Wednesday, 4 March 2026

 The SPEAKER (16:01): I have accepted a statement from the member for Caulfield proposing the following matter of public importance:

That this house condemns the Allan Labor government’s failure to address corruption and organised crime on Big Build sites, resulting in $15 billion in waste, and affirms the need for a comprehensive plan to enforce the law, find the money and stop the rorts.

 David SOUTHWICK (Caulfield) (16:01): We now know that the Allan Labor government is a corrupt government. We have seen their signature project, the Big Build, become the big bill – the big bill which has extended to $15 billion of taxpayers money literally thrown down the drain. If you wondered for a minute what $15 billion would bring: if we stood here today and took $15 billion worth of $100 bills and every second threw one into a fireplace, we would be standing here for five years; that is how long it would take to burn $15 billion. But this government has burnt it literally in years and has completely wasted taxpayers money.

This government can laugh about it on the backbench – wasting taxpayers money. Already they are up and about laughing at the fact that taxpayers money has literally just been thrown down the drain, because we know Labor does not care when it comes to wasting taxpayers money. They have got good form in doing this, and we have seen it with this huge corruption scandal with the CFMEU and the Big Build. This Premier should hang her head in shame, because for years she has gone around and cut ribbons, put on the hard hat and said ‘Look what we’re building in Victoria.’

Today it was reaffirmed, because we spoke about the corruption on the Big Build sites, and you know what the Premier said and others said? ‘You know what, that’s okay. We’re building things.’ Is it okay, if somebody does something that is corrupt, to say, ‘Well, you know what, that’s okay.’ Is it okay if you are a doctor and you are dishing out cocaine on the side while you are doing other things? That is not okay. What would happen in that situation? They would be locked up. What about on the Big Build sites? How about locking up some of those CFMEU mates?

Do you know why we do not have the same kind of justice in Victoria? When the ordinary Victorian does something wrong like speeding and gets caught, they get a fine for it. Why doesn’t the same law apply when it comes to the CFMEU Big Build building sites? Why? Because this government is in bed with some of these bikies and their donations. We have seen the donations linked to this. There is a financial link, and the government has not done their job of investigation. We have been calling for a royal commission. We have two-thirds of Victorians calling for further investigation and a royal commission according to a poll today. Everybody wants a further investigation or royal commission except one group, and that is Jacinta Allan and her government. This Premier is hiding because she knows she is responsible for a government that is corrupt and absolutely connected with the CFMEU and her union mates. When we have seen the horrific situation that was revealed by Geoffrey Watson SC when he said, on the sites, in terms of bikies, drugs, strippers, women being used on Big Build sites.

Members interjecting.

David SOUTHWICK: The government goes, ‘Oh, here we go,’ as if there is nothing to hide. ‘Here we go. It’s not a problem.’ Well, I tell you what, government: you have done nothing about it. And this government again –

Members interjecting.

The SPEAKER: Order! I remind members that interjecting across the chamber is disorderly. Members will be removed. Member for Tarneit, I note you are on the speaking list. If you wish to remain in the chamber, I would sit quietly if I were you.

David SOUTHWICK: The minister at the table, the Minister for Veterans, says we should be referring to Victoria Police. We have had the highest law officer in the state, the Attorney-General, who initially gave evidence in this chamber saying, ‘Yes, referred to Victoria Police,’ and then had to give a personal explanation because in fact the Attorney-General did not refer something to Victoria Police. So again, if the highest lawmaker in the state is not following the Premier’s orders of referring to Victoria Police, then I do not know what is going on, because, I tell you what, we do not know what is going on under this government. It is corruption and scandal after scandal, and I will tell you what, there is one group that is missing out, and that is the Victorian taxpayer. That is who is missing out, the Victorian taxpayer, because when you allow corruption to happen then unfortunately people have no confidence – zero confidence. As we heard the member for Brighton quite rightly say, it is not just allowing it but it is encouraging it to happen.

Why is this happening? Why is the government refusing every investigation that we have proposed? Everything that we have heard anyone say about this in terms of following the money, in terms of the member for Sandringham putting a cop on the beat or putting a corruption enforcement watchdog on these sites – all of it has been knocked back by this government. They do not want follow-the-money powers. They do not want to strengthen IBAC’s powers. They do not want to be able to ensure they can follow the money. They are in fact reducing IBAC’s money – reducing their money – to give them less opportunity to follow the corruption. And why? Because of the connections. You have to draw the link. Because when we are seeing donations from the CFMEU to the Labor Party, there is a definite link. We have seen that over $1.3 million in tainted money has been connected to the CFMEU. We have seen again that there are a whole lot of these additional tentacles that have been extended in this ‍– not just the donations that have come from the CFMEU to the Labor Party but now all of these additional labour hire workers and labour groups. It was investigated and reported on by Geoffrey Watson that there is a deep set of corruption, of financial benefit, that has been happening to get these projects signed off, to be able to work on these sites.

