Wednesday, 14 May 2025

Bills

Workplace Injury Rehabilitation and Compensation Amendment Bill 2025

Second reading

Debate resumed on motion of Ben Carroll:

That this bill be now read a second time.

Ben CARROLL (Niddrie – Minister for Education, Minister for WorkSafe and the TAC) (10:42): Under standing orders I wish to advise the house of amendments to this bill and request that they be circulated.

Amendments circulated under standing orders.

Bridget VALLENCE (Evelyn) (10:43): I rise to speak on the Workplace Injury Rehabilitation and Compensation Amendment Bill 2025, a bill which relates to the Rozen review – completed over four years ago – into WorkSafe Victoria’s management of complex workers compensation claims. It also relates to an internal WorkSafe review, also conducted four years ago, into family supports and entitlements for dependants of workers who have tragically died at work.

To say this bill has been a long time in the making – over four years – might be considered an understatement. It is indicative of how tired this Labor government has become, to take that long to implement important legislative reform. This is a bill that appears to have had somewhat of a tortured history for reasons that I cannot really fully understand. To top it off we have just had the minister and Premier hopeful quite embarrassingly circulate further amendments, just moments ago, to fix poor drafting errors in the bills.

It is little surprising that, although this bill was introduced on 5 March, it was not until late on Friday afternoon last week that I was informed that further amendments were necessary. Thankfully these drafting errors that the minister is seeking to fix with the house amendments he just circulated, whilst important, do not impact the bill to any material extent. If anything, they will only serve to benefit families who may lose loved ones as the result of tragic accidents at work.

I do not know why it took so long for Labor to identify these errors, but it does appear to be consistent with how this bill has progressed to this current point – perhaps a lesson for the Labor government to have consulted properly first, and no wonder the minister and this Labor government refused to go into consideration in detail on this bill. Having said that, I do thank the minister’s office for arranging a briefing on the bill. Given the extent of the amendments included in this bill, the briefing was useful in answering a number of questions that we had and also our request for some particular materials that were referred to in the minister’s second-reading speech, although there are still a couple of unanswered questions, which I will refer to later on in the debate.

The bill is a result of various recommendations made in two separate reviews undertaken into the WorkCover scheme: first, the Rozen review, being the review of WorkSafe Victoria’s management of complex workers compensation claims undertaken by Peter Rozen QC, now Judge Rozen. In February 2020 the government commissioned Mr Rozen to undertake this review as a consequence of adverse findings made by the Victorian Ombudsman concerning WorkSafe’s management of the scheme in December 2019. The Ombudsman found systemic problems concerning the management of the claims process and disturbing examples of injured workers being denied their legal entitlements. The Ombudsman recommended an independent review be undertaken, and the Rozen review was completed in April 2021, more than four years ago. Almost a year later, in March 2022, the government finally announced its response to the Rozen review by accepting in full or in principle 19 of the 22 recommendations.

As part of the response the government announced an implementation plan which required WorkSafe to provide quarterly reports to the minister on progress of implementation of the recommendations. The implementation plan originally indicated a number of the recommendations of the Rozen review would be the subject of legislative changes, with those reforms expected to be introduced into the Parliament by 2023. WorkSafe issued its last quarterly report on the implementation plan in September 2023. At that date, 17 of the 22 recommendations had not yet been implemented. The last quarterly report advised a number of the recommendations required further engagement and anticipated this would occur early in 2024, over 12 months ago. After almost four years of delay and equivocation since the completion of the Rozen review and the implementation plan pretty much just disappearing off the map, the government is now seeking to implement five of the recommendations included in the Rozen review. These recommendations are concerned with improving the experience of injured workers and other claimants, the introduction of a code of claimants rights and mandatory training and provision of facilities for return-to-work coordinators. The Rozen review found in recommendations 19 and 20 that the statutory objectives of both the WIRC act and WorkSafe were out of date. Further, Rozen recommended WorkSafe should have clear legislative responsibility to actively manage claims and to treat injured workers with dignity and respect. The government has taken these recommendations a bit further, also amending the objects of the Accident Compensation Act 1985 to ensure injured workers and other claimants of the scheme are treated fairly, respectfully and with dignity and that they receive high-quality service.

These amendments are intended to help ensure WorkSafe, its agents and self-insurers adopt a person-centred approach which is consistent with the government’s policy. The Rozen review at recommendation 14 recommended that WorkSafe should develop and publish a code of claimants rights in consultation with key stakeholders. The purpose of the code is to identify the rights of claimants and the corresponding responsibilities of WorkSafe and insurers when managing claims under the scheme. Rozen noted a similar code operated in New Zealand under its accident compensation legislation, which helped enshrine the primacy of the injured person. The government has stated the code is intended to provide clear service standards that injured workers and other claimants on the scheme will be entitled to receive when engaging with WorkSafe, its agents and self-insurers. However, the bill makes clear, and I think this is an important point, that the code does not create any legally enforceable rights. No damages or compensation can be awarded if a breach of the code is found, nor is there any power for WorkSafe to prosecute for a breach of the code. The government has indicated that, if an investigation finds a breach of the code has occurred, possible remedies may include an apology, an explanation of how the breach occurred or a direction that outlines what steps need to be taken to avoid breaches into the future. Perhaps this is yet another aspect of the bill that the government failed to include, and they might say in the future it is another drafting error.

The bill provides for the code to be subject to public review and comment. The minister’s office has advised that the code is not likely to come into operation until 12 to 18 months from the time that this proposed legislation may be passed in this Parliament, which does allow for further drafting and public consultation to take place, and we will be keenly watching to ensure that a proper public consultation does take place.

Further, the bill inserts a new criterion in relation to persons who may be eligible to become members of the WorkSafe Advisory Committee and the Occupational Health and Safety Advisory Committee. Persons will now be eligible for appointment by the minister if they have been affected directly or indirectly by a workplace incident that involves death or serious injury or illness. The government considers that persons with lived experience will be able to provide valuable insights and a voice for those persons who have suffered serious workplace injuries so that they can provide a contribution appropriately. But interestingly, this amendment was not recommended by the Rozen review. However, the government argues the amendment picks up and is consistent with the spirit of other reforms recommended in the review.

One of the more contentious aspects of the bill relates to return-to-work coordinators. This bill makes changes requiring employers to allow return-to-work coordinators paid leave to undertake mandatory training and to provide extra facilities for the coordinators to perform their role. Currently, under section 106 of the Workplace Injury Rehabilitation and Compensation Act 2013, an employer with a total rateable remuneration of $2,895,000 or more must ensure an appropriate person is appointed to act as a return-to-work coordinator. A similar obligation is imposed on employers who have a rateable remuneration below that amount, but only while one of their workers has an incapacity to work. Rozen review recommendation 17 is that the WIRC act should be amended to impose a duty on an employer to provide return-to-work coordinators, appropriate training and facilities to perform their functions. However, the reasoning relied on by Rozen for this recommendation appeared to lack substance. Rozen observed that after considering the arguments, the time had come for this duty to be imposed, relying principally on the fact that New South Wales, Queensland and South Australia all required return-to-work coordinators to receive mandatory training. In contrast, neither Western Australia nor Tasmania imposed this measure. This argument therefore is somewhat flawed because Victoria, unlike most other states, has resisted the pressure of calls for it to harmonise its OH&S laws to be consistent with the Commonwealth model. Whilst the rest of the country has adopted these model laws, Victoria generally has resisted.

It was also noted by Rozen that a previous review of the Accident Compensation Act 1985 undertaken by Peter Hanks KC in 2008 did not recommend mandatory training for return-to-work coordinators. In contrast, Hanks observed there was a concern that for some employers, especially those who have few claims, mandatory training may impose an unreasonable cost. As such, competing views have been expressed by eminent lawyers as to whether such a requirement is appropriate and reasonable, and under the bill employers are required to ensure return-to-work coordinators complete mandatory approved training and have assistance and facilities reasonably required to fulfil their functions. The proposed new requirements in this bill will likely translate into significant additional costs for employers.

Further, under this bill the minister can determine the training must be completed by a return-to-work coordinator, when it must be completed and the qualifications that must be held by the return-to-work coordinator. The minister can also choose who can provide the mandatory training. The minister’s office has advised these decisions will be made under regulations after a public consultation process has been undertaken. In the bill briefing they could not specify exactly who will be providing the training. An employer who fails to comply with these new return-to-work coordinator requirements faces the prospect of being prosecuted by WorkSafe and ordered to pay a penalty of up to $118,554.

The minister’s office, in the briefing, also quite curiously advised that training requirements might be different for large businesses and small businesses. Again, that is a different obligation for large businesses and a different obligation for small businesses.

For instance, a large employer may be required to attend a course of training that is longer than a course undertaken by a small employer. The minister’s office also said there may be scope for prior experience or training to be recognised; however, these would be matters that would be dealt with in regulation. That does not really provide the confidence level that businesses or industry bodies are after. After I pressed department officials in the bill briefing, the minister’s office disclosed that financial modelling undertaken by the government found that the cost impact on Victoria’s business community to comply with these new requirements was up to $10 million. This is a significant cost impost for employers to manage and was a key point of concern for many of the stakeholders in my consultation with them. That is something that I will return to a little later in the debate.

Further, this bill makes provision for persons or bodies to be approved by WorkSafe to deliver the training. During the bill briefing the minister’s office did not rule out the possibility that WorkSafe would approve only trade unions to deliver the training – another concern for stakeholders and business, and just more revenue raising for Labor’s electoral donors.

Rozen also recommended, at recommendation 9, that there should be periodic reviews of the operation of the scheme rather than waiting for a crisis to occur. Rozen noted that similar statutory schemes provided for regular reviews. Interestingly, Rozen recommended that the first review be undertaken by 1 July 2024. It appears that Mr Rozen had a mistaken impression that it would not take four long years for the government to act on and legislate his proposed changes. The bill has adopted this recommendation and will provide for reviews of the scheme to be undertaken every five years, with the first review to be completed by 31 December 2030. A report of each review will then be tabled in Parliament.

The second review referred to in the minister’s second-reading speech is known as the family supports review. In the government’s media release announcing the introduction of the bill the minister said a number of the reforms contained in the bill were the result of the government’s review of the adequacy of support available to family members following a work-related death. After I was unable to locate a copy of any report related to such a review, I requested the minister’s office to provide me with a copy of the review’s report. I was subsequently advised by the minister’s office:

[QUOTE AWAITING VERIFICATION]

A report was not prepared for public release on the review of family supports. Rather the review was in fact an internal review undertaken by WorkSafe after receiving a directive by the then Minister following the death of a worker in 2021. The findings of the –

so-called –

review were communicated to the Minister by way of a ministerial briefing prepared by the Department of Treasury and Finance and WorkSafe.

