Wednesday, 4 February 2026

 Sarah CONNOLLY (Laverton) (14:50): I rise to speak on the Justice Legislation Further Amendment (Miscellaneous) Bill 2025. Like so many bills that have come before the house in my almost eight years here, this one aims to make a number of really important changes to improve the operation of our courts and, most importantly, our justice system.

Talking about courts and our justice system, I do want to take a quick opportunity to once again note and acknowledge the recent opening of the Wyndham law courts at the end of last year. Having been the member for Tarneit and now the member for Laverton, I have opened many, many, many, many projects in Wyndham, and being at the opening there alongside my great friends the member for Tarneit, the member for Werribee and the member for Point Cook and having that first glimpse at those law courts, I have to say they were absolutely amazing. My breath was completely taken away by the outside architecture of this amazing building and then going in and seeing the entrance and the foyer and going up and having a look at the courts.

It has been a long time since I have been in court. I was a judge’s associate many, many moons ago and spent a lot of time in court in Queensland. Courts have a particular smell. I often think that they have a smell sort of like this room here, which is a little bit scary. I say it is just the age of the seats, the chairs and all that kind of thing here in the room. But I have to say these law courts were absolutely incredible. The courtrooms were the sort of place where you would just love to go and watch. It was absolutely amazing. When I spoke to the Chief Justice of Victoria and others in there in the legal fraternity, I said to them, ‘I don’t remember courtrooms being this fabulous.’ I think courtrooms used to have brown carpet or even orange carpet. Orange is a very bright colour. There were all of those kinds of things in a courtroom. It was really, I remember, 1960s, 1970s kind of architecture.

But seeing Wyndham and looking at the beautiful, beautiful architecture and the wood and the other natural elements and the light that they have brought into those courtrooms, they have done this specifically not just to be a fabulous place to work and a fabulous place perhaps to go for sentencing, but it was actually explained to me that when you have these really smart architectural sorts of designs built into a place like a courtroom, which can be really adversarial and really confronting for a lot of people, it actually brings the temperature down in the room. It makes people that have got mental health issues a bit more calm. When you have got trials and sentences dealing with really sensitive, tragic circumstances and there are heightened emotions, it can really bring things down. I think it was the Chief Justice who said to me that it enables the judge or the magistrate to have better control in the room – something I think, Speaker, sometimes you probably wish you had here in this place as you take back control.

I say to the community: if you have the opportunity, go and get a coffee, go and have a look, because this is the kind of stuff this Labor government is building, and it is building it for people in Wyndham and it is building it right across Victoria. But I have to say this piece of infrastructure was I think the best and most extraordinary I had seen in eight years – well and truly worth the wait. The Wyndham community are really going to appreciate and love having those law courts there and being able to have justice delivered closer to home.

Those courts also have dedicated Koori Court services, and I checked them out. They were absolutely amazing. That is really about improving access to the justice system for Indigenous Victorians living in the western suburbs, and there are a lot of them. The children’s division and the family hearing day services open in July this year, with the full Koori Court coming online early next year. The law courts there also have VCAT services. Many people in my community do go to VCAT, and they like to know those services are up and running. It is also the first community-based venue to bring VCAT services, would you believe, to Melbourne’s booming western suburbs. That includes our government’s Rental Dispute Resolution Victoria, a dedicated one-stop shop for all rental matters to be heard and resolved, which is a great win for those living in Melbourne’s west who rent. I have said time and time again here that I have spent many years as a renter and talked about the trials and tribulations that go with that.

In finishing up about Wyndham law courts, I will say that we will very soon have a dedicated specialist family violence court. That will be up and running from next year as well, making an absolutely profound difference for families in the western suburbs that find themselves experiencing family violence. In Melbourne’s west, particularly in the Wyndham municipality, we know that the number of family violence call-outs and things happening there in the home is far, far above many other municipalities and is something that I think having this sort of specialist family violence court will be really good for, so people are able to access justice more quickly and closer to home. I mention all of this because physical access to justice is really important. When appearance and timing are things that are crucial in having legal matters heard and resolved and when documents need to be lodged with the courts and things like that, having a courthouse close by with all the services you could possibly need ‍– and then Werribee cop shop, the police station, right next door – leads to better outcomes in communities and better outcomes for community safety. Of course you do not just get that by building more courthouses and expanding services, and this is what I am here to talk about this afternoon. Our law books also have a really important part to play. I have not said the words ‘law books’, I think, since doing my law degree in Queensland, which is a very, very, very long time ago, but that is what this bill is really about.

One of the bigger focuses of this bill is in relation to what we call the legacy suppression orders. This acquits a key recommendation, number 33, from the Victorian Law Reform Commission’s 2020 report on contempt of court, if anyone is counting. As many of us will know, suppression orders play a really important role in ensuring that sensitive information that is disclosed in a courtroom proceeding – and there can be a lot of things disclosed and a lot of things said in those proceedings – is prevented from being disclosed, repeated and, really importantly, published outside of the courtroom. There are a number of reasons, including to ensure the safety of parties, witnesses or other persons that may be involved in a case. Under the current rules that govern suppression orders – the Open Courts Act 2013 – all suppression orders have an expiry date of up to five years, which in this day and age kind of does not seem a lot. However, legacy suppression orders – orders that have been made by our courts before the act was introduced and came into effect – had no expiry dates attached to them. So what that means is that information is sealed by the order, which effectively has become a permanent gag order. That is what this bill is going to do – in particular, it is going to empower courts to be able to review these orders under the current act.