Steve McGhie interjected.

David SOUTHWICK: Member for Melton, we know that legitimate labour hire firms have not been allowed to work on the Big Build sites, and miraculously, those that are connected to financial benefit and to the CFMEU have been able to get those jobs. What is the benefit, and why isn’t the government investigating it? Why does the government say, ‘Not our problem. Leave it to Victoria Police’? Well, it is the government’s problem. It is the government’s problem to fix, and the government is not fixing it because they are absolutely up to their eyeballs in this corruption – up to their eyeballs in it. We will not stop until we finally get to the bottom of this. The Liberal–Nationals have said that we will have a royal commission and we will not stop until everyone that is connected is investigated – even many of the backbenchers that may be receiving donations from the CFMEU and many of the ministers that may have received donations from some of the companies connected to these labour hire firms. Who knows who has been promised – who knows who has had contributions to their funds going into all of this? This is the Labor Party at its best – scandal after scandal. When there is an opportunity for a free feed and when there is an opportunity to get themselves into the honeypot of the dough, the Labor Party are just both hands in – head in, the whole lot in – taking everything they possibly can. And again, taxpayers bear the brunt. What has the member for Point Cook done for the $15 billion in his electorate? Nothing.

Mathew Hilakari: On a point of order, Speaker, certainly we are building Central Avenue and Point Cook Road currently. If the member for Caulfield has an allegation –

The SPEAKER: What is your point of order, member for Point Cook?

Mathew Hilakari: he should take it to police, on relevance.

The SPEAKER: There is no point of order.

David SOUTHWICK: Again, there is clearly something that this government is covering up. Members like the member for Point Cook do not like it when we call them out in terms of the corruption that has been happening under their watch. This is corruption that has been happening under their watch. The Attorney misled the Parliament the other day.

Nathan Lambert: On a point of order, Speaker, you will be aware that standing order 118 protects individual members from serious allegations of corruption. If the speaker on their feet wants to go in that direction, they should do so by substantive motion.

The SPEAKER: I do remind members about imputations on individual members of Parliament. Be very, very mindful of that during this MPI, member for Caulfield.

David SOUTHWICK: These are again frivolous points of order because this government are continuing to cover up the corruption that has been happening under their watch. We saw today on the front page of the Herald Sun, ‘We want the truth.’ We want to know what has been going on in terms of the truth. It is very simple.

Anthony Cianflone interjected.

David SOUTHWICK: If the member for Pascoe Vale does not like the Herald Sun, the Age today on the front page warns of corruption in the Big Build authority. The government can laugh – it does not matter what media outlet you use, they continue to laugh because they just think taxpayers money being wasted is a big joke. They do not care.

This government does not care about what the $15 billion would do for taxpayers: $5000 for every household, 130,000 additional police officers, 176,000 nurses, 150,000 teachers, 13 Frankston hospitals. Again, in terms of all of this, a government that is struggling to put more cops on the beat, struggling to put more nurses and doctors on the beat, struggling to pay teachers what they should be paid, is happy to literally spend $15 billion on corruption and cover-up. And why? If the government were serious, they would follow the money and get it back – that is what taxpayers want. They want their money back. It should not go to bikies. It should not go to dealers on these worksites. Again, this is a government that says they stand up for workers. Well, every worker that I know says they want a fair day’s pay for a fair day’s work. Fair days under Labor? Not with the corruption we are seeing here. When you are seeing wads of cash being taken by the CFMEU and their bikies and Labor say that is okay, how do you explain that to hardworking workers that miss out and have their taxpayer money taken off them? How do you explain that? How do you explain the fact that hardworking taxpayers go to a job every day, work their guts out to get their pay and, by the same token, are not part of the CFMEU mates on the Big Build getting this kind of corruption kickback? That is okay under Labor. Do you know why? Because there are two rules: one rule for their CFMEU bikie mates and another rule for everybody else. That is how Labor rolls. Labor is corrupt, and we are now starting to see it. The wheels are starting to fall off, and they will come up and try and take protection and try and take points of order because they know they cannot handle the truth.

The SPEAKER: Member for Brighton, I do believe that you are holding a party document. I ask you to –

James Newbury: This is actually my document.

The SPEAKER: It has got party information on it.

