Wednesday, 18 June 2025

Bills

Corrections Legislation Amendment Bill 2025

Second reading

Debate resumed.

Eden FOSTER (Mulgrave) (14:54): I am very pleased to rise today to speak in support of the Corrections Legislation Amendment Bill 2025. I first would like to thank the Minister for Corrections for introducing this very important bill. The need for this bill is clear. It is the duty of those in Parliament to protect the people who serve our community, to stand by victims and to ensure that individuals who pose a serious risk to public safety are managed appropriately. With these key objectives in mind, this legislation in front of us introduces significant reforms that will provide tangible improvements to our corrections system and the safety of all Victorians.

We are all aware that custodial officers play an essential role in maintaining order within our prisons, ensuring rehabilitation efforts can take place in a structured and secure environment. However, far too often these officers face violence and assaults, with significant consequences for their physical and mental wellbeing. The gut-wrenching thing is that the people who committed these violent acts receive only a concurrent sentence instead of a cumulative one, meaning they would not serve an extra day in prison. This undermines the seriousness of these offences and fails to deter such violent acts. After all, if you can assault a custodial officer without facing extra time in prison, what is stopping you from doing it again? This bill introduces targeted reforms to rectify this injustice. Through this bill we are putting beyond doubt that these attacks will be classified as prison offences and will attract cumulative sentences. This means that offenders who commit violent acts against custodial officers will serve additional prison time as a direct consequence of their actions. This is not just a matter of punishment, it is a matter of justice.

I know that across my electorate of Mulgrave and indeed across the state of Victoria hundreds and thousands of people work day in, day out to keep their community safe. They deserve a workplace where their safety is prioritised and where deterrence measures are strong enough to prevent violence from occurring in the first place. This reform ensures that our corrections system protects those who uphold it, fostering a safer environment for staff and detainees alike. I also point out that this bill does not stipulate or mandate automatic increases in sentencing. Our judicial system will still have full discretion in determining appropriate sentences based on the circumstances of each case. What we are addressing here is a legal ambiguity that has for far too long allowed offenders to serve concurrent sentences instead of cumulative ones, effectively nullifying any additional consequences for their actions.

I also note that the member for Caulfield has put in some amendments to this bill regarding handcuffing. Handcuffing is an important safety measure and is currently used every day in prisons right across our state, and our hardworking corrections officers have the option already to use handcuffs when they need to, when moving prisoners or otherwise. That is a regular occurrence, and there is no arbitrary three-month limit on that. Staff can use those tools when they need to for as long as it is appropriate.

I move on to a second key feature that I want to highlight today, which is the improvement of the sex offender registration scheme under this bill. Currently, these individuals are already required to provide critical information to authorities, including personal details, employment arrangements and travel plans, helping law enforcement monitor their movements and assess any risks. Under the current system reporting obligations may cease when a post-sentence order expires. The Allan Labor government recognises that the transition out of intensive supervision presents potential risks to the community. This bill here today ensures that individuals under post-sentence orders for serious sex offences will be required to report to police not only for the duration of their supervision but for a minimum of five years after their order expires. Local families in Mulgrave and across the state, especially those with children, can be assured that even when the post-sentence order has expired authorities can still track the whereabouts of these offenders. This will enable the appropriate authority to make an early intervention should any warning signs of reoffending emerge. Local residents in Mulgrave and across our state can be assured that their safety and the safety of their loved ones are always at the heart of everything that this government does. I also want to stress that this change is not about unnecessary punishment; rather, it is about responsible and appropriate risk management. By learning from past experiences we ensure that no community has to endure the uncertainty and anxiety that comes from inadequate oversight.

Equally significant are the amendments to the Serious Offenders Act 2018, which will enhance the post-sentence supervision and management of individuals who continue to pose a serious risk of reoffending. The post-sentence scheme plays an important role in ensuring community safety by allowing courts to impose ongoing supervision or detention on serious offenders beyond their prison sentences. Following a statutory review in 2023, a series of recommendations were made to improve this system. This bill here today ensures that those recommendations are implemented effectively. Our community can be assured knowing that if an offender under post-sentence supervision breaks their conditions, authorities will be able to act immediately and decisively, ensuring that offenders who disregard their conditions are swiftly held accountable.

Finally, this bill will make necessary amendments to existing legislation to clarify provisions that were not operating as originally intended. These refinements ensure that important laws continue to function effectively. One of these amendments pertains to the ‘no body, no parole’ provision. This provision was introduced to incentivise individuals in prison to cooperate with authorities in locating the remains of their victims, bringing closure to grieving families. We know all too well the impact that this can have on families who have lost a loved one. For many multicultural communities, particularly the Chinese, Cambodian and Vietnamese communities, including the thousands of families in my electorate of Mulgrave, mourning is deeply rooted in cultural and spiritual traditions that emphasise the importance of properly laying a loved one to rest. The absence of a body disrupts these traditions, leaving families in emotional limbo, unable to complete vital rituals that mark the journey of their loved one’s soul. Our government recognises that for the families and loved ones of a victim, the return of their body will allow them to grieve, will allow them to find closure and will allow them to honour their memory with dignity. The clarification provided in this bill ensures that the law applies only in cases where a victim’s body or remains have not been found, maintaining the integrity of this important policy.