I have said time and time again here that it is really important that legislation keeps up with the community’s expectations and the times that we live in. Part of the legislative agenda that this government has gone ahead and rolled out while I have been here for the past eight years is sometimes having bills like this, which do not seem that big or that important but are tidying things up and modernising services, procedures, regulations and legislation to ensure they are in step with community expectations. This actual change will be particularly important, and it builds on the work that we have been really busy doing for victim-survivors of sexual assault and violence in freeing them up, finally, to tell their story – prohibiting gag orders, restricting non-disclosure agreements and now this. This gives those victims-survivors greater control, which is something I think they lost when they had that crime committed against them.

This is a really important bill. I do not have time to go through all the bits and pieces, but what I will say is the bill makes a number of changes at its heart – which is always at the heart of Labor governments like ours – that are all about fairness, about dignity and about making sure our justice system truly works for the people that it serves. I think that is a really important reminder to folks here in this place. It strengthens protections, it removes barriers, it modernises outdated processes and it closes gaps that simply should not exist anymore. From victim-survivors who deserve a voice, to families waiting for answers, to communities who expect a system to keep pace with the world around us, the changes in this bill are sensible. They are meaningful improvements. They reflect the kind of justice system that Victorians want and expect, and they reflect the kind of justice system that Labor is always committed to delivering for all Victorians. This is good, this is practical reform that will make a real difference in people’s lives, no matter where they come from and what pocket of Victoria they live in. I am very pleased to commend it to the house.

 Martin CAMERON (Morwell) (15:00): It is great to be able to rise in the chamber for the first time in 2026 and get up to speak on the Justice Legislation Further Amendment (Miscellaneous) Bill ‍2025. Of course, as we have heard, this is an omnibus justice system bill, and it is at a stage where we do need to go through and make changes, whether they be minor changes or significant changes, to this omnibus bill when it comes through. The reform is required due to court decisions and the Royal Commission into the Management of Police Informants v DPP. Once we have seen everything that comes through we have to go back through and actually make sure that it is written properly and everything is going to be working, because the one thing we do know when we go and change bills is that there are certain people out in our society that will be looking for any ways or means to find any loopholes in their favour that they can use. So to make sure that we are constantly in the Parliament having a look at some of these is the way to go.

There is ongoing Coroners Court reform. I noticed the member for Laverton spoke about courts in her area. We had one of the most famous courts in Morwell late last year when the Erin Patterson court case went through, so we had a hive where most of the media that stand and listen here in Parliament were down in Morwell. We are talking on justice legislation, and when that court proceeding went through, the police in the area actually had more powers – powers which I have called for many a time, with move-on powers that they could actually use in the community, having that visible presence on the street. I can stand here and let the chamber know that in the week before that court case took place, the police went out into our community, which like every other community has certain elements within the society that try to cause a bit of grief. We all see it no matter where we are in our wonderful community in Victoria. The people were unruly, and because of that court case the police had certain powers to move people on and to stop and search them. It made an absolutely huge difference to the community, especially the people in Morwell who go about their daily business.

We also have recommendations to simplify the discontinuation and reopening of coronial investigations, and I think that is to make sure that the access to that is streamlined for everybody, whether it be the people at the legal level that are doing it but more so the people in the community that are relying on these coronial investigations to take place – that they are done in a timely manner. So this is making sure that is okay to be able to do that.

There is pressure for Fines Victoria and the enforcement agencies – and I know it is a bit of a broad scope when we do mention them. One of the main things that comes through my office a lot is people that have been issued fines. The fines sometimes are very straightforward, and it needs to be reaffirmed that they have, at the end of the day, done the wrong thing and this is what their options are to move forward.

But some people fall between the cracks. Whether or not they receive a fine for committing an offence, they do not actually understand the fine as it comes through. For that enforcement we need to make sure that there are avenues for people. English may not be their first option, and we do have certain people in our community that have come in from overseas. We need to make sure that we can also explain and set out what their options are to contest those fines that do come through.

Also, there is a part here addressing animal abuse and bestiality. When I did come into the Parliament, two things I did not think I would ever talk about are bestiality and UTIs, which I had to speak about in my second or third speech that I did or bill that I did stand up for. So we need to make sure that we talk on everything.

Members interjecting.

Martin CAMERON: Yes, I know. It is very hard, isn’t it? I know we need to make sure not to confuse the two. But I take the point of the member for Lowan when she was talking about how – and I think everybody that stands up will touch on this particular part in this omnibus bill – we need to take all precautions to make sure that paraphernalia that is out there is not seen by anybody in society, especially our children. But we do, on the other hand, need to make sure that, if people that are in the profession are involved in any way, we are protecting them. I think the member for Lowan used the example of pigs and making sure that when we are en masse producing any animal as such, these particular individuals are protected. So we need to make sure that when something like this comes up, yes, on one side, we are making sure that the level of court guidance and this bill are making sure that the community is safe, but we need to also make sure, on the flip side, with unintended consequences, that we are not making a rod for our primary producers that are in this area, producing food for us. These are our farmers, these are our veterinarians, that are going out onsite as well. We need to make sure that that is okay and done as well.

Touching on the clarification and continuation of the Drug Court division in the County Court, of course drugs are prominent in everybody’s society. It does not matter where you are, it does not miss anybody inside our community, right across Victoria and around Australia. Having these checks and balances is good, but we also need to make sure that if you are given alcohol or drugs corrections, there are services for you to get to, because I know down in the Latrobe Valley, if you do get issued a corrections order, it is very, very hard to get into these services. You may get an initial visit or an initial consultation with someone, but then the follow-ups, the second and third visits, are very, very hard to get into. Sometimes in the Latrobe Valley – and it would be the same anywhere in regional Victoria – we do not have the opportunity to do it in our area; we do have to travel to metropolitan areas. So we need to make sure that when we are changing legislation and bills here we do have the option, especially in drug rehabilitation in the County Court when they are issuing stuff for us to have to go and do, of having these services available in our communities. We do have limited services down there, so we need to be looking at all costs to make sure that we have all these services available for our constituents. The bill, I know, we agree with and we are wanting to push through, so I hope that it does get through.