Michaela Settle: On a point of order, Speaker, the member for Caulfield has just made a very serious allegation of corruption, and I do not believe you can do that in normal debate. It has to be under a substantive motion.

The SPEAKER: If it was against a particular individual member, no. But it is fine.

David SOUTHWICK: Again frivolous points of order because Labor cannot handle the truth. This is a corrupt government that has taken $15 billion and literally thrown it up against the wall. It is a complete disgrace, and what would we do about it? We would have a royal commission, we would get to the bottom of it, we would enforce the law with corruption consequences, we would boot bikies off building worksites, we would not allow bikies to continue –

Anthony Cianflone: On a point of order, Speaker, standing order 122, ‘Members not to read newspapers’, says:

It is inappropriate for a member to read a newspaper or similar large documents in his or her place other than when addressing the Chair.

I put to you that he has been reading from a Herald Sun article and an Age article.

David SOUTHWICK: On the point of order, Speaker, I was reading from our plan to clean up crime in Victoria, and that is what we will be doing.

The SPEAKER: Order! The member for Caulfield is warned. We will not have party documents in the house, and that applies to everyone.

David SOUTHWICK: This is a corrupt government that takes $15 billion of taxpayers money and wastes it, and again, Victorian taxpayers are worse off. If this government were serious about this, they would give the powers to follow the money, they would agree to a royal commission and they would get to the bottom of all of this. We know that Labor will not do it, because Labor cannot handle the truth, and again, you lot are all corrupt.

Michaela Settle: On a point of order, Speaker, the member for Caulfield just referred to the Speaker as corrupt.

The SPEAKER: I ask members to just calm down a little bit. It is not okay to refer to people, whether they be members or the Speaker, in disparaging ways.

 Dylan WIGHT (Tarneit) (16:17): I will take the temperature down a bit. It gives me great pleasure to rise this afternoon. Actually, no, it does not give me great pleasure, to be honest. I was pretty surprised when the MPI came through yesterday. I was not surprised at its content. It is the same dross, the same garbage that they have been rolling with for a couple of weeks, when they manage to stay on message in question time. It is the same sort of stuff that they have been rolling out. What I was surprised at is that they let the member for Caulfield kick off an MPI, being the lightweight that he is. I mean, 8 minutes in he was dead in the water, reading a newspaper and playing on his iPad.

The SPEAKER: I remind the member for Tarneit about talking about members of Parliament in disparaging ways. I will not remind you again. If you do it again, I will sit you down.

Members interjecting.

The SPEAKER: Order! Member for Caulfield! Member for Eureka, you are warned.

Dylan WIGHT: I listened to you shout at clouds for 15 minutes. The government –

David Southwick: On a point of order, Speaker, he is referring to the Speaker – ‘listening to you shouting at the clouds.’

The SPEAKER: Member for Tarneit, if you cannot speak to the MPI, you can leave the chamber.

Dylan WIGHT: I was just getting to it, Speaker, thank you. The government’s response to what we have seen in recent weeks through stories in the Age from Nick McKenzie and on 60 Minutes has been solid and has been exactly what it should be. Criminal activity on building sites in Victoria – anywhere in Victoria – is not acceptable, and if that is happening, then matters should be referred to Victoria Police and should be referred to the relevant agencies to be dealt with. Now, this government, in response to these allegations, in response to these reports, has taken strong action. We have introduced new laws giving police greater powers to deal with bikies and organised criminals. We now have a tougher labour hire watchdog. Let us remember that it was this government that brought in the labour hire commissioner. It was this government that did that to make sure that, not just on construction sites but everywhere, labour hire companies are registered and are doing what they should be doing. There is a protected complaints pathway with criminal offences for threatening whistleblowers, something that is obviously incredibly important in this space when we are talking, potentially, about organised crime figures. There have been 70 criminal charges laid. Seventy criminal charges laid is not insignificant, that is incredibly significant. The Labour Hire Authority, which we created, has cancelled 126 construction company licences. That is swift, decisive and real action. We are not into just coming in here and saying a bunch of words just to rile the public up. It is all about politics for those opposite. It always has been, and it always will be.

Danny O’Brien interjected.

The SPEAKER: Leader of the Nationals, I warned the member for Tarneit about interjecting when he is on the speaking list. I make the same warning to you.

Dylan WIGHT: I cannot wait to listen to that contribution! That is swift and decisive action. We are not about politics. If there are allegations of criminal behaviour on construction sites anywhere, then they should be referred to the relevant authorities, whether that be Victoria Police or the Labour Hire Authority or any other authority for that matter, and they will be dealt with swiftly.