Victorians expect their government to take decisive action when it comes to community safety. They expect us to promote frontline workers and protect them, to stand by victims and to ensure that individuals who pose serious risks are managed responsibly. This is what the Allan Labor government is committed to doing, and this is what this bill will deliver. It builds on the work that we have done and reinforces our commitment to a justice system that prioritises safety and fairness. I commend this bill to the house.

Wayne FARNHAM (Narracan) (15:03): I am pleased to rise today to talk on the Corrections Legislation Amendment Bill 2025. First and foremost, I would like to thank our shadow minister, the member for Caulfield, for the work that he has put in on this for our side of the house. The bill seeks to amend the Serious Offenders Act 2018, the Sex Offenders Registration Act 2004 and the Corrections Act 1986. The aim of the bill is to deliver several priority reforms to ensure that safety risks from serious offenders are appropriately managed, to appropriately denounce and deter assaults on custodial workers and to make minor amendments to parole and other provisions that are not operating as originally intended.

We on this side do not oppose this bill. We understand the government has had to bring in this bill. But the member for Caulfield did move a reasoned amendment, and that reasoned amendment is in line with the expectation of the CPSU, who have been waiting a long time for reform in this space. It is important, I think, that the government listen to the member for Caulfield here. He has not done this out of any malice towards the government. He has actually put this reasoned amendment forward to reflect the expectation of the CPSU and what they want for their members. That is why he has put this forward. If you allow me, I am going to read a letter from the CPSU. The CPSU stated:

[QUOTE AWAITING VERIFICATION]

CPSU understands the bill covers custodial workers rather than officers defined in the Corrections Act 1986. Occupations not included may be exposed to occupational violence inside the prison but not captured by definition. Custodial workers should, in our view, be included, as these people work closely with prisoners or within prison areas.

I think that is a very important point. This is the members asking for this amendment that the member for Caulfield has put forward. I think when we are talking about the safety of workers we should always bear in mind what section 21 of the Occupational Health and Safety Act 2004 in this state says. If you will allow me, I will just read this out. Section 21 of the OH&S act:

… requires all employers to provide and maintain a working environment that is safe and without risks to health. This duty is to be met so far as is reasonably practicable. It is an offence not to comply with this section and penalties apply.

I think if the government listen to the member for Caulfield and his reasoned amendments and if the government actually reference the OH&S act, particularly section 21, they would support the amendment by the member for Caulfield. There are lots of people that work in prisons, and we do not put nice people in jail. First and foremost, we have murderers and pretty aggressive people – rapists et cetera, et cetera. So I think if the government look at this and look at the amendment by the member for Caulfield, this will strengthen their bill – but not only that. More importantly, it will protect the workers within the system. I think the government should really take that on board.

The handcuffing of prisoners that are violent – we have some statistics from the past year alone. When we look at what has happened in our prison system, there have been 442 assaults on staff, including 10 sexual assaults and six incidents requiring hospitalisation. That is a lot of incidents within the prison system. At every point in time I think we should do our utmost to protect the staff within the prison corrections system. It does not matter whether they are a guard, whether they are a cleaner or whether they are in the kitchen. Whatever act they are doing within that prison system, we should really do our utmost by section 21 of the OH&S act to make sure they are safe, and if that means that these people come under that umbrella, then that is what we need to do. So I would encourage the government to take on board what the member for Caulfield has done. As I said, he has not done it out of malice. I think it is probably a good amendment to the bill.

Just touching on where the member for Mulgrave left off in her contribution, I think one of the changes I fully support is the ‘no body, no parole’ change. I think that is very important. As the member for Mulgrave did rightly point out, within Victoria we are a very large multicultural community, and there are communities here where it is hard to get closure if there is no body recovered. I think that is very important to note. I think if there is a prisoner that has obviously committed murder – there is no body but they have committed murder; they have been found guilty of that murder – parole should never be given if they will not give the location. At the moment we all know the family in Ballarat that is going through their thing up there with the missing lady. I think for everyone, no matter what culture or where they are from – Catholic, Christian, Muslim, whatever – the recovery of the body is so important, because it does give people closure. It does allow them to bury their loved one and say their final goodbyes, so that part of the bill I think is very, very important, especially for our multicultural communities. They are why – as the member for Mulgrave pointed out, and rightly so – that part of the bill is important.

The really strong part, or the point I want to get to, is what the member for Caulfield put forward. I think it is a fairly reasonable request that the government listen to that and get that pushed through. Other than that, there is not a lot more I really have to say on this bill, other than to reiterate that the government should really consider what the member for Caulfield put forward and the fact that I support strongly the ‘no body, no parole’ section of the bill. It does clean up the parole board a bit. You do not have people going in there that do not deserve to be there. I think if they are in there and they are not prepared to let a family know where their loved one is, then they should not get parole until they fess up.