 Anthony CIANFLONE (Pascoe Vale) (15:10): I rise to support the Justice Legislation Further Amendment (Miscellaneous) Bill 2025 as well. This is a bill that amends various justice and community safety related acts to improve the operation of the courts and justice system overall. The bill will go to quite a number of reforms to a number of acts, including the Coroners Act 2008 and the Births, Deaths and Marriages Registration Act 1996, and amend fines and tolling legislation, public advocacy and the Guardianship and Administration Act 2019. There are five acts in particular, with the time I have, that I would like to focus my contribution on. One is around the anti-vilification and social cohesion reforms. The second is around the contempt-of-court reforms. The third is around animal welfare and bestiality reforms. The fourth is around the County Court Drug and Alcohol Treatment Court, and fifth is the Road Safety Act 1986 reforms.

As the member for Pascoe Vale, Coburg and Brunswick West, but of course as someone who is a proud son of migrant parents, I remain firmly committed to doing all I can to help build a more socially cohesive, resilient and tolerant community. That is why I have always continued to support measures in this place to combat hate, violence, intimidation and racism through those anti-vilification reforms we previously passed, banning the Nazi salute and Nazi symbol; supporting our First Nations communities through voice, treaty and truth processes; standing up for our multicultural communities to combat antisemitism but also Islamophobia and other forms of hate; and standing against hate to support our LGBTIQ+ communities as well.

The devastating terrorist and antisemitic attack of 14 December 2025 against our Australian Jewish community on Bondi Beach means we must continue to do more to combat hate and antisemitism at its core. I particularly acknowledge everyone who made a contribution yesterday through the condolence motion, particularly my friend the member for Box Hill and also my colleague the member for Caulfield. My heart and that of my community remains broken for the victims, their families and the entire Jewish Australian community, who were celebrating the first night of Hanukkah with their children and loved ones, a sacred time of honouring light over darkness. Our prayers and thoughts also remain with the first responders, emergency services, witnesses and brave everyday Australians who experienced the horror of the attack and did what they could through many heroic acts, which have since emerged and are being brought to light, to keep people safe. Every community in Australia, including the Jewish community, has the right to celebrate their traditions openly and safely without fear of prejudice, persecution or violence. Hatred and extremism have no place in a multicultural and diverse Australia and can never be justified towards innocent civilians, no matter their faith or cultural background. The evil perpetrators of these attacks will not succeed in their efforts to divide and destroy us. That is why, building on our original anti-vilification laws, we must continue to do more.

This bill proposes to provide that the consent of the Director of Public Prosecutions is not required for a police officer to commence prosecution for an offence of incitement on the grounds of a protected attribute or when threatening physical harm or property damage on the grounds of that protected attribute – those being race, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender, disability, mental illness, age, status and more – or personal association with someone with a protected attribute. Essentially this reform will lower the threshold for people to be prosecuted for alleged acts of anti-vilification conduct, particularly antisemitic conduct, and seek to better stamp out behaviours that seek to vilify and harm people and communities based on these attributes.

In this respect I would like to draw the house’s attention to an email I received on 22 December from a local constituent, which I believe best helps encapsulate the mood and sentiment locally on these issues:

I am writing as a constituent to raise serious concerns about the rise in anti-Semitic behaviour within our state and the impact this is having on public safety and community cohesion.

I am not Jewish, but I feel compelled to speak out. I also recognise what is occurring in Gaza as a genocide and strongly condemn the suffering of Palestinian civilians. Holding this position does not, and should not, require tolerating hatred or intimidation of Jewish Australians, who have suffered immensely in the aftermath of the murder of over 1,200 Israelis by the terrorist group Hamas on 7 October 2023, an act of terrorism and brutality that I equally and unequivocally condemn.

I am a 40-year-old mother of two young children, and I am increasingly worried about the kind of society we are creating. I want my children to grow up in a community where differences can be debated without fear, where minority groups feel safe in public spaces, and where hatred is challenged rather than excused. What they see normalised now will shape the Australia they inherit.

I fully respect and support the right of people to peacefully protest, including in relation to international conflicts and human rights. However, many rallies have crossed a clear and unacceptable line, with openly anti-Semitic language and conduct that vilifies Jews as a group and, at times, incites hostility or violence …

towards them.

When demonstrations move from political expression into racial vilification or intimidation of Jewish Australians, they cease to be legitimate expressions of dissent and become a threat to public safety and social cohesion, and should not be allowed to continue unchecked.

I am particularly concerned about the enforcement of existing laws. Many in the Jewish community feel there has been a lack of accountability for anti-Semitic conduct, including high-profile incidents such as the events at the Sydney Opera House on 8 October 2023.

The impact is also being felt at a very practical, local level. Jewish-owned businesses –

including one in Merri-bek as well that was previously reported, but others –

have been harassed and targeted, with some forced to close due to safety concerns, including a … bakery in Sydney. When people cannot operate a business or enter public space safely because of their identity, it represents a failure of public order and equal protection under the law.

The Bondi attack just one week ago –

at the time –

directed at the Jewish community, has left many of us shocked, devastated, and deeply unsettled. While it targeted Jewish Australians, it was also an attack on all Australians and on the shared values that underpin our society. It highlights the urgent need for firm, early intervention against hate-fuelled intimidation and violence.

There are also escalating security costs for Jewish schools, synagogues, community organisations, and businesses, alongside the cancellation of Hanukkah and other community events due to safety concerns, resulting in financial losses …

I urge the government to consider –

and she lists a number of measures, including –

Ensuring police consistently enforce anti-vilification, public order, and incitement laws at protests and public gatherings …

again, amongst other measures.