After I made several attempts to find out on what date this ministerial briefing occurred, the minister’s office refused to advise me on what date that briefing took place – quite curious. They did advise me that they did not have access to the then minister’s diary, but given the fact that the department arranged the briefing it is curious that they cannot provide the date of the briefing. I can only imagine that they are seeking for some reason to keep the date of the briefing secret. It is clearly not accountable at all, and the only inference that can be drawn is that the government has something to conceal or potentially is facing embarrassment about how long it has taken to implement changes as a result of this review that was conducted four years ago.

However, at my request the minister’s office did provide a summary of the findings of the WorkSafe review, and the WorkSafe review was on the basis of the proposed changes in the bill relating to increasing the weekly pension payable to dependent children and lump sum payments to other dependants of a deceased worker as well as other measures. During the bill briefing it was confirmed by representatives of the minister’s office and WorkSafe that the family supports review was not the subject of any public consultation or submissions from key stakeholders. Rather, DTF and WorkSafe were solely responsible for making the recommendation contained in this internal review. As such, we have today a bill before us that includes a number of new entitlements and payments that have not been subject to any community consultation or engagement with stakeholders. Do they hit the mark? Are they even enough? Whilst the measures may have considerable merit, it is remarkable that this government refuses to engage with those in the community and interested stakeholders such as injured workers or family members of a deceased worker on such important issues as these.

Currently the WIRC act does not provide compensation to a person who is economically dependent on a worker’s earnings at the time of their death if there was also compensation payable to partners or children. This means if a worker was providing economic support to a partner, a child and also a parent or sibling, the parent or sibling would not be entitled to compensation. The new provision will create a new lump sum compensation entitlement for dependants of the deceased worker who are not partners or children, such as siblings or parents. Eligible dependants will be able to receive compensation of up to $20,000 for their economic loss. The specific amount payable will be determined by WorkSafe or the insurer.

Dependent partners of workers whose death is work related are currently entitled to receive a provisional pension for up to 12 weeks while the liability for their claim is determined. However, for around one in four claims it can take much longer than 12 weeks for liability to be determined, causing financial hardship, so the bill does amend the WIRC act to extend the provisional payments period for up to 26 weeks after the death of a worker. The bill will also remove the current exclusion on making provisional payments in connection with a worker’s death that was caused by suicide. We consider this to be a welcome change and acknowledge the additional suffering for families who may have been unable to access supports as a consequence of this exclusion.

Now, this bill is not without concern. The bill presents several concerning provisions that may have significant and in some cases detrimental impacts on employers and jobs across Victoria. While we support initiatives aimed at improving workplace safety and ensuring appropriate treatment and rehabilitation of injured workers and supports for family members of workers who die at work, there is concern the bill may increase the complexity of the scheme, present compliance challenges for businesses and jeopardise business viability and therefore jobs through even higher premiums.

In relation to a return to work, the requirement to provide mandatory approved training and facilities to return-to-work coordinators will come at a cost for employers. Despite the Hanks review in 2008 finding that mandatory training of return-to-work coordinators may impose an unreasonable cost on employers, especially those with very few claims, the bill will impose this mandatory requirement. Hanks was at pains to stress in his review that small employers should be allowed sufficient flexibility to meet the requirements to appoint a return-to-work coordinator without imposing an undue financial burden.

As I indicated earlier, when officials were pressed during the bill briefing on how much this measure would cost employers to implement, the officials advised their modelling suggested these changes could cost up to $10 million for Victorian businesses to implement. This is a considerable additional burden for employers to carry and represents how the cost of doing business in Victoria is becoming much harder under this Allan Labor government – much harder and much more expensive. The minister’s office has since tried to walk back from these figures by advising that, depending on the type of training undertaken, the costs could be between $185 for an online training course or $485 for a two-day facilitator-led course. So there are different types of training but all for the same type of return-to-work coordinator – again, curious. However, none of the figures provided by the government appear to measure or take into account any of the on-costs that employers will be required to pay. This includes the cost of providing additional paid time off to attend the training, which means a loss of productivity while the person is away from the workplace. There is also the cost of providing the return-to-work coordinator with facilities required to undertake their role. Facilities could include a dedicated office with necessary equipment, IT facilities, floor space and the provision of equipment. It all comes at a cost. Clearly employers are going to face additional costs in complying with these requirements at the same as in Victoria taxes are increasing. Stakeholder groups with whom I consulted were opposed to the increased compliance costs the return-to-work measures would impose. A two-day training course was considered excessive, and there appeared to be insufficient recognition of prior training. It is not clear how often this training must be undertaken, and it is yet again just a matter for the minister to determine, which provides further uncertainty.

Now, with the family supports amendments, whilst there is no objection to family members of workers who have died at work receiving compensation as a consequence of suffering that tragic work-related death of a family member, no data or information has been provided as to how the amounts included in the bill have been arrived at or calculated, whether they will hit the mark for family members or whether they will result in higher premiums for employers.

As noted earlier, the family supports amendments were not subject to any public consultation process. Rather, they were a product of an internal review conducted by WorkSafe and the Department of Treasury and Finance. When asked in the bill briefing how much these additional payments were likely to cost the scheme, the officials advised the new entitlements were not expected to have any material impact on the scheme, because they did acknowledge that there is a low rate of work-related deaths in Victoria. For instance, in 2023–24, 50 Victorians tragically lost their lives as a result of a work-related death. Departmental officials did indicate that it would cost the scheme around $24.3 million to operationalise. However, again no stakeholders, including workers, employers, unions or industry bodies, were consulted about these proposed changes before the bill was introduced. The introduction of a new $10,000 grief and loss payment for deceased workers’ families alongside expanded funding for therapy and support services will likely lead to higher insurance premiums and administrative burdens. Increasingly, the scheme is being used to solve issues, and employers are being asked to cover the cost.

For several years Victoria’s WorkCover scheme has been in decline in performance, and the quantity of claims, in particular mental injury claims, has significantly increased. In 2023–24 there were 35,575 claims, an increase from 32,780 in the previous year. That represents an 8 per cent increase in one year and a 28 per cent increase since 2019–20. Mental health claims represented 18 per cent of all claims in 2023–24, an increase from 16 per cent in the previous year. Employers were forced to accept a massive 42 per cent increase in their premiums in 2023, making Victoria the most expensive WorkCover scheme in the country. The average premium rate in Victoria is now at 1.8 per cent, having increased from 1.27 per cent in 2023. The government has admitted the WorkCover scheme is fundamentally broken and have done that publicly but have done very little to make meaningful reform to the scheme or protect it from being abused. Stakeholders have advised the increasing cost of WorkCover premiums for small to medium-sized businesses was a factor when considering the ongoing viability of their business in Victoria. While there was a freeze last financial year as a result of pressure from the Liberals and Nationals, employers remain very fearful of an inevitable increase in premiums going forward, especially as a consequence of the various changes in this bill. Given the concerns that we have raised about certain measures contained in the bill, I move a reasoned amendment:

That all the words after ‘That’ be omitted and replaced with the words ‘this house refuses to read this bill a second time until the government:

(1) agrees to freeze the average premium rate at 1.8 per cent for 2025–26 to provide certainty to Victorian employers;

(2) consults with interested stakeholders and the public on proposed changes recommended by a WorkSafe review into family supports;

(3) makes available all modelling prepared for the legislative impact assessment for this bill in relation to the additional costs and financial impact the bill will have on employers and the WorkCover scheme;

(4) consults with industry to minimise fees for training for return-to-work coordinators; and

(5) implements measures to prohibit entities responsible for corruption on Big Build and Victorian construction sites from becoming an approved training provider.’

The government’s bill will result in further compliance burdens and costs being placed on employers, and given Labor’s massive 42 per cent hike in premiums last year, costing businesses an additional $1.7 billion, we call on this Labor government to agree to our call to freeze WorkCover premiums to give cost relief and certainty to Victorian businesses when they need it most. Further, given the bill gives the minister the ability to authorise the return-to-work training providers, it is important that only appropriate organisations can be approved. As such, the reasoned amendment is a sensible measure to ensure disgraced and corrupt organisations like the CFMEU are prevented from deriving any benefits from the potential opportunities this bill may offer in terms of new revenue streams via training provision for return-to-work coordinators. Further, it is imperative that there is consultation with industry about fees for return-to-work training. The minister’s officials confirmed that to date there had been no consultation with businesses and no consultation with industry groups about training costs, which I find, again, astonishing and just smacks of the arrogance of this Labor government.

There should also be proper and meaningful public consultation on the proposed changes recommended by the WorkSafe review into family supports for those families who have lost a loved one at their workplace, simply because the government conceded that they have done no public consultation on these new entitlements. Are these new entitlements enough? Do they hit the mark? Our minds should be with those family members who have lost a loved one at their place of work, and yet this Labor government could not be bothered to consult with family members who have had a family member die at work when it comes to these entitlements.

The government would be hypocritical in the extreme if it attempted to criticise us for seeking to delay the passage of the bill with this reasoned amendment to achieve this, because the government has been sitting on the recommendations of both the Rozen review and the internal family supports review for over four years. As it has taken the government four years to introduce these changes, it is worth taking a little more time to ensure that a proper public consultation process takes place on some of these very important reforms, particularly the family supports for family members who have lost loved ones at work.

Again we urge the government to accept our proposal to freeze WorkCover premiums and provide employers with certainty and tax relief, which will only assist in creating further jobs in the future, assist Victoria to have a business-led recovery and make Victoria a more attractive location for existing and new businesses to invest and grow and provide Victoria with the competitive advantage that it needs. We know that businesses, particularly small businesses, are the backbone of the Victorian economy. But under this Labor government they are hit with tax increase after tax increase after tax increase. Again, as I said, in Victoria, under this Allan Labor government, Victorian businesses and Victorians are the highest taxed in the country, and our Victorian businesses are suffering. They are making choices about not employing extra people or potentially moving their operations offshore or interstate or closing altogether, and this is something that we do not want to see. These businesses suffered a 42 per cent increase in their WorkCover premiums last year. Again, as I said, for Victorian businesses that amounted to $1.7 billion in additional contributions to the WorkCover scheme.

We think it is only reasonable that this government agrees to this part of the reasoned amendment around freezing WorkCover premiums. It is Liberal–Nationals policy that we freeze WorkCover premiums for this period of time, and we are calling on the government to match us with that and give that cost-of-living and cost-of-business relief to employers that they so deserve. We think there should be some additional consultation taken. We also believe that the modelling should be made public and available in relation to the legislative impact of this bill and the additional costs and the impact it will have on employers. I commend the reasoned amendment.

