 of the State Sporting Legislation Amendment Bill. In addition, clause 8 of the State Sporting Legislation Amendment Bill 2024 repeals section 30 of the Kardinia Park Stadium Act 2016 and abolishes the Kardinia Park Advisory Committee, as the committee is no longer seen as fit for purpose. The advisory committee was formed in September 2017 after all the committee groups that call Kardinia Park home reported together under one banner as the Kardinia Park Advisory Committee, known as KPAC.

The committee, since its establishment seven years ago, has been made up of several community representatives from the Kardinia Park Stadium Trust: the Geelong Football Club, the City of Greater Geelong and local sporting clubs of the Geelong surrounds. It is important that these voices are not lost from the advisory committee’s abolishment. It is important that these voices continue to be actively engaged with the continual development of the Kardinia Park stadium precinct.

In addition, the State Sporting Legislation Amendment Bill 2024 makes several amendments to the Melbourne Cricket Ground Act 2009. Clause 25 of the bill amends section 7(b) of the Melbourne Cricket Ground Act 2009 to increase the maximum number of members that can be appointed to the Melbourne Cricket Ground Trust from eight to nine. Further, clause 26 of the bill amends section 9 of the principal act to provide that members of the Melbourne Cricket Ground Trust may resign by giving notice in writing, signed by the member, to the minister. Currently members are required to resign in writing, signed by the member, to the Governor in Council. It is hoped that the effect of this amendment is to reduce the administrative burden and the delays members experience when seeking to resign from office.

With the Paris Olympic Games now on, sport becomes front and centre on a global scale, and our community have been cheering on our amazing Aussie athletes. It has been wonderful to see our local schools across my electorate having many Olympic activities and celebrating participation in sport. We are very proud of our local girl Cortnee Vine, competing with the Matildas soccer team at the Paris Olympics. As you can imagine, her whole town is behind her and is very proud and cheering the whole team on. Also, future aspiring athletes get to watch the sporting dreams of our elite homegrown athletes become a reality. We have to ensure those opportunities are there and that sporting communities can get behind their athletes.

Communities need funding support so that they have adequate sporting facilities. Investing in sport keeps communities healthy and active. This government must support regional sporting facilities, and across my electorate we have a large number of run-down sporting facilities in great need of investment. The Shepparton Sports Stadium is in desperate need of a redevelopment and has been a community infrastructure priority for many years. The 1972 building is no longer fit for purpose. Both the federal and state coalition governments supported this project at the last elections. Basketball Victoria has this project as a priority project with the opportunity to attract both state and national basketball tournaments to Shepparton, which now are being lost due to the facility not being up to standard. It is worth noting Madeleine Garrick began her basketball career here in Shepparton and went on to be a professional basketballer, going on to represent Australia and play in the Women’s National Basketball League. I am sure she would be quite appalled by the lack of current investment in the basketball facilities which she played on many years ago.

Unfortunately, the people of Shepparton district, which I represent in this great place, each and every single day are paying the price for this government’s financial mismanagement, and the sports stadium is just another example. The over $20 million that we are paying in interest towards the state debt should be going towards facilities like the Shepparton Sports Stadium, as should the $600 million cost of cancelling the Commonwealth Games. Imagine the amount of sporting clubs that could have benefited from that $600 million; we could have had our stadium funded 10 times over with that money. The regional Commonwealth Games led to great disappointment in my electorate as one of the host cities – we were to host the BMX competition. We also know the economic opportunity sporting events bring to communities, filling accommodation and keeping our businesses busy. This is often an enormous economic injection. This government needs to understand how much that means to regional communities. I have heard members on their feet today talk about the investment within Melbourne, and often city-centric projects get done and regional communities miss out.

We have had incredible homegrown Olympic, Australian and world sport champions from my electorate. Cyclist Brett Lancaster, an Olympic gold medallist, has recently returned to live in Shepparton, paving the way for future sporting champions. Just this past week an exhibition was launched celebrating our local sporting heroes by the Greater Shepparton Sporting Hall of Fame, and it includes Brett’s Olympic gold medal. As you can imagine, it is very exciting for people to see a real gold medal firsthand, particularly children. My daughter Emma is also a world aerobics champion and a sporting hall of fame recipient – she gets her sporting talent from her father, obviously. This weekend her football team, Shepparton United, play in the footy grand final. I have seen firsthand the dedication and commitment of an elite athlete as well as at grassroots clubs and the need to ensure they are provided with the right infrastructure for their sport. So much sporting talent comes from regional communities, and as I have mentioned, regional communities need support and investment to provide adequate fit-for-purpose facilities, something that is significantly neglected. We also want sporting facilities that we are really proud of when we host sporting events.

Finally, I would like to wish all of our Aussie sporting champions all the best in Paris. As mentioned, this side of the house will not be opposing the bill.