All communities deserve to feel safe in public spaces. I ask that you advocate for firm, principled action to address anti-Semitism, uphold the rule of law, and protect community safety while respecting human rights.

To that constituent, who is a young mother and a doctor as well, I say that is what this bill today and this reform are all about.

The bill also implements recommendations of the Victorian Law Reform Commission’s 2020 Contempt of Court report to enable applications to lower courts of the Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal, VCAT, to revoke legacy suppression orders. These legacy suppression orders of course, as we know, heavily impact the right of victim-survivors to speak out. One of those victim-survivors I want to point to is a local constituent who is doing amazing work in this space to combat family violence and is everyone’s favourite local neighbour from the show Neighbours. She was an actress on there, playing Libby for many years, Kym Valentine, and I have been delighted to catch up on many occasions over recent times with Kym to support her advocacy on these important issues, particularly around better health and wellbeing and family violence prevention outcomes for households locally and across the nation. In her role as a lived experience adviser at FARE, Kym is bringing her powerful voice through lived experience to support national efforts to prevent, deter and mitigate against alcohol-related harm on families, children and communities. She is advocating for an Australia free from alcohol harm, raising public awareness about the widespread harms caused by alcohol, with alcohol, for example, being involved in at least 65 per cent of all police-reported family violence incidents. She is working to highlight that it is children who face greater harm in households where alcohol is consumed at high-risk levels, with men most often being the high-risk drinkers. She is advocating for new reforms around retail sales, availability, delivery and access to alcohol through new proposed laws and regulations and corporate accountability. She is seeking through FARE Australia to partner with government, the retail sector, health and wellbeing professionals and those with lived experience to progress real change in this space. I recently welcomed Kym, before the end of last year, to Parliament to meet with the Minister for Education and the Minister for Casino, Gaming and Liquor Regulation and others to help progress that advocacy.

The third major reform here of course goes to issues around animal welfare and bestiality. I have had a number of residents contact me on this issue over recent months, including Dale and Lisa and many, many others, who I acknowledge. I say to you that this bill directly responds to those issues and concerns.

Number 4, about the County Court Drug and Alcohol Treatment Court, is also an important part of the bill and talks directly to some of the important work being done by local organisations across the north-west to help support young people with these issues. I draw the house’s attention to the magnificent work of Ahmed Hassan and Youth Activating Youth, the YAY organisation, based out of Merri-bek for a long time at the Brunswick town hall, servicing the whole north-west. They do incredible work for young people in need. Established in 2014 by youth leaders Ali Ahmed and Ahmed Hassan, who was a previous Victorian Young Australian of the Year, YAY has grown to support multicultural diverse communities and people of all backgrounds across Victoria through dedicated initiatives and programs to reduce youth offending, reoffending and knife crimes, divert young people away from substance abuse and much more. Over 15,000 people have gone through YAY’s programs, which have built up young people’s confidence, resilience and opportunities to thrive, with over 450 young people also having been directly employed through YAY’s partnership and employment pathways. I attended their recent end-of-year luncheon in Port Melbourne, which was attended also by Mark Stone, Chief Commissioner of Police Mike Bush and many other distinguished luminaries from across Victoria and many young people, importantly, who have gone through the YAY program, reformed their behaviour and gone on to make a good contribution to the community. In this regard I also acknowledge the work of the Les Twentyman Foundation. I have done a lot of work with Les over the years in fighting for youth outcomes across my community, mainly helping establish the Oxygen youth centre in Coburg. I acknowledge the current CEO Paul Burke for his outstanding work and the work that they do to help support youth outcomes as well.

 Roma BRITNELL (South-West Coast) (15:20): I rise to speak on the Justice Legislation Further Amendment (Miscellaneous) Bill 2025 and in particular to address two aspects of this omnibus bill that have direct and practical consequences for the Victorian community: the amendments to the Road Safety Act 1986 and the continuation and modernisation of the Drug Court division of the County Court. This bill by design is a miscellaneous bill and responds to court decisions, operational pressures across the justice system and the need to clarify or tidy legislation that is no longer fit for purpose. So whilst wideranging, many of its reforms are modest and technical, and they will not make the difference needed by the police to address the relentlessly growing crime rates right across Victoria. Victoria is in a crime crisis, so this is a real missed opportunity.

In my electorate of South-West Coast, crime rates have been significantly rising, and we are paying the price for two years of crime prevention failures under the Allan Labor government, with Warrnambool recording a new high. It is a terrible thing to be claiming that there is a new high in criminal offences. The latest figures from the Crime Statistics Agency confirm that in Warrnambool serious assaults have risen by 47 per cent, aggravated robbery by 33 per cent, non-family serious assaults by 22 per cent, residential non-aggravated burglary by 18 per cent and stealing from a retail store by 15 per cent. These are shocking figures. We also see figures right across the state as bad or worse. Local residents in South-West Coast are experiencing the direct consequences of fewer police in my electorate, as well as across the state, and reduced resources. There are nearly 400 fewer police on the beat since Premier Allan came into office. That is a damning indictment on her governing and her leadership. We do not want to be a state in a crime crisis, but that is where we are here in Victoria.

In May 2025 the government cut almost $50 million from Victoria Police, and that is why we are seeing police stations close. Portland police station is closed overnight and Portland has also seen an alarming increase in crime, which you can understand when the police station is closed overnight, with a total increase in offences of 37 per cent. Motor vehicle theft in the Portland area is up by 148 per cent, aggravated robbery is up by 133 per cent and serious assaults have nearly doubled. You can see why people are really concerned in their communities.

