Thursday, 20 November 2025

 Danny O’BRIEN (Gippsland South) (14:46): (1418) My question is to the Minister for Police, and I ask: when will the vacancy at the Toora police station be filled? Toora is one of a number of single-officer stations in my electorate, and it has become a pattern of behaviour under this government that those single-officer stations are regularly vacant. Toora is a very small community but a very vital one. It is between Foster and Yarram, and of course the Toora officer supports the Foster police particularly. But we have had a growing amount of crime in the area: a 3.5 per cent increase in the South Gippsland shire in the last figures and a 127 per cent increase in the recorded offence rate in Foster in those same figures. So in that neck of the woods there is activity. The community would like to see visible policing. They want to feel that there is someone there. We have had problems in the past. The Loch station I believe has now been filled, but it has been without officers for a period of time over the last few years. So I seek the minister’s advice on when Toora will be filled.