Wednesday, 4 February 2026

 Danny O’BRIEN (Gippsland South) (16:31): I grieve for the people of Victoria and for the management of this government of our finances, and in particular the impact that has had on our emergency services. But I might begin by grieving for the people of Mordialloc as well, if that is the best that they have got to represent them. It is like the bigger picture with the Premier at the moment. Have a look at the Premier’s social media at the moment: it is all about Jess Wilson; it is all about the member for Kew. Someone was humming a song to me before. It was I’ve Got You Under My Skin. I think that is what it is, because very clearly the Premier and the member for Mordialloc have the member for Kew under their skin. There is an obsession at the moment with her diary, for example, and with my diary. There is an obsession with Barnaby Joyce on the member for Mordialloc’s side. It is just extraordinary that they are more focused on that at a time when we have got $200 billion of debt, when we have got crime up 29 per cent since this Premier came to office, when we have got fires around the state and we have got a CFA in crisis – and this mob is more worried about what conference the Leader of the Opposition is going to. That is why Victorians will turn on this mob this year, because we are the opposition. We are meant to keep them honest. We are meant to keep the government honest – that is our job. Their job is to govern the state, not to worry about what the opposition is doing. If they actually did a little bit more governing of the state and actually looking after our emergency services, then we might be in a better place.

I am going to pick up from where the member for Berwick was talking about Productivity Commission reports on government services. The emergency services report on government services, ROGS, as it is known, confirms one thing today: a $10 million cut to the SES. All of those on the other side keep saying, ‘We’ve got to support the SES. We’ve got to actually look after them. That’s why we’re bringing in this $3 billion emergency services tax. The SES is one that needs some funding.’ Well, maybe it needs rescuing from the current government, because the annual report released in November shows that the SES has lost $10 million in grant funding from the state government. That was rejected by the minister and by the government, even though it is the SES’s annual report, so it is actually their report. If they do not like that one, they could try the report on government services from the Productivity Commission today.

In Victoria, STES organisations – what are STES organisations? State and territory emergency services, as opposed to fire services organisations, which are another part of the table. In Victoria, in 2023–24, the SES received $101.4 million; in 2024–25, $91.4 million. Last time I checked, that was a $10 million reduction. That actually reflects exactly what the SES annual report says, which the government says is not correct.

Then we have had the unedifying spectacle over the last month or so of the government’s logical gymnastics when it comes to the CFA. This is not an issue that has come up since the bushfires. This is an issue that the opposition has been pursuing for more than 12 months since the government decided to bring in the emergency services tax. Where is that money is going? $3 billion of additional taxpayer funding to fund the emergency services and we cannot get a straight answer out of this government on what the budgets actually are. It has been a tortuous process. Back in May I asked the Minister for Emergency Services what the CFA budget would be in 2025–26. She said, ‘You will have to wait for the budget.’ I knew at the time that the CFA budget is never in the state budget, but I had to suck it up and say, ‘All right, we’ll wait for the budget.’ The budget came out, and I asked another question of the Minister for Emergency Services – ‘What is the CFA budget for 2025–26?’ – because it was not in the budget. The Minister for Emergency Services said, ‘Oh, you’ll have to wait until the annual report comes out.’ Everything in the state of Victoria when it comes to managing budgets is in the budget. We have an estimate of what we are going to spend, except for the emergency services. You have to wait until the end of the year and then three or four months afterwards – or in this case nearly six months afterwards – to find out what the budget was 18 months ago, because this government does not want to tell us. That is the thing.

We had some extraordinary examples in the last month or so of the government desperately trying to defend its cuts to the CFA, the SES and others, to the extent that in the Public Accounts and Estimates Committee hearings in November, ably led by my colleague the member for Mildura holding the government to account, we had the secretary of Treasury, so not even the Secretary of the Department of Justice, and not even in answer to a question from the opposition but in answer to a question from Mr Galea in the other place, explaining why the government’s own figures are wrong and should be ignored. I looked at a Government Gazette from May last year – and I have got a copy of it here – which outlines exactly how the emergency services funding is delivered and who it actually goes to. And of course it has now just disappeared on me, but that gazette literally has a breakdown of where the funding will go. It shows that the CFA gets 95 per cent of its funding from the emergency services levy. The gazette actually has a figure in it, $312 million, so you can work out pretty quickly that 95 ‍per cent equates to $328 million. If you compare that to previous annual reports, that is a significant cut. But we asked questions. We asked the Treasurer, ‘So how is that not a cut?’ ‘No, it’s not, because you’re not covering everything.’ We asked the Minister for Emergency Services, ‘Is that not a cut?’ ‘No, no, no, because there’s other money there too.’ We asked the Premier – ‘Oh, misinformation, Mr O’Brien and Ms Benham. That’s not the figure at all. There’s no cut and it would be wrong to assume so.’ Okay, so why then does the government in a Government Gazette publish these figures?

In November the government got on the front foot with the secretary of Treasury and said:

… I would not want there to be any misunderstandings.

So he has read the talking points from the Premier’s office as well.

… the Emergency Services and Volunteer Fund Act, the forecast funding requirement for each organisation or program – and this is very important – is indicative only, and it comes at a point in time and ahead of the financial year, effectively.