The township of Terang had an armed home invasion just recently, and can I take the opportunity to commend the police right across the electorate. In that instance, in the Terang community, the police and the community did such a good job and very quickly had the criminal in custody – extraordinary efforts by our local communities, despite an environment where police are just crying out for more resources and more instruments of the law to be able to do their job and put the criminals away where they need to be rehabilitated, treated or whatever needs to happen. The tireless efforts by our police to protect our community demonstrate their significant commitment, but the police are tired and cannot speak up because the government is their boss. But I hear in our community from families, from members of the community who cannot get the police to answer their cries for help because we often do not have enough police to attend to their cries for help. One of the reasons I know as well is that years ago we used to have nine people in the remand custody cells in the Warrnambool station; now we have got 18, and many of these people are coming from Melbourne.

The police have got custody officers who look after them while they are in the station, but often these prisoners end up in the hospital. Of course, having been a nurse in the past, I hear about that from my old nursing colleagues – that they have got two police up there guarding two different prisoners. That takes place away from the job that they should be able to do, because the custody officer cannot supervise them in the hospital. So you are two police down and you have not got the police out on the street where they need to be on the front line, helping the people who are calling for urgent help. People just do not want to hear that prisoners from Melbourne are being brought up to Warrnambool. And they are not actually just staying a few days; they are staying months in this situation. Enough is enough. This government has really lost control, and the police are doing their absolute best.

I will also now turn to the Road Safety Act 1986. The bill makes some amendments, which at their core are about procedural clarity and fairness, ensuring that motorists are not unfairly penalised because of administrative failures or outdated service requirements. The bill introduces new extensions of time for applications and reviews in circumstances where a person did not receive the actual notice of infringement. We do know that the post is getting more unreliable, and so this does give Victorians more time. But this government has been in for 10 years. It really is typical of an old, stale government that they are taking so long to fix a problem like that. Even with modern technologies and the different ways we can communicate, we are still using snail mail, so it is no surprise that people are not getting their infringements.

At a time when public confidence in road safety is at an all-time low, nowhere is this felt more acutely than in the South-West Coast. Our communities see it and they live it every single day with the condition of our roads – widening potholes, crumbling shoulders and damaged surfaces that pose a risk to drivers and passengers alike. Motorists are paying out for blown tyres, bent rims and suspension damage, often without any clear avenue for redress, and that is despite roads being a state government responsibility which are causing damage to their cars. People are doing the right thing. They maintain their vehicles, ensuring they remain roadworthy, yet they are forced to drive on roads that are anything but roadworthy. The simple truth is that roadworthy cars do require roadworthy roads. Nobody wants to see road safety sacrificed for speed, neglect or bad behaviour. Enforcement has an important role to play, and firm penalties for dangerous driving are necessary to keep our roads safe. But enforcement alone is not enough. It depends on a system that the community sees as accurate, accessible and fair, and that includes roads that are properly maintained. When governments fail to invest in basic road conditions, they undermine their own message of safety. You cannot lecture motorists about safety while expecting them to navigate damaged, deteriorating roads. Restoring public confidence starts with fixing the fundamentals, and that begins with roads that are safe, reliable and fit for purpose.

Now I will turn to the Drug Court division provisions in the bill, part 7 of the bill. These amendments provide an ongoing legislative basis for the Drug Court division of the County Court, transitioning it from what began as a pilot to a permanent and formalised part of the Victorian court system. The Drug Court is a specialist jurisdiction and sits at the intersection of criminal justice, health and rehabilitation. It recognises the reality that a significant proportion of offending, particularly repeated offending, is driven by untreated substance dependence. We know that drug and alcohol misuse is a significant and ongoing problem, and that is why the South-West Coast needs the Lookout centre that we have been campaigning for for many years, so that people can get drug rehabilitation services in the south-west. Our community sees this impact every day on families, on health services and on the justice system, and there is a strong recognition of the need for local, accessible support services. This is essential. While legislative reforms are definitely important, they need to be matched with real investment on the ground so people can get close-to-home help before their lives unravel further.

With the budget fast approaching, the government must prioritise meaningful and effective initiatives that save lives and strengthen social cohesion, and in Warrnambool that looks like the Lookout project for drug rehabilitation. Those on this side of the chamber understand what genuine reform looks like. My colleague beside me the member for Lowan is a strong advocate, along with my community, of getting the Lookout funded in the next budget. We have been doing that together for some years. But if this government is out of ideas or lacks the energy, we stand ready to govern and provide drug rehabilitation that is desperately needed.

This bill does make meaningful changes to allow the County Court to adjourn proceedings into the County Court division, expanding the range of matters the division can hear and modernising sentencing and order-making arrangements. However, while diversion through the courts has value, our priority must be prevention and treatment early, supporting people before they enter the justice system. This bill does not go far enough. It is a failure of this government to grasp the seriousness of the challenge of the failing justice system. Without commitment to early intervention, rehabilitation or effective police powers, this legislation falls short of what the community rightfully expect.

 Katie HALL (Footscray) (15:30): I am also pleased to make a contribution on this bill. I would like to just pick up on some of the closing comments the member for South-West Coast made around early intervention. This is a government that has invested heavily in early intervention in the areas of alcohol and other drug abuse. Just recently I visited the fixed site for our pill testing service. For many people, particularly young people, who enter this service, it is the first time they have spoken to a health professional about their drug use, and they have the opportunity to learn about the risks and proceed with the necessary caution by having the full information about the drugs that they are ingesting. I do not believe that reform was supported by those opposite, even though it has been an enormously successful reform in minimising and reducing risk, particularly for young people attending music festivals and events where they might be taking drugs. I know that our commitment to alcohol and other drug reform has been led very ably by the Minister for Mental Health.