Alison MARCHANT (Bellarine) (18:50): It is a pleasure to rise and make a contribution to the State Sporting Legislation Amendment Bill 2024. This amendment bill makes some important administrative changes across several different acts. It includes the Kardinia Park Stadium Act 2016, the Melbourne and Olympic Parks Act 1985, the Melbourne Cricket Ground Act 2009, the Professional Boxing and Combat Sports Act 1985 and the State Sport Centres Act 1994. As we do in this place many a time, it is a pretty straightforward administration-type amendment, but it is important that we continue in this place to fine-tune all these acts as we go along and make sure that these acts are modern and fit for purpose. Essentially, by doing this we are making sure that there is effective governance in this state. In this case we are looking at our sporting assets and the regulation of professional boxing and combat sport, as I have said. In terms of trusts that we have across our state, together they manage in excess of $4.1 billion worth of significant state assets spread across a number of major and complex sporting venues. It is an absolutely incredible investment that we have. But what is incredible, I suppose, about that investment that we are delivering are the events that we host in these facilities and these sporting venues.

We like to say we are the sporting capital of the world. We have had that title officially for the last decade, from 2016, when we were crowned the SportBusiness Ultimate Sports City for the decade at the 10-year anniversary awards in Switzerland, which was confirmation of our claim as the world’s best city for sport. That award is the longest running rankings of the world’s top sporting hosts, and we took that gong off cities such as Berlin, London, New York and of course Sydney as well. We always like to do well and do better than Sydney. We know that these types of accolades and awards are lovely to have and we can claim them, but it does not happen by accident. These are dedicated investments that we have made as a state government.

In May of this year our Minister for Tourism, Sport and Major Events said in this place in a ministers statement that we can think of the Melbourne and Olympic Parks precinct as really the jewel in the crown of our events calendar. On the back of more than a billion dollars invested across the precinct over the years, it has generated more than $740 million in economic activity in one year alone. In just one year that economic activity was $740 million. That precinct welcomed over 3 million visitors and also contributed to 1.2 million bed nights across our hotels in Victoria. That is what these investments are about as a driver of our economic activity.

I just wanted to relate this bill to my own electorate back in the Bellarine and our Geelong region, because we have the Kardinia Park stadium, which this bill also speaks to. Kardinia Park stadium is the biggest and best stadium in regional Victoria. It is a place where I have grown up. I have grown up born and bred in Geelong. I have seen that stadium transform in front of my eyes. I used to go and watch the football in the outer, and we would stand there and watch the mighty Cats play. Over the years I have seen that transform into an absolutely world-class stadium, which we can enjoy. It still has a section where over 2000 people can go to the footy and stand in the outer; they can watch the footy and have that same experience, which is fantastic. When I say it is the best, it literally is. This stadium has been awarded, over several years now, an official title as the best regional stadium. After a landmark hosting of major events, such as the Foo Fighters and the 2022 T20 World Cup, that stadium was awarded Australia’s best regional stadium in the annual Austadiums awards. Like I said, that won it, really, from a fan base. It is voted by fans, and it is determined across Australia over seven different categories. It was followed up again last year but announced earlier this year. That regional stadium is a key part also of our regional events calendar and plays a key part in Victoria’s $36.9 billion visitor economy, which also continues to grow.

I have talked a little bit about Kardinia Park, but it also has a trust that works under the act. It was delivered after an election commitment by the then Andrews Labor government, which delivered on that election commitment to establish the Kardinia Park Stadium Trust. Really, to establish that trust was to give the iconic Geelong venue that safe and exciting future and would give responsibility for the oversight of that stadium – which is really in charge of attracting those world-class events – to the Geelong region.

With the different redevelopments that have happened over the years, we have had the last stage, stage ‍5, open earlier this year – the Joel Selwood Stand and also other facilities in that stadium, which I will talk to in just a moment. It is an incredible investment that we have made to ensure that this is a rare asset for regional Victoria and to have events and major events, not just AFL, coming to our region. It is really a source of pride for our communities, this stadium. It does enable those major events, and with that comes that sizeable economic benefit. The economic opportunities at that stadium other than AFL include other things that we have seen there already. We have had monster trucks and motocross events. Soccer has been played there and cricket, as I have said. We have had science exhibitions and even a Jurassic World movie day at the stadium. It really allows now for some world-class events to come there.

As I have mentioned, who could forget the incredible Foo Fighters concert when they came to Geelong. I was lucky to have seats in the nosebleeds up the very top, but it was an absolutely incredible event to see the region rocking out with the Foo Fighters. But from that, an additional $1.3 million was injected into the Geelong hospitality sector. Our hotels were chockers, our bars and our restaurants were filled and the visitor spend in the inner city jumped 75 per cent from one event, which was fantastic. There is a little bit of a cliché in Geelong that when the footy club is winning so is the city. But really I think this stadium – as I said, over the years since growing up there I have seen it develop in its different stages – has indicated and is a symbol of how Geelong has matured and grown up as well. It really is a uniquely Geelong- and community-focused stadium.

Just on a couple of other things I wanted to touch on about that redevelopment, a really important part was telling our First Nations stories. Our First Nations people would gather at Kardinia Park, and there is now Djilang Plaza as part of that stadium, which is – I encourage people to go there – an absolutely amazing installation of art telling the traditional owners’ stories. Every time there is an event there or a sporting event there, people will go gather there and they will be able to also learn and experience some of the First Nations stories at this really important place for our traditional Wadawurrung people. Also part of that redevelopment was a cricket centre. It is also an indoor cricket hub for the region’s community with year-round access. This bill is a really important part of modernising our state’s sporting assets but also ensuring – (Time expired)

Business interrupted under sessional orders.