It is opportunities like this where I think the government actually needs to step up and have this bipartisan support. Unfortunately, I have seen in this chamber a few times now since I have been here – and I have not been here that long – where we have actually put something forward on our side and the government has rejected it. Then, unfortunately, we have had to come back to the chamber – and I suppose I will reference the Denyer bill, for example. That would be a very good example in this chamber of where we put forward a bill especially for the families in regard to Denyer. We put forward a bill and the government knocked it back, and then a few months later the bill came back. It was virtually exactly the same bill, and those families had to go through all that grief, all that heartache, all over again. I will just reference the member for Frankston, who I know pushed very hard for that bill to come back into the house. All credit to him and actually our leader, the Leader of the Opposition, who put it forward. I know the member for Mornington worked very hard on that as well.

I think this is another one of those times where the government can look at this and, rather than being obstructive, let us work together on it. Let us put this in place to make it a better bill. As I said, the member for Caulfield is not doing this out of malice. Maybe if the government had listened to us on machetes, a bill that we put forward four times, which now the government has finally done, then we would not be wasting time in Parliament. We could actually be moving on to other bills that the government wants to push through. These are the times where we actually need to come together. We represent our communities all over the state, and I think our communities would appreciate that every now and again opposition and government come together and actually say, ‘You know what? That’s a good idea, let’s support that.’ So I am encouraging the government to support the member for Caulfield’s amendment and not have another repeat of the Denyer situation.

Steve McGHIE (Melton) (15:13): I rise today to contribute to the Corrections Legislation Amendment Bill 2025, and I want to thank the minister responsible for this very important bill. I am pleased, after following the member for Narracan, that those opposite are not opposing this bill, but I do not accept the amendments that have been put forward by the member for Caulfield. The reason I do not accept the amendments put forward is because while handcuffing is an important safety measure, it is currently in place and currently used by custodial officers right across our prisons and right across the state. Of course they have the option to use handcuffs when they need to. I noticed the member for Narracan referred to the Occupational Health and Safety Act 2004, which is a good act and an important act for the safety of all employees within all workplaces. I dare say that those custodial officers have got a very good health and safety committee working on the safety issues within their workplaces, and I dare say that is why they are able to use handcuffs to make sure that they have a safer workplace. That is the reason why I do not necessarily think that the amendments should be upheld. I think the custodial officers could work through that issue with their employer through their health and safety reps and through their health and safety committees.

The Corrections Legislation Amendment Bill 2025 represents a significant step forward in our ongoing commitment to strengthening community safety, improving the integrity of our corrections system and of course enhancing those protections available to all those that work every day to keep our state safe. The Allan Labor government has long held a firm commitment to ensuring that our corrections system not only holds offenders to account but also supports a safer, more rehabilitative and humane environment for those in custody and for those who serve within it.

It is really important that all those involved in the correctional system are safe, and this bill responds to several priority areas requiring reform across the corrections system. It is also about strengthening the sentencing outcomes, clarifying the operation of existing legislative provisions and ensuring that the tools available to our authorities remain fit for purpose. This bill introduces several amendments across four principal areas, and I will read those areas out: strengthening protections for custodial officers who face violence in the workplace, implementing the recommendations from the 2023 statutory review of the Serious Offenders Act 2018, enhancing reporting obligations under the Sex Offenders Registration Act 2004 and making targeted improvements to the Corrections Act 1986 to address operational gaps and ensure legislation functions as Parliament originally intended.

Every day custodial officers perform an essential and often dangerous role in maintaining the safety and security of our prison system. We all know that they are dealing with some very hardened criminals that are incarcerated, and it would be very difficult to deal with some of those people. It is of the utmost importance that custodial officers are well protected within their workplace. The work is very complex. Clearly, they are under enormous pressures. It is a high-pressure environment, and it is obviously very confronting sometimes with some very challenging behaviours. I do know some prison officers, some custodial officers, and I know that it is really difficult work. It is not only difficult work within the workplace, but they have also got to be very protective when they are outside of their workplace, because some of these people that have been incarcerated eventually get out of jail and cross paths with custodial officers, so that can also be very dangerous for them.

Any assault on custodial officers is a very serious offence. It can result in lasting physical harm and psychological trauma, and it deeply impacts the morale within that workforce. Again, it is like any other service industry, whether it be custodial officers, police, ambulance or fire: they are big families, and they certainly support each other and look after each other. It is really hard when one is injured in the workplace. It has an effect right across the workforce. Too many of the offenders who assault custodial officers are not required to serve any additional time in prison, and this bill will address that. It was due to some lack of clarity in the current application of the sentencing requirements under the Sentencing Act 1991. It includes a presumption that sentences imposed for offences committed by prisoners while in custody should be served on a cumulative basis. The reforms contained in this bill will close that loophole for good. The bill amends the Corrections Act 1986. It explicitly defines certain offences involving injury to custodial officers as prison offences, and this designation ensures that the presumption of sentence accumulation under the Sentencing Act will apply beyond doubt and requires the courts to impose additional prison time where appropriate. I think all of us here would agree with that. The opposition have stated that they are not going to oppose this bill. I am pleased that we are all very supportive of that – that if you harm a custodial officer in the course of their duties within the prison system, then you should get an additional penalty. Hopefully it will be used as a disincentive against any violence against any custodial officer within the system. This recognises the fundamental right to feel safe within the workplace and in particular within our corrections system, so as I say, I think everyone is very supportive of that.