Gary MAAS (Narre Warren South) (11:13): It is with an immense amount of pride that I rise today to speak to the Workplace Injury Rehabilitation and Compensation Amendment Bill 2025. In doing so, I consider this premise: that while no-one plans to get injured at work and while we want all of our loved ones to come home from work, if the worst does happen, it is absolutely essential that the right support is available, whether to the worker who is injured or to the families of loved ones who have been lost in the workplace.

I find it absolutely astounding that the member for Evelyn, the opposition spokesperson on this bill, would talk about the length of time that it has taken, talk about the cost to business and talk about lack of consultation. All of these things are covered in the Occupational Health and Safety Act 2004 under a section which talks about the formation of the Workplace Incidents Consultative Committee. If the opposition spokesperson had taken the time to read the OH&S act and to see the WICC that has been formed under there, she would see why those elements, which she referred to as the basis for her reasoned amendment, and that committee are so important and why those elements have been covered.

When you are talking about the death of someone injured at work, guess what, there is trauma, right? And this government will always make sure that it speaks to workers, injured workers and the families of people who did not survive going to work. There is an enormous amount of trauma that is involved with that, and thankfully, through this Workplace Incidents Consultative Committee, there are lived-experienced members, people who have actually experienced what has happened on the worksite. It takes time. Have you ever come and spoken to a lived-experience member, member for Evelyn? Have you ever spoken to a lived-experience family member of someone who has died at a worksite?

Bridget Vallence: Yes, I have.

Gary MAAS: Well, the member for Evelyn would understand the trauma that goes with Coroners Court hearings, would understand the trauma that goes on in the community and would understand the trauma of losing a loved one, whether it is your son, whether it is your brother or whether it your husband. On the Workplace Incidents Consultative Committee we have lived-experienced members, and we also have all of those family members on the committee. When people come to this committee and speak to them about the cost to business, they will always retort, ‘Well, what about the cost to the community? What about the cost to family? This is our loved one that we have lost here.’ Who does the economy operate for? Does it operate for the benefit of small business, does it operate for the benefit of business or does it operate for all of us as a society? Does it operate for all of us as a community? These are the types of questions and the types of balance that we need in having this debate.

The government does speak to a business advisory council, and it gets input from them, but equally it has formed the Workplace Incidents Consultative Committee under the OH&S act to ensure that injured workers will have their say. When it comes to employers implementing return-to-work training, it is actually not a $10 million cost; it is a $4.9 million cost. But what cost do you put on an injured worker? On that basis, the reasoned amendment that has been put forward by the opposition just does not stand up, and the government will not be supporting that reasoned amendment.

The Workplace Incidents Consultative Committee I am very proud to be the government co-chair on. I am a co-chair with Brett Struhs, who is the current lived-experience co-chair. I think that whole committee acknowledges the enormous work of the former co-chair, Dr Lana Cormie. We also have some fantastic work on that committee that is done by the deputy co-chair, lived-experience member Samantha Burns. I would like to acknowledge that whole committee for the extraordinary work that it does in giving the government advice from a lived-experience perspective. I turn up to that committee every few months. I sit and I look at the pain in the faces of lived-experience members, and I know through what they say what they are feeling. It takes time to be able to get it right, to get those laws right and to ensure that the laws that are being passed in this place are going to improve lives and improve the support that is available to workers’ families.

The Workplace Incidents Consultative Committee has been absolutely instrumental in helping to inform that work. I have seen the way that they speak to members of our police force in being able to help through the investigations process. I have seen the way they speak to representatives of the Coroners Court about the processes that take place there. I have seen the way that they speak to WorkSafe executives to describe to them what it is like. It is visceral. It hurts. It is the sort of feeling that needs to be conveyed when a bill like this is put together. Do not come into this place with some simple drib drab about the cost to business. The cost to business will always be balanced, under this government, with what the cost is to the community. And you know what? In the medium to long term the cost will well and truly balance itself out – with young people who live in this world, grow up and go on to be what their parents would have hoped that they would be: contributing members to our society, contributing members to our community.

Labor is and always will be the party and the government for workers – it is a part of our great legacy – whether it is by protecting wages or whether it is by protecting workers rights and safety and ensuring that when the worst happens workers and their families can get the assistance and the compensation that they need. This bill has a core aim of improving the experience of injured workers and their families throughout their time on the WorkCover scheme through people-centred policy. This government’s priority is to ensure that this scheme continues to be contemporary and that it is fit for purpose and supports workers, unlike those opposite, who have put a reasoned amendment forward. I thank the members of the WICC and all of those who have shared their stories to help inform these chambers.

It would be remiss of me to finish my contribution today without quoting a comment I received from Dr Lana Cormie last night. Let us face it, Dr Lana Cormie always gets the last word. She said to me:

I’m excited –

about this bill –

… I really hope this goes through. The aspect relating to an increase in the children’s pensions is particularly close to my heart and something which I raised many years ago now. It’s been a long time coming and will make a tangible difference to the support of families with young children in the future. Fingers crossed!

Lana, I have got my fingers crossed as well. It is with the support of this government that we will get this bill through this house. I commend the bill.

Tim McCURDY (Ovens Valley) (11:23): I am delighted to rise and make a contribution on the Workplace Injury Rehabilitation and Compensation Amendment Bill 2025, and I am pleased to follow the member for Evelyn, who led the charge for this side of the chamber with her high level of knowledge in this space. I certainly do support the reasoned amendment that she has put forward, which I will go into a bit further on in my contribution.

Workplace safety, we all know, has come an enormous way from years gone by. As a former dairy farmer and having spent 25 years in the dairy industry, I know just how unsafe and high risk farming is, whether it is dairy farming or any other farming occupation, working long days, working long nights and working alone. Although my family has left agriculture, we still see the need for workplace safety and reform wherever possible, both physically and mentally.

We know that the bill includes the introduction of a code of claimants rights to prescribed service standards that must be met by WorkSafe and self-insurers when assessing claims by injured workers. The bill will introduce a lived experience membership criterion for the Occupational Health and Safety Advisory Committee and the WorkCover Advisory Committee, and it will amend return-to-work provisions by requiring employers to provide return-to-work coordinators, with paid time off to undertake mandatory approved training. Again, all of these changes I do not have any problems with.

I do have a problem where there is rorting in the system. We know this happens by a small percentage across every industry. We get that, but it comes to the employer to have to pay that price in many cases and that is why we always have to put as much energy and effort into making sure the system is not rorted. It will also introduce new compensation entitlements and supports for family members after a work-related death by allowing family members of a deceased worker to receive provisional payments after a death by suicide – again a commonsense inclusion. It will also increase weekly pensions payable to dependent children of deceased workers, extend the duration of provisional pension payments for dependent partners up to 26 weeks, create an entitlement to lump sum payments for economic loss for dependants who are not the partner or child of a deceased worker and create an entitlement to lump sum payments for non-economic loss for close family members of a deceased worker. It will also provide access to a broad range of therapy and other support services, introducing a new entitlement to compensation for forensic cleaning where a worker dies at home or at the home of a family member – another commonsense initiative. It will also improve the operation of the Workplace Injury Commission by allowing the Workplace Injury Commission to certify consent agreements made between parties to resolve arbitration disputes and order costs in favour of an injured worker where the parties resolve the dispute in arbitration. There are some other minor drafting errors, but we will go into that a little later on.

WorkCover, as we know, is a wild and unruly scheme that has always been very complicated, and when it comes to streamlining and making changes it is difficult. That is what incurs a cost to business owners. Small and medium business owners are already overtaxed and over-regulated in Victoria, and they simply cannot afford to pay more, which is why the member for Evelyn has moved a reasoned amendment to ensure that they will not be hit by a massive increase in WorkSafe premiums, as was the case last year with a 42 per cent increase. Businesses are struggling at the best of times from being overtaxed, and certainly in regional Victoria we are finding with the seasonal conditions and a late break it is going to get very tough this year – even if it rains tomorrow. People think it is all fine, but it is not all fine, because if it rains today or tomorrow it still takes six weeks in cooler weather to get grass to grow and feed to grow. Those who are out there purchasing feed now will still be purchasing feed for the next six to eight weeks until probably the best part of August. That is provided we get a break in the near future. That flows on to the community. What farmers are not making does not flow on to the shops in town and the businesses in town. As I say, we really cannot afford premiums to go up like they did last year. I was speaking to some larger businesses in Wangaratta recently. They had an increase of 288 per cent over two years. That was massive as far as they were concerned, and they were saying they just cannot support anything like that as an increase again, let alone the other taxes we have got coming like the emergency services tax which may or may not get through. Those are the concerns that we have.

In terms of the reasoned amendment, as the member for Evelyn has said, we want the government to agree to freeze the average premium rate at 1.8 per cent for 2025–26 to provide that certainty to employers. It is not just for regional, whom I have spoken about, but all employers in metropolitan Melbourne and all across Victoria, because we know the 42 per cent we saw last year is a result of poor management, and it took a long time to catch that up. We now need to make sure that does not happen again, such a massive increase. The second part of the reasoned amendment is to consult with interested stakeholders and the public on proposed changes recommended by a WorkSafe review into family supports. It will make available all modelling prepared for the legislative impact assessment for this bill in relation to the additional costs and financial impact the bill will have on employers in the WorkCover scheme. We simply do not trust the government when they say they have got it right this time. We need the evidence, we need the modelling, to see for ourselves that these changes that will take place are not going to end up in massive increases in WorkCover premiums, which we have spoken about. It also calls for consultation with the industry to minimise fees for training to return-to-work coordinators and, finally, implements measures to prohibit entities responsible for corruption on the Big Build and Victorian construction sites from becoming approved training providers.

You simply cannot allow Dracula to be in charge of the blood bank in this instance. Those responsible for the Big Build have never achieved a budget target on any project, and those responsible for the Big Build should not become an approved training provider. I think that is a very important concept that we should include, and I do hope the government seriously considers the reasoned amendment to improve this bill. We talk about work safety. I do not think there is anybody in this place who wants to oppose or see less work safety. We just want to keep the costs in control and make sure that the system is not rorted, as I said.

Mental health is a concern. One of the employers in my region said that it is always very easy to work out when someone should come back to work with a broken arm or a broken leg or something like that. For mental health it is far more difficult to understand when the right time is. Again, it is only a small percentage, and we just have to try and keep that percentage as small as we can regarding those who do want to rort the system. I certainly believe that mental health is a significant issue in the workplace, and we do have to monitor it. People are entitled to support for that, as long as they do not just milk that system, milk that cow, because our premiums will continue to go up. It is the government who need to be spending more time, more energy and more resources on making sure that rorting does not get out of hand, because if it does, that small percentage becomes a larger percentage. It becomes very, very costly for all employers, not just the ones who are affected directly. As I say, some of my businesses have had a 228 per cent increase, one of them an $860,000 increase over two years, despite last year’s freeze. They are absolutely fearful that they will see more increases, and they want to make sure that does not happen.