Certainly in my own community of Footscray I have seen the benefits of funding for Cohealth to run an outreach service in the Footscray mall. That outreach service means that people have access to confidential help, advice and referrals, including access to naloxone, which I think the member for Preston and I have in our electorate offices. These are important reforms to make sure that we minimise the harm of drug and alcohol use, which of course can lead to a whole range of lifelong problems for some of the very vulnerable people who are using drugs and alcohol and may have mental health challenges. I want to pick up on that because I find it insulting that the opposition, who often vote against these reforms that we introduce to reduce harm from drugs and alcohol, can talk out of both sides of their mouth when saying that this bill has not gone far enough. Actions speak louder than words. I will be surprised if I ever see the Liberal Party and the National Party supporting these important prevention reforms that we continue to roll out in our communities to make sure that we reduce and minimise harm.

I am pleased to make a contribution to this omnibus bill, the Justice Legislation Further Amendment (Miscellaneous) Bill 2025. As has been mentioned by many, this bill does a range of things. It amends the Open Courts Act 2013 to implement recommendation 133 of the Victorian Law Reform Commission’s 2020 Contempt of Court report by allowing lower courts and VCAT to vary or revoke legacy suppression orders made prior to that act. It amends the Coroners Act 2008 to enable the Coroners Court to streamline investigation, finalisation and reopening procedures. It amends the Births, Deaths and Marriages Registration Act 1996 to enable more doctors to register deaths and to clarify their death-reporting obligations. It amends fines and tolling legislation to make minor, fines-related amendments to other acts to strengthen fine enforcement by correcting minor anomalies and inconsistencies and to make minor procedural improvements. It amends the Guardianship and Administration Act 2019 to clarify the delegation powers and acting arrangements of the Public Advocate. It amends the Crimes Act 1958. As has been mentioned, there is a special place in hell for the people who produce bestiality material, and it introduces indictable offences that prohibit the production, distribution and possession of and access to these animal abuse materials. It amends the County Court Act 1958 and the Sentencing Act 1991 to extend the operation of the County Court Drug and Alcohol Treatment Court – another fantastic reform – and amends the Road Safety Act 1986 to enable the Magistrates’ Court of Victoria to carry out certain administrative functions under the Road Safety Act more efficiently.

With the time I have left, I will speak to the changes to the Open Courts Act 2013, the Coroners Act ‍2008 and births, deaths and marriages. This bill introduces a transitional provision in the Open Courts Act to allow the lower courts and VCAT to review legacy suppression orders made prior to the commencement of the act in December 2013. Many of these orders operate indefinitely, and currently applications to vary or revoke pre-existing orders can only be made to the Supreme Court under its inherent jurisdiction, which of course is a costly process; it strains the resources of the court and it hinders access to justice. These amendments will address this problem and implement recommendation 133 of the Victorian Law Reform Commission’s Contempt of Court report.

The bill will allow persons with a sufficient interest in a pre-existing order, including victim-survivors of a sexual offence or a family violence offence and news media organisations, to apply to the relevant court or VCAT to review the order. The court or VCAT will be able to confirm, vary or revoke a pre-existing order. This work of course is in line with existing reforms the Allan Labor government have made to support victim-survivors of sexual offences or family violence, such as the landmark changes we introduced last year to change the use of NDAs for workplace sexual harassment matters, which I spoke to at the end of last year.

The bill will also introduce a new discretion for coroners to discontinue investigations into certain reportable natural cause deaths which do not require further investigation once the cause has been identified. As someone who has worked in a previous professional life with the Coroners Court, I think this is a really good reform. As someone as well who has had a friend whose death was investigated by the Coroners Court, I think this will really help to avoid the need for the coroner to make findings into a death and remove the need for the court to provide the Victorian Registry of Births, Deaths and Marriages with particulars of the death. The end result of that is that it will reduce investigation finalisation times, and that of course will provide families with closure sooner when they are grieving the death of a loved one. These amendments acquit recommendation 4 of the Coronial Council of Victoria’s Review of Reportable Deaths in Victoria report and recommendation 1 of the 2024 Coroners Act statutory review.

Another change I will quickly go to is the amendment of the Births, Deaths and Marriages Registration Act, which will enable more doctors to notify births, deaths and marriages of deaths and clarify the circumstances in which they can do so, reducing the unnecessary reporting of natural cause deaths to the Coroners Court.

Currently, some doctors might not feel comfortable signing a death certificate where there might be multiple natural causes, such as dementia or pneumonia, or they are not 100 per cent certain of what is the ultimate cause of death. The bill will clarify that a doctor can notify the registrar of a person’s death and cause of death if they are unable to form a definitive opinion as to the probable cause of death. I commend these reforms to the house.

 Michael O’BRIEN (Malvern) (15:40): I am pleased rise to speak on the Justice Legislation Further Amendment (Miscellaneous) Bill 2025. Sometimes bills pass through this place and you think to yourself, ‘I wonder how long it’s going to take the government to realise it got it wrong?’ In this case the answer is less than 12 months, because it was less than 12 months ago that this government did its deal with the Greens political party to give the Director of Public Prosecutions a veto on filing charges in relation to anti-vilification offences. When the government originally brought its anti-vilification laws to the Parliament, it accepted the recommendation of the Legal and Social Issues Committee of this place – a unanimous recommendation, a bipartisan recommendation – which said the DPP’s consent should not be required for police to bring a charge in relation to anti-vilification. The government originally accepted that recommendation, and the government originally reflected that recommendation in the bill it introduced to this place. But then as the bill progressed and debate continued, the government decided that rather than sitting down with the opposition and sensibly working with us to resolve concerns and have a bill that could pass this place on a genuinely bipartisan basis, the Premier and the current Attorney-General would rather do a deal with the Greens political party to gut their own bill than sit down with the Liberals and Nationals and get a broad-based, bipartisan outcome. Now, in less than 12 months, we see the government bringing this bill in here to fix its own mistakes and undoing part of the deal it did with the Greens. It is very much to this government’s shame that it chose to do a deal with the Greens in the first place.