Of course a safe custodial workforce is essential to the safe, secure and rehabilitative operation of our prison system, and that is exactly what we hope to achieve out of that. It is not going to be achieved with every person that has been incarcerated. There are some that probably never will be rehabilitated, but you can only try. We have just got to make sure that part of that process is not about continuing to extend violence against custodial officers within the system.

I am pleased to say that next week I and a number of members are going out to visit the new Cherry Creek correctional facility. I believe there is a tour on sometime next week, so I am going out there to have a look at that. I will be very interested to see it and hopefully talk to some of the staff that will be employed in that facility. It will be interesting to talk to them about their experiences and what they expect.

The Serious Offenders Act 2018 provides the legislative framework for Victoria’s post-sentence supervision and detention regime, a scheme that enables the courts to impose ongoing detention or strict supervision on individuals who continue to pose an unacceptable risk of serious sexual or violent reoffending following the completion of their custodial sentence. In 2023 the government completed a statutory review of the Serious Offenders Act to assess its operation and effectiveness. The review found that the act is largely operating as intended but made 13 important recommendations to strengthen the scheme and ensure its ongoing effectiveness in safeguarding the community.

I just want to skip over to the member for Narracan and the member for Mulgrave, who raised the issue that the bill also clarifies some technical issues, but the one that is really important is the application of the ‘no body, no parole’ provision. It is an important provision which is designed to encourage cooperation from offenders by incentivising them to disclose the location of their victims or their remains. As both members referred to, it is important for families – in particular multicultural families, but I would go further than that and say it is important for all families – to know where their loved one is or that they have been found or where their remains have been found, and it is important to have closure. It must be so difficult for families and family members and friends, when someone has been seriously offended against and murdered, to not know where they are. This is a really important bill, and I commend the bill to the house.

Ellen SANDELL (Melbourne) (15:23): I am just going to give a very, very short speech on the Corrections Legislation Amendment Bill 2025. I think others have detailed what is in the bill. It is primarily implementing the recommendations of the review of the Serious Offenders Act 2018. There are some things in here around clarifications around the ‘no body, no parole’ policy and altering reporting periods for sex offenders, and there are things around the Adult Parole Board of Victoria et cetera and a few other matters. They are important matters, and the Greens are discussing those matters with stakeholders. We will not be opposing the bill in the house, and we will continue those conversations with stakeholders to ensure we get detailed feedback on some of the details of the bill. I note there are a few amendments that have come before us as well, which no doubt will be moved in the other place.

As this bill deals with corrections and post-release matters, I want to use my short speech just to highlight an issue that has come to light recently which is very much related, which is that Victoria Police have rejected a recommendation by the State Coroner to notify domestic violence victim- survivors at least 48 hours before their abuser is released from prison. I was really distressed to read that police have not implemented this recommendation and will not be notifying victim-survivors when their abuser is released from prison because they do not feel like they have the resources to do it.

We have one of the most well resourced police departments anywhere. Victoria Police have received huge, huge amounts of money over the last 10 years since this Labor government has been in power – much, much more than when this Labor government first came to power. They are one of the most well funded police forces in the country, and I find it strange that Victoria Police cannot find the resources to notify victim-survivors when their abusers are being released from prison, given the risk to safety that may arise, particularly as this was a recommendation from the coroner.

We know that far, far too many women are being murdered across Australia, including here in Victoria, by partners and ex-partners in family violence situations. It is an epidemic. It is something that we have had a royal commission into, and yet it continues despite some of those recommendations from the royal commission being implemented. It is something that we all should be doubling our efforts on to figure out how to deal with, because it is just a horrific and extraordinary situation we have when a woman is killed every week in a domestic violence situation by a man.

The Greens believe that the recommendations from the coroner to notify victim-survivors when their perpetrators are being released should be actioned, and we are looking at some amendments to this corrections bill that would put those recommendations into effect so that they actually do happen and the police cannot shirk their responsibilities, if that is what they are doing, and so that people affected by family violence can feel safe when someone who has harmed them returns to the community. I will not be circulating them in this place because, as we know, we will not get to the third reading and we will not actually have a chance to move them, but we will certainly be having more to say on it when this bill comes before the other place.

Anthony CIANFLONE (Pascoe Vale) (15:26): I too rise to speak in support of the Corrections Legislation Amendment Bill 2025. In doing so I would like to begin by acknowledging the Minister for Corrections, his office, his department, Corrections Victoria and all the stakeholders who have come together to help develop and progress the passage of this bill. As part of this I would like to particularly thank and commend all of our Corrections Victoria office workers across the state who work every single day to keep our justice, custodial and prison staff safe and, in turn, who work to keep our communities safe. It is because of this that we must continue doing all we can as legislators and policymakers to help keep our Corrections Victoria staff safe too. I would like to acknowledge all of our corrections staff across the state, including particularly those who live and work in my electorate. There are quite a few in Pascoe Vale, Coburg and Brunswick West, including my wife Anna, who was a longtime Corrections Victoria and prisons officer and who is celebrating her birthday today as well.