I have spoken about the rorting. I have spoken about making sure that mental health recovery is adhered to. I certainly accept that it needs to be part of this and also that it is difficult to measure, but we do have to stop anyone from milking the system. On the whole, there are a lot of complex and technical changes in the bill. There is a lot of room for improvement. As I say, I do hope the government takes into consideration the reasoned amendment that was put forward by the member for Evelyn. There are considerably good points in there. The government has taken a long time to get to the table. Even as late as today it is still making amendments. I think if they also take note of the amendments that we have put forward, we can genuinely make this better legislation for all and not find ourselves in a predicament like we did last year when, through poor management by this government, we ended up with a 42 per cent increase to employers. As I say, workplace safety is paramount – absolutely paramount. It is not just one side of this chamber, it is both sides of the chamber that support work safety, and we certainly support what we can do further with this bill.

Bronwyn HALFPENNY (Thomastown) (11:33): I am not sure if I heard correctly, but I think I heard the comment ‘milking the system’, and it is the most shocking and appalling attitude that I have ever heard. Here we are, talking about legislation amendments that have been recommended by a ministerial consultative committee of people with lived experience and their own professional lives, who have brought all sorts of incredible, professional, intelligent and also compassionate proposals to the minister that make up the majority of this bill, and all we hear from the opposition is ‘milking the system’. I am absolutely disgusted that you could behave in that way when we are talking about people whose families have lost loved ones – who have lost their father, their mother or their son – and in this sort of circumstance this is the way that you talk. Anyway, let us get on to what the bill is about. I have said my bit on that.

The amendment bill that we are talking about is the Workplace Injury Rehabilitation and Compensation Amendment Bill 2025. This legislation, as you may know, is very close to my heart because the substantial amendments that will be debated here today will change various workers compensation and health and safety laws, and they are a direct result of the dedication and commitment of the members of the Workplace Incidents Consultative Committee (WICC).

I also commend the member for Narre Warren South, because he is now co-chair, along with Brett Struhs, the new co-chair. I would like to acknowledge members of the WICC who are in the gallery this afternoon, who have come all the way from many parts of regional Victoria to listen to and see the work that they have put in for years really come to fruition. Thank you for your dedication and your commitment to do this work on behalf of other people really. You have had the experiences, which is what we value as the Allan Labor government, to advise us, but you are really doing this for those that come after you, to help them with what they will be going through. It would be the most terrible thing a person would ever have to experience, to hear the news of a loved one having been needlessly killed at work or, in other cases, seriously injured.

As I think I said, in my previous role as Parliamentary Secretary for Workplace Safety I also had the honour of co-chairing this committee, with the amazing Lana Cormie, who I understand cannot be here today. I really did have the privilege of working with a group of people who, whilst they had tragic lived experience, volunteered to join the Workplace Incidents Consultative Committee, which is now enshrined in law and regulation as a body to provide advice directly to the minister. It is the WICC from which many of these amendments that we are talking about today came – they arose from the industrial manslaughter legislation which the state Labor government introduced I think in 2020.

A key part of this, again on the advice of many of the families that agitated and campaigned for this workplace legislation for industrial manslaughter – they also lobbied and advocated for this – is that advice is to be provided by those with lived experience. I guess this is one of many pieces of legislation. I know there has been legislation in the past, but the legislation we are talking about today really is continuing that work, and it has been a long time coming. For example – and this is what really gets me with the opposition – one of the amendments is to ensure that the WorkCover system, the WorkCover authorities and the health and safety legislation treat people with dignity and respect and provide the entitlements that they are entitled to. How could anybody argue with that?

Also within this legislation is the formation of, or the opening of, the way to having a sort of bill of rights for those who have lost loved ones, the families, and those with serious injuries. These are just basic human rights. We need a system. We hear too many stories of how the system brings people down and in fact often makes people more hurt and injured than they were previously with the original injury. Here we are talking about having proper systems in place that ensure that there are, for example, objectives and a format of rights so that injured workers and families of loved ones who have died at work are treated with the proper respect and provided the entitlements – no more, no less – that they have under the legislation.

I have talked about the objectives and the rights of injured workers. There are also a number – again these were suggestions and matters put forward by members of what is called the WICC, the Workplace Incidents Consultative Committee – of small changes that really cost very little but will have a huge impact on the individual or the families of those whose loved ones have been killed at work. In many cases the person who has died at work has had dependants. They were working in order to provide for their families, and with their passing a great amount of the necessities of life that you need to pay for have gone with that person.

As well as having those overarching rights and considerations, the legislation we are talking about today deals with things such as – do not tell me the opposition is opposing this – at the moment, a dependent child of a person who has died at work receives 5 per cent of that person’s pre-injury average weekly earning as part of the compensation, on a weekly basis. Five per cent – that is not much. That is going to be increased to 12.5 per cent per dependent child. I do not think anybody would say that when a loved one passes away at work, the family that is left behind is better off financially. They are at all times financially worse off. Of course that is not the main consideration of the family, but they still need to have those bills paid and they still need to make sure, and we want to make sure, that that is not a burden in addition to the grief, which is completely life changing, not just for one or the other parent but also for the children, that trauma passing down the line. We want to make sure that finances are not the thing that has to be looked at in the forefront.

And well done and congratulations – when I was involved there was not a lot of support in some circles for adding a lived-experience person to the WorkSafe board advisory committees, but one of these amendments is for that very thing to happen. Therefore the membership of both the Occupational Health and Safety Advisory Committee and the WorkCover Advisory Committee will include members with lived experience. I think everyone would say that that is a great step forward. It really is important that people with lived experience are on these advisory bodies and can provide another perspective.

There are also requirements under these amendments in the bill that the minister will cause an independent review of the WorkCover safety scheme at least every five years, with the first review to be completed by 2030. This fits with other parts of these amendments around the treatment of families of injured workers and how the scheme is working to support and not further damage those that have been affected by a workplace serious injury or death. These are small things in the scheme of things but very important to those individuals that are dependent on the scheme and are requiring certain supports. There is also another change that was advocated for through the week. Sometimes dependents may not necessarily be children of a person that has been – (Time expired)

Cindy McLEISH (Eildon) (11:43:323:): I rise to make some comments on the Workplace Injury Rehabilitation and Compensation Amendment Bill 2025. I have listened to the previous two speakers of the government, and fair dinkum, they are living in la-la land. They are talking up a scheme that has consistently let down injured workers over the last decade. Things got so dire that the former minister had to make some fairly big changes to try and bring the scheme back onto sustainable footing with an organisation that actually has injured workers at its heart, because that is not what has been happening. The member for Thomastown is completely out of touch.

Under the Labor government WorkSafe has suffered greatly. They have had so many deficits that they have not been able to manage the scheme, let alone the injured workers. We have seen that in previous years this state government had to inject $1.3 billion into the organisation. This is an organisation that should be fully funded through the premiums it collects from employers, but it was not. In the year 2021 they had to inject $550 million; the following year, $450 million; and then $300 million, so they propped it up by $1.3 billion.

Realising that the government should not have to be doing that, because the scheme was in such a desperate state of mismanagement, they looked at what they had to do. They had to make some legislative change, but also they whacked employers to an extraordinary extent of 42 per cent. Most people, I heard, did not have a 42 per cent increase; it was much, much more. The $1.7 billion that was collected actually represented a 53.23 per cent increase on the previous year’s premium.

Not only was it financially a basket case but also the claims were up. Claims were up, and return-to-work rates had stagnated. Instead of looking after injured workers and preventing injury to workers, it was going in the wrong direction. We can have a look at return-to-work rates in six months for physical injury, which is the rate that is measured, and in 2023–24 it got to 75 per cent. It had been at 80 per cent in 2016–17, so in 2016–17, 80 per cent of workers with a physical injury got back to work. It dropped down to 73 per cent and 74 per cent in the last couple of years, so the return-to-work rates have gone backwards. The longer people are off work the more complex their condition can become. If it is a physical injury it can become a lot more complex. Perhaps they have multiple operations, their mental health deteriorates and they become quite complex cases. The return-to-work rates in a six-month period for mental injuries have only been measured in more recent times. They are most recently about 42 per cent, so not even half of the people with a mental health injury are getting back in time.

The government have completely failed injured workers, and for them to talk it up is quite astounding – it really is – because we have seen the history behind this. Let me give the members over there a little bit of history. The Ombudsman had a report, number one, in 2016 on the treatment of workers with complex injuries. It had completely disturbing reports and identified systemic issues. There was not only that report in 2016. In 2019 the Ombudsman had to go back and do another report because things had not got better. The government, who talk their work up, were failing even more. The Ombudsman went back and found continued systemic issues and disturbing reports, to the point that the government said, ‘Gosh, we’ve been failing these people for four years. Let’s pretend it hasn’t happened. We’d better get an independent review,’ so we had the Rozen report.

As we know, the Rozen report, by the now Judge Rozen, was handed down in April 2021. It was looking at what the government needed to do to actually fix the system which they had broken piece by piece. It was looking at the agent model and the administration of complex claims. The agent model includes self-insurers, so we have the four main agents plus self-insurers. Complex claims can be when somebody has had multiple injuries as a result of a trauma at work, or it could be a health condition that continues to deteriorate. There can be a mental component associated with it, or indeed it can be as a result of multiple robberies at work. I remember, having worked in rehabilitation some years ago, speaking to people who had been subject to many traumas at work such as that.

One part of this bill is because the government went away and had a look at the experience of the families. They are having to make it better for the families. Numbers of workplace deaths jiggle around a little bit. In the last four years we have had between 50 and 69 deaths each year. That is 50 to 69 too many. The family sometimes are left hanging on a bit of a limb. They are not adequately compensated. This bill looks at the number of families – and as I said, it is 50, 69 or 68 families each year; that is too many – but the numbers in relation to helping and making a difference to those families’ financials are not huge. The figure is only $20-odd million, I think the government has said. Some of the things that needed to be looked at were pensions for dependent children.

Every family circumstance is different, and the injured or deceased worker may not just have a spouse who is dependent and may or may not work but they may have children. I have known people who have also had disabled siblings that they have been the prime carer for and prime supporter of, so it picks up some of those guys with lump sum payments and the like.

I want to talk about the investment in return to work. I mentioned earlier the return-to-work rates and the failures of the government in that regard, with the physical and mental injuries, and the government have realised that they have actually got to do something about this. It was only a few years ago that they looked at how to save money in the scheme, rather than work out what works and what does not work, and they had a bit of an attack on occupational health and rehab providers. They thought, ‘Gosh, look at the cost that’s being spent here. So much money is being spent; let’s reduce referrals to rehabilitation. Let’s reduce that and try and save a bit of money.’ But what do you think happened with saving a bit of money by not referring people to rehab? Well, return-to-work rates deteriorated. Hello! You know, there is a direct connection between sending people to rehab, helping them gain the confidence and the skills and working with their employer to get them back to work so that they do not have longer term complex issues.