The tragedy of Bondi did not happen in a vacuum; it is part of a continuum, and it is part of a continuum that we have seen for at least the last two years – increasingly antisemitic behaviour.

Michaela Settle interjected.

Michael O’BRIEN: Half the members of the Labor government are in because of Greens preferences, so the member Eureka might want to think about that before she interjects. This is the government that did the deal with the Greens political party to gut their own anti-vilification bill. We know that the DPP have used their veto in the past to stop charges being brought forward; this came out through the bill briefing on that anti-vilification legislation. I was Shadow Attorney-General at the time, and I asked the question, ‘Has the DPP’s veto been used to block charges being brought forward?’ The answer was yes. The government was not able to tell me how many times, but the fact that the veto is being used is enough to tell the government and Victorians that having that DPP veto stops these laws being effective. But when push came to shove, the government had the chance to sit down with the opposition; the government could have deleted four words. That is all our ask was: four words from that entire bill – four words – and there would have been broad-based, bipartisan support that would have done this Parliament proud. But this government decided then, as it does now – as it does every day – to play politics instead. This government’s political calculus was to do a deal with the Greens political party to gut its own bill rather than sit down and work with the Liberals and Nationals, and that is where we are now.

In fact it was interesting because when the original bill was introduced, it was introduced by Ms Symes, who was Attorney-General at the time. Then when the deal was done, it was by the current Attorney-General, the member for Carrum. And when asked about this in the other place, Ms Symes said in the Legislative Council Hansard, 1 April 2025, page 1368:

We went in great detail through the fact that I am hesitant about the Greens amendment, but when I formulated the bill there were very mixed views on whether you should or you should not have DPP consent. I fell on the side in the development of the bill that you do not require it, except for those under 18. In the good-faith consultations that have happened since the introduction of the bill, the now Attorney-General has been persuaded by the Greens argument …

Ms Symes was washing her hands of the decision to give in to the Greens, to gut their own bill and to give the DPP veto over bringing charges for anti-vilification offences. Ms Symes did not support it. She voted that way, but you can tell from her words in Hansard that she did not support it. This was a deal done by the Premier and the current Attorney-General, and it was done to gut the bill.

While the government might be undoing this aspect of the deal, there are other aspects that have not been undone, and I think the government should get back to the table and undo these ones as well. For example, another part of the Greens deal that Labor signed up to was a new provision in determining whether an offence against section 195N(1) or 195O(1) is to be prosecuted:

The Director of Public Prosecutions must take into account all the circumstances (including the social, cultural and historical circumstances) surrounding the conduct that is alleged to constitute the offence.

We have now got a sociology lecture in the Crimes Act 1958. The DPP now needs to consider – not may consider, must consider – social, cultural and historical circumstances relating to an offence. I am sorry, if you incite hatred against somebody because they are a Jew or because they are gay, I do not care about the historical circumstances – no decent Victorian should. Historical circumstances are not a get-out-of-jail-free card for horrible acts of discrimination and incitement, but they are under this government. If this government had any guts, it would undo every aspect of that grubby deal it did with the Greens and remove this provision as well, because there is no excuse for hatred and there is no excuse for incitement on the basis of protected attributes. That is the position of this side of the house. There is no excuse for it. But this government and the Greens have now put a provision into the law which says, ‘Well, actually, there kind of is an excuse. When you consider the social and cultural and historical circumstances, maybe you shouldn’t prosecute that poor little person who has incited hatred and threats against somebody else because they’re gay, because they’re a woman or because they’re a Jew.’ It is unthinkable, it is unconscionable and the government should have the guts to admit that it got it wrong on this aspect as well and deal with it.

It is not good enough for this government to say, ‘Well, we did a deal with the Greens. Whoops, we got that wrong. We’re going to undo part of it.’ They should undo the whole thing, because social cohesion is in a desperate place in this state at the moment – it is in a really desperate place. And as I enter my 20th and final year as a member in this place, I can say it has never been worse, and that is gutting. I came here to try and improve my state, and on that measure Victoria is in a far worse place now than when I came here in 2006. We need to do much better and we do not do better by ignoring the elephant in the room. We do not do better by pandering to groups because we think that maybe, politically, they might support us or our allies in the Greens. We need to call out disgraceful behaviour for what it is. We need to call it out when we see it, and our laws should reflect it.

While we support this amendment to remove the DPP’s veto of Victoria Police for bringing charges against anti-vilification offences, it does not go far enough. At the time, a year ago, I was of the view that maybe it was appropriate that the DPP veto remain for under-18s. I am not so sure that is even right these days. I think the current Shadow Attorney-General made a persuasive case that if somebody is 17 years old and they incite hatred and threats against somebody based on a protected attribute, why should they get a leave pass? Why should they get a get-out-of-jail-free card? Things are bad enough in this state, things are bad enough in our capital city, that we cannot afford to play games. We need to take strong action against those who threaten social cohesion. We need to do it and ideally do it with one single voice, and that means the government should be willing to work with the opposition instead of their mates in the Greens.