This bill will continue to support all of our corrections staff across the state. Corrections Victoria’s vision is for safer prisons, safer people and safer communities. Their mission is to create a safer, smarter system with a skilled and supported workforce that enables people in their care to make better decisions. Corrections Victoria is home to and responsible for over 3000 staff and operates Victoria’s adult prison and post-sentence system. It runs 15 correctional facilities across Victoria. Thirteen of them are for male prisoners and two for female prisoners. Six prisons are maximum security, five are medium-security prisons and four are minimum-security prisons. These prisons, for the record, include Barwon; Melbourne Assessment Prison, the MAP; the Metropolitan Remand Centre, MRC; Port Phillip Prison; Western Plains; Fulham medium security; Hopkins medium security; Loddon Middleton medium security; Ravenhall maximum security; Beechworth minimum security; Judy Lazarus Transition Centre; Langi Kal Kal minimum security; Dame Phyllis Frost, the women’s prison; and also Tarrengower. As of June 2025 there were over 6500 adult prisoners in Victoria, 95 per cent of which were male and 5 per cent female, 40 per cent are on remand and 60 per cent are sentenced.

Corrections Victoria do essential work to help keep our communities safe by remanding and housing some of our state’s most dangerous, notorious and repeat violent offenders. But they do also undertake a lot of critical work by aiming to reduce the risk of reoffending through case management informed by sound risk assessments, delivery of offence-specific and offence-related programs, and transition into support programs post release. Corrections Victoria in that regard also help oversee our post-sentencing and release schemes.

The Victorian Labor government have been working to strengthen our justice system to keep Victorians safe from crime. We have already passed those new, tougher bail laws, meaning that serious and repeat offenders are taken off the streets. This year’s budget invested $727 million in new funding for the corrections and youth justice systems to ramp up capacity. This will mean that our custodial facilities will continue to be safe and focused on supporting people to turn their lives around. That new funding package will increase the number of staff working right across our corrections and youth justice system with over 700 new staff to be recruited, and the new Western Plains Correctional Centre is due to open very soon, adding an extra capacity of over a thousand maximum-security beds into the corrections system. These are all part of a coordinated effort to help build a fairer and more resilient and robust corrections and community safety system.

The Corrections Legislation Amendment Bill 2025 makes a number of targeted and important changes to keep our community safe, including for our hardworking corrections officers.

The bill will make a number of important amendments to corrections-related legislation, including the Serious Offenders Act 2018, the Sex Offenders Registration Act 2004 and the Corrections Act 1986. These changes are about keeping the Victorian community safe from the risk of harm caused by serious offenders both in the community and within our correctional facilities. This bill is part of a number of reforms that this Victorian Labor government has brought before this Parliament to crack down on those serious offenders, including, as I said, the recent bail laws, a ban on the sale of machetes and this week’s announcement of the new post-and-boast laws. The bill will deliver on recommendations from the review of the Serious Offenders Act 2018, otherwise known as the Harper review, and ensure community safety risks posed by serious offenders are appropriately managed, denounce assaults on custodial officers and address other provisions of the Corrections Act 1986 that are not operating as originally intended.

As I said, there are over 3000 people working as corrections workers in our public prisons right across this state. They are the front line of our prisons and in many ways our criminal justice system as well. While their work is largely unseen by most people in the community, they are working hard every single day and night to keep Victorians safe from crime, and we should thank them for that. But their work can also be dangerous. Every day they are working with the most dangerous people in the community, as I mentioned – people that the courts have decided we all need to be protected from. Unfortunately, sometimes corrections workers are subject to violence and aggression from people in custody, and that is unacceptable. Violence and aggression have no place in any workplace, particularly our prisons. They should be treated no differently. That is why this bill will make important changes to make sure that there are real penalties for people in custody who assault a corrections worker.

The bill will define assaulting a corrections worker as a prison offence under the Corrections Act. This will mean that once Victoria Police charge a prisoner with assault and they are found guilty of that offence by a court, the court must impose an additional sentence to be served on top of the sentence the prisoner is already serving. Too often courts are directing that sentence be served at the same time – concurrently – as the prisoner’s existing sentence, and it has no impact on the prisoner’s release date. This means that there is no real practical consequence for committing an assault on a corrections officer. This bill will change that and ensure that there are real punishments for assaulting corrections officers at work. This change will also act as a disincentive for people in custody to be violent towards staff, hopefully reducing the number of these assaults that occur in the future.

The bill also makes a number of changes to the Serious Offenders Act. This act has been in place since 2018 and establishes the post-sentence scheme. This scheme provides for the supervision and risk management of serial sexual offenders and serious violent offenders after they have completed their prison sentence. The act allows these offenders to be subject to a supervision order, with a range of conditions designed to prevent them from committing further harm to the community, overseen by the Post Sentence Authority. This is designed to cover the most serious offenders who are not in jail. At any one time there are up to 150 people subject to such supervision orders. This scheme arose out of the Harper review conducted back in 2015 and is targeted to the most serious offenders who have completed their court-imposed custodial sentences. A statutory review of the scheme was completed in 2023, subsequently informing the need for further changes and reforms.