The government failed in this regard. Now they have realised they need to do something about return to work, and it is one of the things that is being addressed here. We are looking at the return-to-work coordinators. Now, if you are a large employer, it is quite easy for you to have a return-to-work coordinator. For smaller employers that is more difficult. Then you get some very small employers who in 20 years may never have a claim, so we need to understand exactly what the obligation is of a small family-run business with three employees who may never have an injury. They need to know what systems are in place and what they can do at the time to be guided through to help them manage the worker so that the worker has a good experience, not a joke of an experience, which is what has happened for a decade under Labor. The fact that Labor have got their head in the sand here and keep talking up all the great work that they have done is laughable, and it is an insult to those injured workers.

One of the other things that are being introduced here is the code of claimants rights, and that is going to set out clear service standards for injured workers when they deal with WorkSafe the body, whether they deal with their agent or the self-insurer, so that the worker has an understanding of what standards they can expect and vice versa – the agents, WorkSafe itself and self-insurers need to know what they need to deliver. They need to have a very clear understanding. Now, that is yet to be released. There will be some public comment on that, and I am looking forward to seeing that. I would have liked to have seen that done here.

Finally, I want to mention that it is pretty ordinary that the government come in and say they have got a couple of minor amendments to make to the bill, two pages. There are a lot of words on that. They did not get it right at the time. They have had to do a substantial rework on clause 15 with other dependants and also parts of the Accident Compensation Act 1985.

Ella GEORGE (Lara) (11:53): It is always a pleasure to follow the member for Eildon when making a contribution in this place. I am always incredibly impressed by her passion for Victoria and her innate curiosity. I am proud to rise today to speak on the Workplace Injury Rehabilitation and Compensation Amendment Bill 2025. I would like to acknowledge the Minister for WorkSafe and the TAC and his team for the tremendous work that they have done with this bill and across the portfolio to keep people safe at work and ensure that every worker comes home safe to their family at the end of the day.

This bill is an important piece in our state’s legislative framework to protect all Victorians and their right to return home safely from their workplaces. We know that no-one plans to get injured at work, but the reality is, sadly, sometimes this does happen. And when it does, we need to ensure that those workers are supported by a system that treats them fairly and respectfully while navigating those tough times. The bill aims to enhance the effectiveness of Victoria’s workers compensation system by ensuring that all users receive high-quality service focused on treating them with respect, fairness and dignity. The legislation implements suggestions from the Independent Review into Complex Workers’ Compensation Claims Management, the Rozen review, which I will discuss a little later on in my contribution, and these amendments are focused on the handling of complex workers compensation cases, ultimately benefiting all injured workers.

One of these involves the minister gaining the authority to create a code of claimants’ rights, establishing service standards and outlining the responsibilities of WorkSafe, its agents and self-insurers. There will be new requirements for employers to ensure that return-to-work coordinators undergo approved training and receive the necessary facilities and support to carry out their duties effectively. Additionally, the amendments will allow for the appointment of individuals with lived experience to the advisory committees at WorkSafe and mandate an independent review of the entire scheme every five years starting in 2030.

This legislation also introduces reforms aimed at enhancing support for family members who are affected by work-related fatalities, following the Victorian government’s review of existing provisions. This includes raising the weekly pension for dependent children, establishing new lump sum payments to acknowledge the grief and loss experienced by close family members as well as compensating dependents who are not partners or children. Furthermore, entitlements to provisional payments will be expanded. These changes will facilitate broader funding options for therapy and other types of support for the families of deceased workers and those facing eligible progressive diseases or severe injuries. Lastly, this bill will incorporate minor adjustments to improve the functioning of the Accident Compensation and Conciliation Service, which is now referred to as the Workplace Injury Commission, while also streamlining some administrative processes.

This bill delivers on the Victorian government’s commitment to implement recommendations provided in two separate reports. Firstly, the independent review into complex workers compensation claims management undertaken by Peter Rozen KC and provided to the government in April 2021, known as the Rozen report, and the review of the adequacy of the compensation and supports for family members of workers whose death is work related, known as the family support review.

In 2019 the Victorian Ombudsman released a concerning report titled WorkSafe 2: Follow-Up Investigation into the Management of Complex Workers Compensation Claims. This report unveiled troubling instances where injured workers faced unfair treatment and were denied their rightful legal benefits. This report highlighted a systemic flaw in how complex claims are managed, alongside a noticeable lack of oversight and review mechanisms. In considering these findings, the Victorian government took action by commissioning Peter Rozen to conduct an independent review of the claims management process.

In March 2022 the government responded to the Rozen review, with the then Minister for Workplace Safety announcing that the state government would support 19 of the 22 recommendations made in the review. This included a commitment to amend the Workplace Injury Rehabilitation and Compensation Act 2013 and mandate the creation and publication of a code of injured workers right. This code will ensure that WorkSafe is obligated to treat every worker with the dignity and respect that they deserve, guaranteeing high-quality service and fair treatment.

Since the Rozen review, under this government, WorkSafe has undertaken substantial efforts to enhance the management of complex claims and improve outcomes for injured workers. One of these was the establishment of the claims and recovery support team in 2021. This specialised team now directly manages the claims of long-term injured workers. Following the recommendations of the review, this team was expanded in 2022, allowing WorkSafe to support an even greater number of complex claims.

Furthermore, WorkSafe has initiated a pilot program known as the recovery model office. This is an innovative approach that utilises advanced data, claims management and analytics to identify workers with intricate needs, ensuring they receive tailored high levels of support. As a government we have been closely monitoring the outcomes of these initiatives, using the insights gained to refine agent contracts and guide any future transitions of claims to WorkSafe, because it is only under a Labor government that we understand how important it is to ensure that the experiences of injured workers in our system reflect fairness, respect and the right to high-quality services.

I would like to spend some time speaking about the Workplace Incidents Consultative Committee, because in my opinion this is one of the most important parts of our government’s reform work in this space. It was under a Labor government that we established this committee in June 2021 to strengthen the voice of Victorians who have been affected by serious workplace incidents. The committee was established to provide advice to the Minister for WorkSafe and the TAC about a number of important areas, including the needs of persons affected by workplace incidents involving death, serious injury or serious illness and the development, review and improvement of policies, practices, strategies and systems relating to serious workplace incidents and occupational health and safety more generally.

This embeds lived experience into the important reform work that this government is doing. The committee currently comprises 13 lived experience members and one government representative, and this group of people have already achieved some really significant accomplishments since they first came together in 2021. These include finalising the report A Best Practice Model of Workplace Incident Support, which outlines opportunities to improve the experience of affected families, injured workers and co-workers following a serious incident. They have provided advice to the Department of Treasury and Finance, including best practice principles for better support for injured workers to inform the future work of Return to Work Victoria. They have provided advice to WorkSafe Victoria to influence legislative amendments included in the Workplace Safety Legislation and Other Matters Amendment Act 2022 and they have provided advice on the design of the bereavement support service provided to families after a workplace death, amongst other things.

I acknowledge the hard work of all the members of the Workplace Incidents Consultative Committee. This committee has been instrumental in contributing to these reforms to support injured workers and families who have lost a loved one from a workplace death. In particular, I want to acknowledge three members who have joined us today to hear the parliamentary debate on this important legislation: Brett Struhs, co-chair and lived-experience member; David Brownlee, a lived-experience member; and Ralph Snider, also a lived-experience member. I thank the members of the committee for being here with us today, and I thank them for all of their work fighting to protect workers safety.

Labor has a proud history of fighting for workers, workers rights and workers safety. Labor built the WorkCover scheme to support workers, and this is at the heart of what Labor governments do. In fact, it was this that drew me to the Labor Party. In 2006 I was one of thousands of workers affected by the Howard government’s WorkChoices policy. Like many people who were adversely affected by policies like these, I was a young university student, and like most of my friends, I relied on a casual job in hospitality. Overnight I saw my rights and the rights of my friends disappear, and it was that which led me into the Labor movement, because I knew that my values aligned with those of the Labor Party. I knew that fighting for the rights of all Victorians was something I firmly believed in and wanted to do. That is why I am proud to be a member on this side of the house – because on this side of the house, we are fighting for the rights of all Victorians. We are fighting for the rights of Victorian workers. We are fighting for the rights of Victorian workers who are injured at work, and the rights of their families when they lose a loved one due to a workplace incident.

We will always prioritise the safety of workers, and that is exactly what this bill does. When the worst happens, it is essential that timely support is given to families who are grieving the loss of a loved one. No-one should die at work, and no-one should have to fear a loved one not returning from work. I commend the bill to the house.

Jess WILSON (Kew) (12:03): I rise to make a number of comments on the Workplace Injury Rehabilitation and Compensation Amendment Bill 2025. Can I begin by saying that WorkCover is an incredibly important scheme for Victoria and for workers in Victoria, and it is so important that we strive for it to be a strong and viable scheme for all workers in Victoria. But unfortunately, under the administration of the Labor government in this state, we have seen the scheme fall apart at the seams. You do not have to take my word for it – the former minister, the member for Essendon, has called WorkCover fundamentally broken in this state.

Can I, from the outset, commend the member for Eildon for her considerable work last year when this scheme was undergoing a number of major reforms and the work that she did at the time to ensure that not only did those reforms actually deliver for workers in Victoria and for injured people in Victoria who suffer workplace injuries but indeed that Victorian businesses and Victorian industry did not see further premium increases. She secured a premium freeze for employers in this state at a time when they simply could not afford to be hit with another hike from this government.

If we look at the administration of the WorkCover scheme over the past decade, we have seen the Labor government simply run it into the ground. We have seen the state government have to inject billions of dollars of taxpayer money into the scheme to prop it up. In 2022–23 it was $300 million; in 2021–22, $450 million; and in 2020–21, $550 million, adding up to $1.3 billion of taxpayer bailout for WorkCover under the Allan Labor government. This follows the fact that the scheme has simply not been delivering for injured workers in this state. How do we know that? Because of a series of reviews and reports into the scheme that showed that injured workers were not being looked after under this scheme under the administration of this government. We saw the 2016 Ombudsman’s report, and then because the recommendations in that report were not picked up by the government, were not implemented and were not delivering for injured workers the Ombudsman came back in 2019 to look again at what was happening in the administration of this scheme. Then of course we have seen the Rozen review as well.