 Eden FOSTER (Mulgrave) (15:50): I rise today to speak in strong support of the Justice Legislation Further Amendment (Miscellaneous) Bill 2025. This is a bill of targeted amendments. While this legislation touches on vital improvements to our coronial system, open justice principles and the protection of animals, to name a few, I wish to focus my contribution today on a matter that is deeply personal to my professional history and central to the safety of the community I represent in Mulgrave and in the south-east: the permanent extension of the County Court Drug and Alcohol Treatment Court. Before I entered this place I spent years as a psychologist. My work was on the front lines, often in the alcohol and other drug sector, in the heart of the south-east. I have sat in the rooms where the cycle of addiction and crime is laid bare, and I have seen the revolving door of the justice system from the perspective of a clinician trying to help someone who has lost their way to a physiological and psychological dependency. This bill ensures that the therapeutic sentencing pathway of the Drug Court does not sunset on 26 April 2026. It ensures that we do not go backward to a time when our only answer to addiction-driven crime was a prison cell that did not work.

This bill is a comprehensive suite of reforms designed to improve administrative efficiency and legal clarity. Beyond the Drug Court, it implements crucial recommendations from the Victorian Law Reform Commission’s Contempt of Court report. It allows lower courts and VCAT to vary or revoke legacy suppression orders made before 2013, which often have no end date, effectively silencing victim-survivors indefinitely. As a psychologist, I know that for a victim-survivor the right to speak about their experience is a fundamental part of that healing process. These reforms restore control to the victim-survivor, allowing them to share their lived experience when they are ready, which in turn builds community momentum for further reform.

The bill also streamlines our Coroners Court processes by allowing pathologists or supervised medical practitioners to register certain natural cause deaths directly. It will reduce the agonising wait times for grieving families in electorates like mine and it strengthens our animal cruelty laws, expanding bestiality offences to reflect modern community expectations that any non-consensual sexual act involving an animal is abhorrent and must be met with the full force of the law.

As I mentioned, I do want to focus specifically on the Drug Court extension. It is the amendments to the County Court Act 1958 and the Sentencing Act 1991 which I want to focus upon. In my years as a psychologist I learned a hard truth: you cannot punish a dependency out of someone. If a person is committing crimes – maybe burglaries, thefts, shoplifting – to fund a heroin or ice habit, a standard three-month prison sentence is often just a pause button on their offending. They go in, they detox, they lose their housing and they are released back into the community with the same cravings, same circle of friends and fewer resources than they had before. The Drug and Alcohol Treatment Court breaks this cycle. It utilises a drug and alcohol treatment order, which is a specialised sentence that combines a term of imprisonment with an intensive, court-supervised treatment program in the community. From a clinical standpoint the Drug and Alcohol Treatment Court is grounded in therapeutic jurisprudence. It is not a soft option. In fact participants that I have previously worked with have told me it is much harder than serving time in a regular prison. They are subjected to constant judicial supervision and regular appearances before a judge who knows their name, knows their story and knows their progress.

It also includes mandatory clinical treatment, intensive counselling and rehabilitation, which addresses the psychological roots of their addiction, and frequent drug testing – the strict accountability where any slip-up has immediate consequences. For the residents of my community this bill is a direct investment in their safety. The data is clear: the Drug Court reduces recidivism. Studies of Victoria’s first Drug Court in Dandenong, a hub that serves my local community and has done so since 2002, found that graduates committed significantly fewer crimes than those who went through the traditional system. When we stop one person from reoffending, we are preventing dozens of future victims in our local streets. I have personally worked with participants in the Drug Court. I have seen the journey and, for many, have been able to walk through it with them. I have seen the hurdles that they have gone through of course, but I have also seen them bounce back because of the support of the Drug Court and the treatment orders.

As a member of a government committed to fair outcomes and efficient systems, I must also point out the economic reality. It costs the Victorian taxpayer roughly $67 a day to support someone on a drug and alcohol treatment order. Compare that to the $257 or thereabouts per day it costs to keep that same person in a prison cell. The Drug Court provides a return on investment by reducing the strain on our prisons, our police and our emergency departments at hospitals like the Monash Medical Centre that services my community. I remember many individuals that I once worked with in the drug and alcohol sector who may perhaps have engaged in petty crime driven by a chronic addiction, whether it be due to past traumas, poor relationships or injuries. In the traditional system, these individuals were just another number, but in a therapeutic setting, the kind this bill makes permanent, they are people with a treatable health condition. By extending the Drug Court we are saying that we believe in the possibility of change. We are saying that we would rather have someone in treatment, working a job, paying their taxes and contributing to society than sitting in a prison cell at the expense of the state. This bill also improves administrative processes in the Magistrates’ Court, allowing more functions to be performed electronically. This efficiency means that cases move through the system faster and victims of crime get the closure they deserve sooner.

In my work in the drug and alcohol sector, I have been moved by so many stories of hardship but also of growth and resilience. Seeing the positive outcomes that the Drug Court delivers for these individuals, I am so pleased to be part of a government that chooses to extend this most worthy program. I recall being part of a trial through the Drug Court back in the day where I was assisting methamphetamine users in group treatment, which demonstrated evidence that the group treatment itself worked and that the support of the Drug Court worked too.

In closing, this bill is a practical and carefully considered set of reforms that improve how our justice system operates day to day. It responds directly to expert reviews, removes unnecessary barriers, strengthens protections and delivers clearer, more efficient processes across multiple areas of law. From restoring sensible review pathways for legacy suppression orders to streamlining coronial and death registration processes, clarifying guardianship arrangements, expanding serious animal cruelty offences and, as I spoke of, extending the Drug Court, these are reforms that are measured, targeted and necessary. Importantly, this legislation balances efficiency with fairness, transparency with protection, and accountability with compassion. It supports victim-survivors, reinforces open justice and ensures that courts and agencies are better equipped to do their work effectively. I go back to my mention of the Drug Court. I have seen the benefits of it. I have seen what it does to individuals who have succumbed to substance use.

Business interrupted under sessional orders.