The sex offenders register is another important tool protecting the community to keep it safe from the risk posed by known sex offenders. There are some crossovers between this act and the Serious Offenders Act, both of which are aimed at ensuring we have an appropriate level of supervision of sex offenders. This bill will make a small change to improve the interaction between the two schemes by requiring people who are subject to a supervision order to have reporting obligations under the sex offenders register for five years after their supervision order ends.

The bill also makes some minor changes to the operation of the parole system, which is supported by the independent Adult Parole Board of Victoria. The bill clarifies the application of the ‘no body, no parole’ provisions for use only in homicide cases where the location of the deceased remains unknown at the time the perpetrator is being considered for parole. This is the original intent of the provisions and will save significant administrative and reporting burdens placed on Victoria Police to provide evidence of cooperation by the perpetrator even in cases where it is not relevant.

Of course these reforms are built on the feedback and views of many across the sector, particularly the corrections staff and proud members of the Community and Public Sector Union. As per the media release of 1 May 2025:

Prison workers will not accept unsafe workplaces, collapsing morale, and poor leadership.

These changes reflect:

… the lived experience of staff, and the strong desire for meaningful change at the top of the department.

I should add we can formally communicate that these changes will help make the system safer for corrections officers.

In that respect I turn to the amendments moved by the shadow minister. Frankly, to cut to the chase, when it comes to handcuffing, there already are powers and provisions in place in the existing act for corrections officers and prison staff to use handcuffs to keep themselves safe in situations they deem appropriate.

It goes without saying that I am also supporting this bill in the context of someone whose community was home to Pentridge prison, one of the oldest prisons and institutions in this state’s history, having been established in December 1850 and closed in 1997. It was notorious for many reasons, including for the infamous H division. But it is also, tragically, a place where many corrections staff over the years suffered and were abused. Arguably the most infamous such instance of prison staff treatment in the state potentially occurred on 19 December 1965, when Ronald Ryan and Peter Walker, both serving sentences for armed robbery, broke out of B division the corner of Sydney Road and today’s Pentridge Boulevard, opposite St Paul’s church. After 2 pm, when many prison officers were distracted by a Christmas party, they climbed the 5-metre prison wall to disarm and overpower a guard at the watchtower and forced him to open the gate. As Ryan and Walker sprinted down Sydney Road and Champ Street and tried to commandeer a passing car, an unarmed officer, George Hodson, tried to stop them and was shot dead through the heart. Ryan and Walker were captured in Sydney 17 days later after killing Arthur Henderson and robbing a bank. After a 12-day trial, after being captured in March 1966, Ryan was found guilty of prison officer George Hodson’s murder, a sentence that carried the death penalty but which was usually commuted at the time to a life sentence. However, it was then Premier Sir Henry Bolte who refused to commute the sentence, despite the prolonged and strenuous efforts of many eminent people and community campaigners gathered outside Pentridge to oppose the death penalty.

Dylan WIGHT (Tarneit) (15:36): It gives me pleasure this afternoon to rise and make a contribution in favour of the Corrections Legislation Amendment Bill 2025. It is a comprehensive piece of legislation but also one that is incredibly important here in Victoria. There have been contributions prior to my own contribution that have gone into why exactly this amending bill before us this afternoon is so important. It will update and strengthen the legal framework surrounding the management of serious sex offenders and the corrections and parole systems.

The Allan Labor government has said time and time and time again that the principle of community safety comes first. We have demonstrated our willingness to pass legislation and to come to the table to do everything that we can to keep the community safe, and this piece of legislation is just another illustration of that. This year we passed the toughest bail laws anywhere in the country. We did so after lengthy consultation with communities like mine in Tarneit and also with Victoria Police, which is an incredibly important stakeholder when you are creating laws that aim to keep the community safe. We have just recently banned the sale of machetes here in Victoria. I know the Minister for Consumer Affairs, his office and his department have been working with private retailers to make sure that that ban sticks and that it is as hard as it possibly can be to purchase a machete here in Victoria. We have also said in response to our new bail laws that we will deliver and release an extra thousand beds throughout Victoria’s corrections system to make sure that if there are those that do the wrong thing, they stay exactly where they should be.

This bill, on top of all of that, marks another significant and also necessary step in strengthening the safety and wellbeing of our community. What it also does is help support victims, who are going through a horrendous time and having to play a horrendous part, by making sure that the people that do the wrong things, in particular sex offenders, are brought to justice, so that during that horrendous experience – more than likely the most horrendous experience they will go through in their life – the victims know that they will be supported even more than they are currently.