As I said, in the words of the former minister, WorkCover is fundamentally broken in this state. The impact of that is that time and time again the poor financial administration of this state and of the various schemes and agencies in this state means that Victorians pay the price. Because of this we have seen premiums increase time and time again under the Labor government’s administration. Over the past few years we have seen an average premium increase of 42 per cent for businesses in this state at a time when they are being hit with tax after tax by this government: COVID debt levies, mental health levies, payroll tax increases and land tax increases. Under this government they are also being hit with an average 42 per cent increase when it comes to WorkCover premiums. But I am yet to meet with a business in this state that only saw a 42 per cent increase. I have heard stories from small businesses, from family businesses and from businesses in regional Victoria that have suffered 70, 80, 90 per cent increases when it comes to their WorkCover premiums. These are businesses that have not even had to submit a claim for their workers for years, yet they are seeing these massive hikes when it comes to premiums.

This is a system that is designed to ensure that workers who are injured in the workplace when they are undertaking their employment have security when it comes to ensuring that they are looked after as a result of those injuries. But if we do not manage the scheme well and if we do not manage the financial capacity of the scheme, then the consequences of that are that it is no longer sustainable. We can see that when we look at the detail of how this agency is being managed. This is an agency that is now reporting $870 million of negative equity. How is that sustainable over the long term? The consequence of that will be simply to put up premiums time and time again. We only have to look as far as another government insurer, the VMIA. This is in a very similar position to WorkCover. This is where we have once again seen poor financial administration in this scheme. We have seen the fact that the IFR, the insurance funding ratio, threatened to fall below 100, as it has with WorkCover. We saw that there had to be put in place a potential capital management plan for the VMIA. Once again, like WorkCover, it is in negative equity – $477 million last financial year – and it is $98 million in the red. What does it have in common with WorkCover as well?

Under this government we are seeing insurance premiums rise right across the board. Domestic building insurance premiums increased 43 per cent in 2023 and 65 per cent in 2024. What we are seeing from the Allan Labor government right across this state is the fact that it cannot manage money. Ten years of financial mismanagement when it comes to the budget, when it comes to these agencies and when it comes to the insurers means that Victorians are paying the price, whether that is through poorer services or higher premiums or not being able to access the insurance coverage they need when they are injured at work.

If we look at the bill here today and what we are looking at in terms of the various amendments being made, we are looking once again at a myriad of reforms that do not go to the core sustainability of WorkCover in this state. We are looking at the fact that we are going to see once again the risk of premiums increasing. We will see once again businesses being put under pressure in this state. The quantity of claims continues to rise. The return-to-work provisions are not meeting what we would expect in terms of supporting people to get back into the workplace.

What we know is that the decline in the financial performance of the WorkCover scheme will only result in more businesses being put under pressure in this state. Ultimately what does that mean? It means that these businesses cannot employ Victorians. They cannot grow their businesses. They cannot look for other opportunities. I remember visiting a small business in regional Victoria, in Ballarat, and they were looking at opportunities to start exporting their product overseas and they showed me their premium increase when it comes to WorkCover. That premium increase, combined with the increase in payroll tax and the fact that they have seen their land tax bill go up as well meant that they could not take on the extra employees to do the extra shifts required to ensure that they could export those products overseas. That is a missed opportunity for this state. That is a missed opportunity to employ more people in this state, and that is a direct result of the financial mismanagement under this government.

I commend the member for Evelyn for the reasoned amendment that she has put forward today and the importance that the Liberals and Nationals are placing on the call to freeze the premium rate for WorkCover on employers to ensure that we do not put businesses and industry in this state under any more pressure at a time that they can least afford it. This government continues to tax business out of business. They simply cannot make it stack up anymore in this state. You ask any business that has a national operation, and they will say that Victoria is the hardest place to operate, the hardest place to do business. Why? Because this government has managed the economy into the ground. It has, time and time again, put up taxes on business. It has increased payroll tax, land tax and an average increase of 42 per cent when it comes to WorkCover premiums. The poor, poor state of finances in this state means that Victorians are paying the price and Victorian businesses are paying the price.

Dylan WIGHT (Tarneit) (12:13): It is a pleasure to rise this afternoon and contribute in favour of the Workplace Injury Rehabilitation and Compensation Amendment Bill 2025. I do so as a member of a movement – the broader labour movement here in Victoria – that has the plight of injured workers at the core of absolutely everything that it does. I said in my first speech that I will spend all of my days in this place trying to improve the lives of injured workers, so you can imagine how I feel when I walk into this place to debate a bill that is so important to helping the plight of injured workers only to find that there is a reasoned amendment from the member for Evelyn that would mean that injured workers in this state and their families get less for longer, and for what reason?

What reason was provided for this reasoned amendment, which would delay the passage of this bill? There were two main reasons, from what I understood and from what I heard. The first is just the old impost to business – it is just, ‘This is a bit hard for business, so what we’ll do is we’ll just stop debating this until we can go out and drum up a little bit more fear in the community.’ And in particular, what was cited was the need for return-to-work coordinators to be adequately trained. Now, as somebody who has represented workers in a past job, the impost to business for a return-to-work coordinator to be adequately trained is pretty minimal. You know, if we are talking about even SMEs, the return-to-work coordinators already exist; they are already in the business, so we are not forcing businesses to go and employ somebody else at $80,000 or $90,000 a year. These return-to-work coordinators already exist – they are typically somebody that works in HR or perhaps they are somebody in middle management. So the return-to-work coordinators already exist, and they play a pivotal role within the business.

If you do not get your return-to-work systems within your business right, then your business will pay more, and what will end up happening is you will have injured workers who end up with secondary injuries because they have returned to work too quickly or they have returned to work in roles that they should not have returned to work in. Given that those return-to-work coordinators already exist, I would have thought that it was pretty sensible to have them adequately trained. Training obviously comes at a cost. The cost for a return-to-work coordinator to be trained – let us say you want to go and do it with AIG, the Ai Group – is $495 and one day. It is one day’s training at $495, which of course can be claimed as a business expense. For the member for Evelyn to come in here and say that this is going to cost Victorian businesses millions is utter garbage.

The other reason that I picked up on was, ‘Oh, we need to do this reasoned amendment because we just need to make sure that none of this training money is going into the hands of the CFMEU’, and then they cited the normal sort of fear stuff that those opposite do with really any union but the CFMEU in particular. I would just like to remind the member for Evelyn, in case she has been living under a rock, that the CFMEU is in administration. So to sit there and say, ‘Oh, some of this money might end up in the corrupt hands of the CFMEU’ –

Members interjecting.

Dylan WIGHT: If you want to stand there and call a former judge corrupt, then go right ahead. But I would remind the member for Evelyn that the CFMEU is under administration.

We also had the member for Eildon come in with a contribution after that, which was quite considered. I deeply respect the member for Eildon’s knowledge in respect to workers compensation and in respect to this act. But I would just make the broad point: for those opposite to come in here and to have a go at this government in respect to how we deal with workers compensation is just the biggest case of gaslighting that I have ever heard in my entire life. It is a pretty quick google to find out what former Liberal governments tried to do to this scheme when they were in power. I have got an article here headed ‘Kennett Govt’s changes to workers’ compensation laws draconian’. In 1993 what we had was a former Liberal government break an election promise and rip the common-law rights –

James Newbury interjected.

Dylan WIGHT: I was; I was three – and rip common-law rights away from Victorian workers. So what that meant was that there could absolutely be a decision where a worker was entitled to let us say $20,000 in compensation, and there was no way for the worker to actually seek it, because those opposite ripped those rights away from them. And they want to come in here and lecture us about our performance in respect to workers compensation. Supporting injured workers is at the core of everything that we do, and we will continue to do it. We know that if those opposite ever get the gift of government again they will cut and cut and cut. They should be honest with the Victorian people as to whether this scheme is something that they will cut if they ever find themselves in government, because it is in their DNA, and we know that.

This is a piece of legislation that, like I said, is incredibly important for Victorian workers, especially injured Victorian workers. This is a piece of legislation that benefits every Victorian worker. Even if they do not go through the horrible situation of being injured – or worse – at work, having that safety net there is incredibly important. It adds objectives to the act and WorkSafe to expressly provide for fair, respectful and dignified treatment. It develops a code of rights and requires return-to-work coordinators to be trained and for that training to be completed within a set time frame. As I said, return-to-work coordinators in businesses, particularly SMEs, often do not hold a singular, defined role. Typically it is somebody from HR, it is someone from middle management and it is somebody who really should have adequate training to be able to perform the role.

I have seen in my time the consequences when return to work goes wrong; I have seen that firsthand and it is not a pretty sight. It often ends up with the worker sustaining a further injury. There have been situations where I have seen return to work go wrong, the worker has sustained a further injury and that worker has not been able to work ever again. That obviously is horrendous for that worker. It is horrendous for that worker’s family, for their health, for their mental health and for their financial security. It is also horrendous for the business. It is a significant impost on the business. If that part of your business goes wrong at the rare time that you have to activate it – to say that it is an impost on business to spend $500 and have one employee at training for one day a week, as compared to the consequences when it goes wrong, I think is incredibly short-sighted. But let us be honest: the reasoned amendment has nothing to do with the substance of the bill; it is just to try and delay it. It is not to try to improve the bill at all, and the reasons given make that incredibly clear.

There are new lump sums and increased lump sums for economic loss of up to $20,000 for dependants and a new lump sum for non-economic loss of up to $10,000 for close family to recognise grief and trauma. There is also an increase in child pensions from 5 per cent to 12.5 per cent of pre-injury earnings and an extension of provisional payments to partners from 12 to 26 weeks.

Behind every workplace injury, indeed behind every workplace death, there is the worker who is obviously immediately affected. But often there is also a family that relied on that worker’s wage to be able to get through and live their life. Those on this side of the house have always and will always try to improve the lives of Victorian workers and injured Victorian workers, as opposed to those opposite, who have a history of ripping the guts out of this scheme. I commend the bill to the house.

Martin CAMERON (Morwell) (12:23): I rise to talk on the Workplace Injury Rehabilitation and Compensation Amendment Bill 2025. Everybody in this chamber wants to get a piece of legislation through in this amendment bill that does work for every Victorian worker, not only if they are working on Big Build projects in Melbourne or if they are small business owners in the city or in regional Victoria. We need to look at getting a system that works right across the board, because for far too long the WorkCover compensation that we get and the premiums that we are paying have been out of kilter.

As a former small business owner who employed mums and dads in regional Victoria, the one thing that I wanted to do, and I think the one thing that every person in this chamber wants to do, was ensure that if a worker left through the front door, they returned to that front door at night to go home to their family.