Isn’t that what the entire budget process is? It is an estimate at a point in time. It is designed to say to departments and agencies like the CFA and the SES, ‘This is how much money you’re going to have. We know things will happen throughout the year – there might be a bit more, there might be a bit less ‍– but here it is.’ You would think that would make quite a bit of sense, but you have got the government publishing a gazette signed by who? Signed by the Treasurer Jaclyn Symes, in the other place, and then the secretary of her department says, ‘Don’t listen to that. That’s not what the budget is. I know it’s in the official Government Gazette, I know it’s signed by the Treasurer, but it’s not what the actual budget is.’

Wayne Farnham interjected.

Danny O’BRIEN: Absolutely, member for Narracan, it is absolutely like something out of Utopia. Okay, then the government said that is not what the budgets are. So we put in an FOI, and we asked the Minister for Emergency Services if she has provided a budget at any stage. And we get it. We find in our FOI a departmental brief signed off by the Minister for Emergency Services and Minister for Natural Disaster Recovery Vicki Ward. It says literally here: 2025–26 gross funding emergency services organisations, released output funding, Country Fire Authority, $345 million for 2025–26, which is less than anything else that had been published before. So I came back again and I asked the minister a question. I said, ‘I’ve got this document that you signed off, and it says the budget for the CFA is $345 million, and that’s less than the previous year.’ And she said, ‘No, that’s not the budget either.’ Then we go, ‘Right, okay.’ Then we come to the fires this year, which have been a devastating event for many, and we had a very solemn condolence debate on that yesterday.

Naturally enough, as the fires hit and after the fires hit, firefighters, CFA volunteers and victims on the ground were pretty angry. They were angry not that the government caused the fires or anything like that; no-one is saying anything ridiculous like that. But they are angry about the facilities they have got and the old trucks that they have got. They started raising this, and I can say I have had a number of conversations with the Leader of the Opposition, the member for Lowan and others in our team. We are not going to politicise while the fires are burning, but we know this is an issue. But people on the ground started to raise it with the Premier. They raised it with the media. They rang talkback and they said, ‘We’re driving around in a 35-year-old truck. We’re concerned that the CFA is not getting enough funding.’ Then we got the CFA board putting out a statement saying that there have been no cuts and echoing the Premier’s speech with statements that there have been increases in funding each and every year to the CFA. I thought, ‘Well, that’s a bit weird, because that’s not my recollection of what the CFA annual report says.’ So I went back to it, and I found that in 2021, the first year since fire services reform, the budget for the CFA, the grant income – it actually literally says ‘grant income’, which is the funding from the government – was $351 million. In 2023–24, $339 million. Now, I am not going to ask anyone on that side because I know they do not do numbers very well. So is there anyone on this –

Lauren Kathage interjected.

Danny O’BRIEN: That is page 64, member for Yan Yean. You are not reading it very well. Have a look. I will bring you the highlighted version.

The SPEAKER: Leader of the Nationals! I will sit you down. Through the Chair.

Danny O’BRIEN: It is $339 million.

Jade Benham: That’s less, isn’t it?

Danny O’BRIEN: Than $351 million? I think it is less. And if you do not believe that is the figure, then we finally get the CFA 2024–25 annual report, and the very same line item shows $361 million for 2024–25. It is an increase, yes. So then the Premier and the minister go out and say, ‘Look, we increased the budget by $22 million. Just ignore the four previous years because we just want to highlight the one that we’ve got.’

Lauren Kathage interjected.

Danny O’BRIEN: The member for Yan Yean, Speaker, is saying that is not right.

The SPEAKER: Order! Through the Chair, Leader of the Nationals.

Danny O’BRIEN: That is exactly what it is.

The SPEAKER: And I would ask you to cease waving around your prop.

Danny O’BRIEN: That is not a prop. I am just excited. Sorry, Speaker. And we have seen the same attitude today. We literally saw the same attitude today when we had the Minister for Health quoting the Productivity Commission data on ambulance services, which was apparently right because it showed good stuff for this government. To the very next question, when the member for Kew asked about cuts to police numbers, as reflected in the Productivity Commission, what did the Premier say? ‘No, wrong. Your assertion is wrong.’ Again, it seems that when the line item in the CFA budget looks good for the government, they say that is right. When the line item is bad, that is misinformation from a reckless opposition who cannot be trusted. When the PC says things are going well in ambulance services, yes, that is good; that is correct. When the PC shows that police spending is down in Victoria, as opposed to every other state, where it has gone up, no, wrong, wrong, wrong.

A member interjected.

Danny O’BRIEN: It is Utopia. We know that the Herald Sun called it out pretty well when the CFA report was actually released. Shannon Deery wrote in his op-ed that the attitude is ‘The sky is blue, but if I say it’s green, then it is. Just don’t look up.’ That is the exactly the attitude of this government. ‘We will deny, we will obfuscate, we will tell untruths, and then we will say that the opposition are the ones providing misinformation.’ It is absolutely extraordinary. That is why people are angry. That is why the Premier had to sneak out the back of a hospital in Alexandra, because people are angry, because this government just cannot lie straight in bed. They are saying what is black is white and completely ignoring the facts. The facts are they have been cutting our emergency services, despite the fact that Victorians are being asked to pay an extra $3 billion in emergency services tax. The government will not be straight with the Victorian people. That is why I grieve, and that is why this government stands condemned.