With this bill we are introducing tougher and more targeted laws to ensure that the most dangerous and high risk offenders are kept exactly where they belong, and that is behind bars. That is clearly what our changes to bail earlier this year aimed to do – the toughest bail laws anywhere in the nation. They were aimed at keeping those serious offenders and repeat offenders exactly where they should be, and where they should be is in a corrections facility. This piece of legislation builds on that landmark reform that we made just earlier this year and in fact actually goes further. It introduces powerful new tools that close loopholes, improve oversight and reinforce the supervision of serious offenders, particularly those convicted of violent and sexual crimes – the types of offenders that belong in a correctional facility and away from innocent, hardworking Victorians.

Sexual offences will not be met with leniency or silence. The bill ensures that sex crimes are dealt with more seriously, not only in the interests of the broader community and their safety but, I think most importantly, out of respect for the victims who have already suffered far, far too much. Victim-survivors should never have to question whether their government is standing behind them. We are. We hear you, we see you and we are acting to make sure that your voices carry real weight in our justice system.

Importantly, this bill also empowers victims to participate more actively in the correctional process if they wish. This is done through stronger rules around victim submissions, and the legislation makes it easier for victims to share their story and be part of decisions affecting offender management. Your voice is not just welcome, it is absolutely essential. This is about making sure that the system works with you and for you, not just around you. By modernising and aligning reporting and parole laws and improving how we manage high-risk individuals, we are sending a clear message: Victoria will not tolerate threats to public safety. We are delivering a justice system that protects our people, supports victims and also upholds accountability. It is not just law reform; this is a promise kept to every Victorian who deserves to feel safe in their home, on their streets and in their community.

I said at the beginning of this contribution that the principle of community safety always comes first with the Allan Labor government. Over the last couple of weeks in my community of Tarneit and indeed in Hoppers Crossing I have spoken to many stakeholder groups, I have spoken to victims and I have spoken to Victoria Police. This is a piece of legislation and an instrument to help keep people in my community and indeed right across Victoria safe. This, with our machete ban and with our new bail laws, is delivering on the promise that we have made to Victorians to put their safety first and foremost in everything that we do in this place.

The Serious Offenders Act 2018 allows these offenders to be subject to a supervision order with a range of conditions designed to prevent them from committing further harm to the community, overseen by the Post Sentence Authority, which is designed to cover the most serious offenders that are not in jail. At any one time there are about 150 people subject to supervision orders. A review of this scheme was completed in 2023 which covered the first five years of the scheme’s operation. The review found that the scheme overall works well, but it made some recommendations for improvements. This bill implements the legislative aspects of those recommendations. So we brought in legislation in 2018 which fundamentally has been successful, but the review found that there are some changes that can be made. This piece of legislation is acquitting those recommendations.

I will repeat once again: the principle of keeping our community safe comes first and foremost with this government. Through our actions in passing incredibly important legislation, and particularly this year, in response to community sentiment, we can sit here and know that we are doing absolutely everything that we possibly can to keep Victorians safe. I commend the bill to the house.

Meng Heang TAK (Clarinda) (15:46): I rise to join the member for Tarneit in support of this amendment bill, the Corrections Legislation Amendment Bill 2025. This is another important bill that will deliver recommendations from the review of the Serious Offenders Act 2018 (SOA), ensuring community safety risks posed by serious offenders are appropriately managed; denounce assaults on custodial officers; and address other provisions of the Corrections Act 1986 that are not operating as originally intended. I commend the minister for bringing this bill forward, as we know that there has been a great deal happening here in this place regarding our justice system and keeping our community safe. We have seen some really significant legislation and changes, particularly around bail and youth justice. This demonstrates that community safety is an important priority for this government, and we can see that again here in this bill.

I was happy to be involved in the debate on our tough bail bill, a bill to put community safety above all in bail decisions and remove the principles of remand as the last resort, creating the toughest bail law ever for serious offenders, including a new bail test, which is extremely hard to pass, targeting repeat offenders for the worst crimes. It was a really important measure, and we are seeing the results in remand rates. That is really important because there was and is a really clear expectation from the community on this. It is one of the most common concerns in my community and still is a major concern for many, along with the importance of quality public health care, major infrastructure projects and local development, and ensuring amenity for local residents.

We will keep working, particularly around community safety, and we will continue to work around the government’s new tough bail laws to keep Victorians safe by putting community safety above all and creating the toughest bail laws ever for serious offenders, targeting repeat offenders of the worst crimes. Thank you to all of my constituents for raising community safety with me at community events, while doorknocking or at my mobile office. The feedback is important to me and for to the government. Those were positive changes which sent a clear message that community safety must be placed above all, and we will keep working to make sure that that is the case – that we have the legislation to keep our community safe and to keep our justice system operating efficiently and effectively. We continue this work here through the changes in the Corrections Legislation Amendment Bill 2025.

The first of the amendments here will make changes to the Serious Offenders Act 2018 to implement six recommendations from the review of the SOA to strengthen the operations of Victoria’s post-sentence scheme, address operational issues and reinforce the scheme’s ability to protect our community. The Serious Offenders Act was introduced in 2018 to help manage people who continue to pose an unacceptable risk of committing serious violent or sexual offences after they have completed their prison sentence. It is an important piece of legislation, and it is important that it is operating effectively.