I have seen people get minor injuries at work, where it might have been a two-week or a four-week injury before they stepped back into the area of getting back to work, and where there was a longer injury; I have seen friends of mine have years off before they were able to step back into the workforce. We need to be mindful that we are covering the whole range for everybody because, as the member for Tarneit just stated, it has got a huge impact not only on the worker but the family that relies on that wage. Unfortunately, in the building industry, which I was in, I have seen people pay the ultimate price with their life – of going to work and not being able to return home – friends of mine, people that I have known. If you are involved in a sporting community in your electorate, somewhere along the line, for a person going to work – and they should be able to go about their day’s work – coming home is the number one option that should be able to be achieved, and sometimes that does not happen. I know the member for Narracan is going to get up and speak shortly. In the building industry it happens all the time where things go wrong. In some workforces the jobs are more dangerous than others. I have spoken to small business owners that have had coffee shops and have had employees that have slipped on the floor or they have burnt their hand and they have been off work. But in the plumbing industry, in the building industry and in the power station industries down in the Latrobe Valley, people unfortunately lose their lives.

What we do here in this place, changing the laws and making it easier for injured workers to get compensation, is a good thing. But on the flip side, for small businesses we need to make sure that their premiums are kept under control so they can continue to provide the opportunity for people to actually come to work. For a lot of small business owners the number one thing, when you talk to them, for them to open their doors every day, is that they are paying insurance premiums and they are paying WorkCover premiums, and they are all going up. We need to make sure that we create a safe working environment. One of the things that happen if you cannot afford to pay your premiums is you may start to cut corners; you may start to not employ that extra set of hands that you need to make sure that the working day and the working life of everyone in the business is being taken care of. We need to make sure we can do that also.

In my own business I was fortunate that we did not have many WorkCover claims, but as I spoke of before, our premiums every year would go through the roof, so to speak. It is the cost of doing business, making sure that our businesses are complying with the rules and regulations and knowing that, if they do get a worker that does become injured and has to have time off work, we have these mechanisms in place that the worker can go through to make sure they are financially compensated and to make sure that there are rehabilitation pathways for them to do what it takes to get back to work. At the end of the day the worker wants to come back to work, and the business owner wants that worker to come back to work. In a small regional community everybody knows each other. Maybe in the Big Build here in Melbourne, where you have got workers coming from everywhere, you do not have those close interrelationships that you do in a town. In a small town the number one issue is: we want everybody to come back to work. There was mention before that sometimes there is rorting, unfortunately, of the system – it does not matter what system it is. We need to make sure that we have got mechanisms in place and that we can work through those as well.

As hard as we all want to work here in the chamber to make sure that the legislation going through covers injured workers and covers business owners, there are always going to be some grey areas that need to be improved. I do not think we as an opposition put up suggestions or put in reasoned amendments just for the sake of causing issues. We want to make sure that the legislation that comes through here, especially when it involves the building industry, is fit for purpose and is going to work for everybody, because there is always going to be one area with maybe a little grey area with a loophole that people can jump through. The government spoke before about people with lived experience who are putting these recommendations forward. Well, we have got people on our side, like me and the member for Narracan, that have lived it for 40 years in the industry and know what the shortcomings are. We know what the pressure issues are for business, because if we do not have a workforce, our business industry suffers, and that is no good for anybody.

It is amazing as a small business owner the joy that you do get from your workers being at work, knowing that you are providing a workplace where they can get paid so they can pay for their house, their mortgage or their rent and so they are able to send their kids to school or to engage in sport, whether it be football, soccer, netball or basketball – it does not matter what it is. To be able to contribute to the community as a small business – it does not just come as the owner of the business, it actually comes through the people that work in the business.

I know that we are doing our best, and the former minister, the now Minister for Economic Growth and Jobs, who is sitting at the table, to his credit put his hand up to say, yes, we do have a problem. He faced the music and was willing to listen to questions from our side and answer them where he could. Now, we need to make sure that we carry that baton on, and if we do see areas where we can have improvement, we need to now bring them up with the new minister and say, ‘Hang on a minute, we need to have a little step back here and have a look at what exactly is going on,’ because at the end of the day, when we sit in here and vote on this amendment bill going through, we want to get it as close to perfect as we can. I do not think we will ever get it perfect, because the way business is, it changes all the time. So we need to make sure that we are doing the right thing – that we are doing our due diligence for everybody in the working fraternity. So I do want to have the government look at the reasoned amendment put forward by the member for Evelyn, taking on face value that we are doing it for the right reasons for the workers of Victoria.

Danny PEARSON (Essendon – Minister for Economic Growth and Jobs, Minister for Finance) (12:33): I am delighted to join the debate on what is an important piece of legislation. As the previous member said, I have the great privilege of being the former minister in this place for the reforms – reforms which I felt were essential. I want to talk a bit about some of the contributions of those opposite, because when I stood here and introduced the previous bill and we had a consideration-in-detail debate, the member for Eildon sat at the table and the member for Narracan was in his spot and both of them asked very thoughtful, considered and measured questions. They were genuinely interested in why we were trying to come up with the solutions we were proposing. They genuinely were trying to engage in the subject matter. I have got to say the member for Eildon was an honourable person to deal with in all of those debates – honourable, decent, fair – and I could not take exception to the way in which we conducted that debate as we worked our way through those issues. Now, I just want to park that there for a moment because I think it is important.

The member for Evelyn, in her contribution, started off by being critical of the minister for circulating some house amendments. What I would say to the member for Evelyn is that this legislation is incredibly complex. The reforms that this government introduced were the most comprehensive and wideranging reforms to this scheme in 20-odd years. From my perspective as the responsible minister, I wanted to get that right, and I knew how hard it was to get it right. For the member for Evelyn to turn around and be critical of the Deputy Premier saying there were a couple of minor typos we have got to fix – that is nothing. That is nothing in the scheme of things.

The member for Kew made a contribution as well. She quoted me saying that the scheme was fundamentally broken. Absolutely I said that before the reforms – it was fundamentally broken. It was a scheme that was costing business a fortune. It was a scheme that required $1.3 billion worth of investment. It was a scheme that was making injured workers sicker. I said it was fundamentally broken because I looked at it and I thought, ‘Nobody’s winning out of this – nobody.’ That is why we pushed those reforms. The member for Kew also talked about the negative equity, based upon page 72 of the annual report. The member for Kew made those comments. That annual report was for the 2023–24 financial year. These reforms were passed in April. The operating result for the same period showed a surplus of $388.727 million. The member for Kew was talking about the balance sheet, taking into account the fact that there had been an increase in claims, which was precisely why we said we wanted to reform the scheme because it was fundamentally broken. Of course when you have got a large volume of claims an actuary is going to try and price it and value it accordingly, but what we are doing and what we have done with the scheme reforms is give people the dignity of work.

I made a point of making sure I went to the WorkCover awards night, and I met a truck driver who was in his early 60s. He was driving a truck and witnessed a fatal. When he went home that day he was fine; the next day he could not go back to work. A few weeks later he was drinking beer and watching Days of Our Lives, and he said, ‘I thought to myself, is this what my life has come to?’ What happened was he worked with his agent and his agent got him back to work. She was on stage with him, and he put his arm around her and he said, ‘This woman saved my life.’ When you talk about the value of a claim, that is what an actuary says – ‘This person is never going back to work.’ What we did with these reforms is give Victorian workers the dignity of going back to work and making sure they can have the opportunity of living meaningful, fulfilled lives. It naturally follows when more people have the dignity of going back to work, claims fall.

The other point I would make is that yes, premiums increase, but that is dependent upon a number of factors. The first is that for every single business that has got a remuneration of $200,000 or less, it is based upon the classification – that is, if I am working on a construction site and I have got a payroll of $200,000, it will follow that, because of the industry I am in, I will have a higher premium than say you who might be working in a cafe and it is just you and your sister. Once you go beyond $200,000, then it comes down to your claims experience and the industry you are in, and one of the weaknesses with the former legislation was that the inspectorate arm could not talk to the insurance arm. What does that mean? The member for Narracan is off doing inspections on a worksite. He sees something wrong. I am running the insurance business. He cannot tell me what he is seeing, so I cannot mark up or mark down the premium. Similarly, I get half a dozen claims come in. I cannot tell the member for Narracan, ‘Listen, there’s something going on with that workplace. You need to go and inspect it.’ That was why the scheme was fundamentally broken. That is why we did the things that we did, and that is why I feel very confident that under the stewardship of this portfolio by my good friend the Deputy Premier you will start to see a trend up in terms of the insurance funding ratio (IFR). You will start to see those improvements.

The member for Kew can come in and say, ‘I can read; I know what IFR stands for’, and she can pick out stats, but she fundamentally did not do the work to understand the scheme, unlike the member for Eildon and unlike the member for Narracan, who have done the work. You have got to give credit where it is due. And in this place, time reveals all. You will always find out in the end. You know who are the hard workers. You know who are the people who are across their issues. The member for Narracan, when he sat there during the consideration-in-detail debate, made a very thoughtful and measured contribution. He wanted to know if a person in his community who was a paramedic who had PTSD be covered by these reforms, yes or no.

It was a very thoughtful contribution, but he came to this place in good spirits to try and come up with the right response. That is why you have got to do the work. I do not profess for a moment these schemes are simple to understand – they are complex. But similarly, as we saw with the Victorian Managed Insurance Authority, yes, there was a deterioration of the IFR for the VMIA. Why? Because we had the single biggest collapse because of Porter Davis not doing the right thing. I do not suggest for a moment that if it was a Liberal government that had been in place it would have been their fault that the private sector shonks had done the wrong thing. It was the private sector shonks who had done the wrong thing – they had not paid their premiums. That was why we had these problems.

The other point I would make to the member for Morwell is that one of the things I was really keen on was to make sure that we had proper regulatory check-ins and reviews of this scheme. That is why I gave an undertaking that we will have a statutory review three years into the scheme’s operation, to make sure we have got three years worth of data points to get it right. Because I did my very best – I gave my best efforts and my best endeavours – to get this right. But there are unknown unknowns. You do not know what is going to happen, and that is why you need three years of data points to say in 2027, ‘Yeah, we’re going to have a look at this and make sure we get this right. We have to get this right. We’ve got to get the balance right.’

Similarly, we also made a commitment that we were not going to take money out of WorkCover in the event that we saw an improvement in terms of the finances. Why is that important? Well, I think it is only fair and reasonable that if you end up having a better situation, a better financial position, then you can turn around and say, ‘Well, all right, maybe we should be thinking about doing something for premiums into the future. Because of the strength of the balance sheet, because of the strength of the operating statement, we are in a position to turn around and say, “Well, let’s do something about that.”’ But you have got to make sure that you have got the right fiscal settings in place and you have got the right approach in place.

I had the great privilege of working with the Workplace Incidents Consultative Committee, and I want to thank the member for Thomastown and the member for Narre Warren South for their contributions. What I found with the WICC was I thought it was really important as the responsible minister to go before them and talk with them. Can you imagine what it is like? You have lost your son in a trench collapse and you come in time and time again wanting to improve the system so the next person who suffers a loss like that feels less pain than what you felt, retraumatising yourself again and again and again because you believe in the scheme and you believe in making sure that Victorian workers live.

I saw that with Dr Lana Cormie as well as Dave Brownlee and Samantha Burns. I have nothing but credit to give them. I do not think I could have done it. Imagine you have lost your son in a workplace incident and for years after you are going back before this group reliving that trauma. I was in awe of the WICC, and I want to thank them for what they did for me. They made me a better minister. They told me what was important, and they made sure that I always felt that so long as I was doing what was right by them we would get it right.

I want to commend the minister for this work. This is important work. I recognise the fact that members might have different views on issues like this, but I will always value and respect those members who come here and are prepared to look at the subject matter, prepared to inquire and prepared to do the work to understand how this stuff works, because that is what this issue should be all about. You can have the show ponies sworn in and sworn out who might quote the odd acronym here and there, but they will always be shown up to be nothing more than dilettantes.

Wayne FARNHAM (Narracan) (12:44): I am pleased to rise today on the Workplace Injury Rehabilitation Compensation Amendment Bill 2025. The first thing I am going to start off with is to actually thank the minister for his contribution. It is a pity he has just run out. It was a very thoughtful contribution, and I am taking on board a few points he said. I had quite a few conversations with the member for Essendon, the former minister, in regard to the workplace reform that was brought in in 2023 I think, or 2024 – I cannot remember, but when that happened. We did have quite a few conversations. But I have to make this point, because I need this chamber to appreciate that there is not one employer that I know in this state that ever wants to make a phone call for a workplace injury or death on site. It is just something you do not want to do. I have had to do it.

It was not a death, but it was an injury, and it is not a pleasant thing to do. Even though the injury did not create a lifelong disability, it was still not a pleasant phone call. No employer likes it. In my 30 years as an employer I had two workplace accidents – just two. It is a pretty good record in the construction industry, because everything we do is high risk. The first one was just one of those things that happens. It was an icy morning, and a fella slipped and hurt his shoulder. He was on WorkCover for about nine months. The second one was a lot more serious; that was a fall from height. It was not even one of my contractors, actually; it was another person’s contractor who had not been inducted. He did something very silly and fell 6 metres onto his head. When you are in charge of a site that is the last thing you want to see – to walk onsite with two ambulances there and to see a fella inverted into a table and chairs who has had a 6-metre fall straight down.

For the members on that side, I just want them to take this on. There is really no employer that likes seeing that, likes reporting that or likes making that phone call to someone. It is the worst thing in the world to do. I just want that side to realise that as an employer, and I was an employer for 30 years, it is the last thing you want. You do everything you possibly can to make your worksite safe, you really do, but sometimes, unfortunately, people do dumb things. I am not saying it is the fault of the employee, and I am not necessarily saying it is the fault of the employer. You can take all necessary caution and address all necessary safety concerns, but sometimes, unfortunately, things happen. We do not want it to happen. You never do. I just want the other side in their contributions going forward to just bear that in mind, because there is not one employer I know that really wants to make that phone call or have that happen on their building sites. It is a very important point. I suppose I should get into the bill, but I had to make that point.

I will take on board what the former minister said in his contribution. I did have a conversation with the minister, and you will see that our shadow minister has put forward a reasoned amendment to agree to a freeze of the premium at 1.8 per cent. What we have to realise is that in business – I hope those are over there are listening, because this is important – a WorkCover premium always comes out in March. You have got your premiums there, and you have got the next 12 months. You are forward planning on 12 months, and you think maybe your premium might be the same. You come around to those 12 months, and what happened last time was that premiums went up on average from 42 to 85 per cent. I know a lot of premiums that literally nearly doubled. As a businessperson, it is very hard to budget for that. Let us say, for example, I have tendered for a project, and my premium previously was $30,000 but it goes up to $60,000. That is money lost. The one thing we need in this state is employers. If we do not have employers, we do not have employees. It is as simple as that. It is a very, very simple equation. What I would like to see the government do – and yes, we have asked for a freeze – is to have the ability, if there is going to be a rise, to give businesses six months notice so they can adjust. Because if you cannot adjust, you start to lose money. If you keep losing money time and time again, you will eventually close the doors. That is just the way it is. What I would like to see the government do is to have that ability. I spoke to the former minister about that exact point. When that significant rise came in my phone blew up because people just could not believe how much their premiums had gone up. It does cost the business on the bottom line.

I just want to lean in to the member for Tarneit’s contribution. He said the member for Evelyn was pretty well full of it because she said it would cost small business millions and millions of dollars. Well, the member for Tarneit needs to do a quick Google search himself, because when I did a Google search for ‘small businesses in Victoria’ the latest data I could get was from July 2024. We had about 604,379 small businesses. The definition of a ‘small business’ is one with a turnover under $3 million.

If those businesses all have to go out and spend $495, that is $300 million, so the member for Tarneit might want to think about that before he says someone is full of it. It will cost business $300 million. If it was my business and I had to spend $500 to train to be the RTW officer, the return-to-work officer, I would be okay with that. I would do it, because as a businessperson you have to tick all the boxes anyway. If you do not do it – and I think there is a quote here – an employer who fails to comply with these new RTW coordinator requirements could be liable to a penalty of up to $118,000. Even as a sole trader I would train myself to avoid a $118,000 fine. It is common sense.

The other side of this chamber need to understand the pressures of running a business, building a business and all the implications that come with it. I have heard some claims here today, especially when the member for Tarneit was referencing the CFMEU. It is true what he says – it is in administration – but what I would like to know then is: if the CFMEU is in administration, and I am sure the Incolink figures will come out after July this year, is Incolink giving them another $34 million this year? I do not know why you would give $34 million to a body that is in administration. It does not seem to be common sense to me. If they are in administration, obviously they are not trustworthy. ‘Don’t give them $34 million’ is my advice to Incolink.

The debate has gone pretty wide today. I understand that WorkCover injury is complex and there are a lot of moving parts to it. The bills are not always going to be right. I understand that. I can see why WorkCover bills come back every two to three years – it is a very shifting space. We do need to get people back to work. I could not agree more. I was off work once for three days, and it drove me nuts. I got blown off a frame and landed on my back. It drove me nuts lying there for three days. I probably went back to work too early, but I was buggered if I was going to sit at home watching telly for three days. That sucked. Trying to get people back to work is extremely important, and it is the most important thing too because of their mental health. There is nothing worse than seeing a worker that cannot get back to work for various reasons. The member for Essendon referenced my friend with PTSD. It is so important, but it is so important that we get the rehabilitation right. If we get that right, it does take the pressure off the WorkCover system.

Any bill that comes into this place, especially around workplace injury and rehabilitation – that aims into that space – we deserve to talk about and debate. I would have loved to have gone into consideration in detail on this bill so we could get questions answered. We on this side want the bills – as the member for Morwell said, we are never going to get it 100 per cent right – that we are putting to Victorians to be the best they can possibly be at this point in time. That is our job in this chamber, and that is what I want the government to consider. Going forward in your contributions, just remember that not all employers are bad people.

Steve McGHIE (Melton) (12:54): I rise today to contribute to the Workplace Injury Rehabilitation and Compensation Amendment Bill 2025. I think we are all here to say that every worker deserves to work in a safe environment and to come home safely. Unfortunately that does not always happen, and that can be due to a range of reasons. Following on from the member for Narracan, who made the comment that no employer wants to make the call about someone being injured or killed at work, I accept that. There are still a number of employers that do not provide safe workplaces, and unfortunately too many workers still get injured at work unnecessarily. If their workplaces were safer, we would not have these issues that we are raising today through this bill. This is a complicated area – there is no question about it – and nothing is perfect. It is very difficult in regard to dealing with workplace injury compensation and return to work.

It is very complicated, and I will make reference to the fact that as the previous secretary of the ambulance union I dealt with WorkCover every day of the week for paramedics and for healthcare workers that worked in the ambulance industry across this state. I have got to say that sometimes the system and the scheme injured the workers more than the initial injury in the processes that they had to go through in regard to, firstly, justifying their injury and, secondly, getting proper compensation but trying to get back to work. Unfortunately, ambulance was not a great area to try and return people to work, because it had limited places for people to return to work.

What do you do with a paramedic that has a mental health injury? Where do you place them within the ambulance service that will assist them with their mental health injuries? What do you do with a paramedic that has an injured back and can no longer lift patients? Where do you place them if they cannot work on the road? The ambulance service has limited avenues for paramedics to return to work, and that is why, when governments are dealing with legislation supporting injured workers, the issues of weekly payments, compensation, proper return-to-work programs and very active return-to-work officers within the respective industries are so important.

This bill amends the Workplace Injury Rehabilitation and Compensation (WIRC) Act 2013, the Accident Compensation Act 1985 and the Occupational Health and Safety Act 2004. It also is correcting minor drafting errors from the Workplace Safety Legislation and Other Matters Amendment Act 2022 and the Workplace Injury Rehabilitation and Compensation Amendment (WorkCover Scheme Modernisation) Act 2024, and ultimately these amendments aim to ensure that WorkSafe can continue to provide the best possible support to injured workers and to the families after work-related deaths in line with findings of the Rozen report and the family supports review.

I take a moment just to acknowledge the important work that WorkSafe Victoria undertakes. Just before the Easter recess we had the opportunity to attend the launch of the newest WorkSafe campaign, Don’t Cross the Line, which was held here at Parliament House. It was very informative to hear about the many ways that WorkSafe endeavours to reduce workplace harm and improve outcomes for injured workers. And this was about workers in the different industries, hospitality in particular, with aggression, violence and even physical assault against them. I will refer back to my previous occupation as the secretary of the ambulance union. I was involved with many other health sector unions that organised a campaign in regard to aggression, violence and assaults against healthcare workers, and out of that campaign WorkSafe formulated some commercials that were placed on TV not dissimilar to the Don’t Cross the Line campaign. It did have an effect. It did raise with the community that you are not to harm healthcare workers, as it should be with any worker in a workplace – that people should not have aggression, violence and even physical assault towards them.

Of course there were recommendations out of the Rozen report, which recommended that the objectives of the WIRC act and WorkSafe be amended to expressly provide for fair, respectful and dignified treatment of injured workers and their dependants by WorkSafe and the provision of high-quality services – and that is really important, getting high-quality service and fair treatment. We know that some of these insurance agencies sometimes do not act appropriately when it comes to fair treatment and high-quality services. Unfortunately, insurance agencies always look at the almighty dollar, and I think they put profits before people, which is disappointing when we are talking about people that have been injured at their work. Of course work-related injury or illness is not a choice by an individual. I do not know of anyone that wants to go to work and deliberately injure themselves. It is certainly one of the worst outcomes that could happen in a worker’s life. And again, as a previous –

Sitting suspended 1:00 pm until 2:02 pm.

Business interrupted under sessional orders.