I remember the introduction of that bill and meeting with my predecessor, the former member for Clarinda Hong Lim, to discuss community safety and some of the rhetoric that was being thrown around leading up to the 2018 election, particularly from the former opposition leader Peter Dutton, who at the time was claiming that people were afraid to go out for dinner in Melbourne, particularly in Dandenong. At one point I was the mayor and a councillor for that city in the south-east, and that was really disappointing – appalling to be honest – so it was great to speak with my predecessor at the time about how proud we were to be part of the south-eastern community and our connection to the City of Dandenong, one of the most multicultural communities in the country. He made some really important points during debate on the Serious Offenders Bill 2018 and in Parliament more broadly that helped to challenge that disappointing and really appalling behaviour at the time. Speaking of our thriving, vibrant and diverse community in the south-east, we are truly a multicultural success story. My thanks to Hong, my predecessor, and to all community leaders and faith leaders for challenging that rhetoric and behaviour and showing what a proud, inclusive and diverse community we are.

Back to the bill: as I mentioned, this bill will make changes to the Serious Offenders Act 2018 to implement six recommendations from the SOA review to strengthen the operations of the Victoria’s post-sentence scheme, address operational issues and reinforce the scheme’s ability to protect our community. The Department of Justice and Community Safety completed a statutory review of the act in 2023, and the review found that the act is operating efficiently but made recommendations to further enhance the ability to protect our community. As such, the bill will deliver the government’s commitment to implementing the recommendations of that review, and the bill will implement six of the 13 recommendations, with a further five to be implemented operationally and to require no further action.

The change will have a number of effects. First of all, it will improve how victims are to be engaged to avoid unnecessary trauma, clarify the directions that the Post Sentence Authority can give to people on supervision orders to reduce the risk of reoffending and create more flexibility around membership of the Post Sentence Authority to respond to its increased workload.

I am going to run short of time. With the remaining time I will just quickly touch on other elements of the bill. There are further amendments to the Sex Offenders Registration Act 2004 to strengthen the protections for community safety by ensuring serious sex offenders on the post-sentence scheme have to report to police under the scheme for an appropriate period. These are important amendments. And there are amendments to the Corrections Act 1986 to strengthen sentencing outcomes for people in prison who cause injury to officers. In 2024–25 there were approximately 330 staff assaults. Sixty-two per cent did not result in injury and were incidents such as throwing food or water and spitting at staff. But five prisoner-on-staff assaults resulted in staff being admitted to hospital. This is unacceptable. Assaults on prison officers can have significant impacts, including ongoing physical and mental health challenges, financial impacts relating to medical treatment and rehabilitation and a decreased feeling of staff safety at work.

Everyone has the right to feel safe and be safe at work, which is why I am happy to support tougher sentences for people in prison who injure a prison officer. There are other miscellaneous amendments to ensure that parole and other provisions of the Corrections Act are operating as intended. Once again, these are important changes to ensure community safety risks posed by serious offenders are appropriately managed and to better ensure safety for our officers. I commend the minister for bringing this bill forward and for the change that is taking place in our justice system to ensure that community safety is of foremost importance. I commend the bill to the house.

Belinda WILSON (Narre Warren North) (15:56): I have this very funny affiliation with corrections staff because for some reason on my phone the job offer comes up for me all the time. I am not sure what it is in my – what do you call it?

Natalie Hutchins interjected.

Belinda WILSON: Algorithm. Thank you, Minister; that is the word I was looking for. My algorithm is suggesting that I could be a great corrections officer. First of all, I would like to say what an incredible job our corrections staff do. I will say I have always had a bit of a fascination about being a corrections officer, so maybe that is a job for me later in my life. Who knows? But they do do an incredible job, and I was intrigued to hear that the member for Pascoe Vale’s wife had been a corrections officer in her past life. That was just astonishing, and I cannot wait to now ask her an extreme amount of questions.

This Corrections Legislation Amendment Bill 2025 is necessary to tidy up a number of different parts of the corrections legislation, and they are targeted and important changes to keep Victorians safe, including of course our hardworking corrections officers, who do an absolutely incredible job. The Allan Labor government is strengthening our justice system and is all about keeping Victorians safe from crime. I had the absolute pleasure of taking our Minister for Police last week to the Narre Warren station, where our incredible police force are doing exceptional work, and it was really interesting to have a conversation with them about our youth justice system and the young offenders in the Casey electorate, of which are there are a few. It was really great to talk about what programs are available for those kids – which some of them are – the Pivot program being one that I champion because I know what incredible results that program gets for our youth, and I know it is one that our police in my area, particularly in Endeavour Hills and Narre Warren, really champion. So that really is one that I support, and that is what we want – we do not want our youth in jail or in detention; we want them to be safe and to have meaning and purpose in their life. There are a number of different aspects that we can do to make that happen.

This bill clarifies the ability of the independent Adult Parole Board of Victoria to revoke an automatic cancellation of parole in certain circumstances. This is about making the parole system fairer and more efficient and not leaving people in custody unnecessarily where a fresh parole application is prepared and can be considered. It also supports the effective operations of the adult parole board, which has a different but important job to promote community safety.

Business interrupted under sessional orders.