To go to some of the member for Caulfield’s contribution, his 15-minute contribution, he sort of rambled on for a bit. But to stand there with a straight face and go to things like donations – I mean, how did the Madafferis treat the member for Bulleen at dinner, hey? Like, to go to that sort of stuff with us – I mean the opposition would not know integrity if it was staring them in the face, and they have the gall to come into this place with an MPI like this to insert government corruption and to look members on the government benches in the face and, frankly, call them corrupt. I mean, the gall to do that is something that I have never seen before. I understand why they are a little bit edgy today for a couple of reasons. I get it.

Another thing that we have done is establish an independent review into this entire situation, and we have committed that we will carry out every single recommendation. I had the opportunity to read another review last night, the review into the Liberal Party’s federal campaign.

James Newbury: On a point of order, Speaker: relevance.

The SPEAKER: The member for Tarneit will come back to the MPI.

Dylan WIGHT: Indeed I will come back to the MPI. At the core of this MPI is the dysfunction and the rabble of those opposite. That is at the core of this. To come into this place with this MPI, stare us dead in the eye and try to talk to us about integrity, it just shows what a rabble that those opposite are. It –

James Newbury: On a point of order, Speaker: relevance.

The SPEAKER: He is comparing and contrasting. An MPI is about a particular thing, though. Member for Tarneit, you might want to read it.

Dylan WIGHT: No, I completely understand. But to come into this place with this MPI shows what a dysfunctional lot they are. I am pretty sure, in that review that I spoke about earlier, which I am not speaking about again, the dysfunction of the Victorian Liberal Party was –

James Newbury: On a point of order, Speaker, this is an abuse of the matter of public importance time. The member is clearly attacking the opposition rather than dealing with the substance of the matter.

The SPEAKER: The MPI is quite a wideranging debate. There is no rule that a member cannot speak about the opposition. Member for Tarneit, I remind you about speaking to the subject matter of the MPI mostly in your contribution.

Dylan WIGHT: Thank you for the ruling, Speaker. I thought that I was talking to the MPI and I was talking to the dysfunctionality of the Victorian Liberal Party. It has got everything to do with the MPI. We can go to the contribution of the member for Caulfield. We can just go to the contents of the MPI. For the opposition to come in here and think that this was a good idea shows complete and utter dysfunction. They show it every single day. They show it every single day, and we certainly saw the dysfunction of the Victorian Liberal Party on show at the federal election. We did see that.

As I said, the government has taken swift and decisive action when it comes to the allegations on Victorian construction sites. As I said, we have seen 70 criminal charges laid and 126 labour hire companies have had their licences removed through the authority that this government set up. What we will not do, though, is come in here and be anti-worker – come in here and trash Victorian workers, trash construction workers. We will not do that, unlike the Liberal Party. The member for Caulfield went through what $15 billion could buy you – how many nurses, how many teachers. I mean, it still was not as many as they sacked last time they were in government. They have never met a worker that they do not want to sack, they have never seen an infrastructure project that they do not want to cancel.

Members interjecting.

Dylan WIGHT: I am glad you found that funny.

A member interjected.

Dylan WIGHT: East–west link – the flawed project that the former government signed a contract for in caretaker, or was it just before caretaker? The former government did a whole bunch of stuff –

Michaela Settle interjected.

The SPEAKER: Member for Eureka, this is your last warning.

Dylan WIGHT: in caretaker in the last government, so I have found out. A couple of precinct structure plans in Tarneit, which are not much good, were signed during caretaker too. Honestly, the audacity of this lot over there to come into this chamber and lecture us on integrity is the most laughable thing that I have seen since I have been elected, and I have seen some funny stuff in this place. This is by far the most laughable.

As I said, the government has absolutely zero tolerance for criminal activity on any of its projects – on any government project, on any infrastructure project, indeed anywhere within our community. That is why Victoria Police and the Labour Hire Authority now have the powers they need to stamp out that criminal activity on work sites, and as I said, they are using them: 70 people charged, 126 ‍labour hire companies losing their licences. That is not insignificant by any means, but that does not mean that the job is done. We need to make sure that Victoria Police and the Labour Hire Authority have the powers that they need to be able to stamp out this behaviour. We have seen several arrests, as I said, but we have seen arrests on the news at night, a taskforce doing its job, and we would urge anybody – whether that is people that have been on construction sites or whether that is other people within the community – that has information in respect to these allegations to come forward to the relevant authorities and report it. Essentially that is what we need to do and that is what we need to be focused on. Taskforce Hawk is doing this work and is moving along and being successful given the numbers that I just gave. As I said, I would just urge anybody with information in respect to these allegations to relay it to the relevant authorities.

Those opposite have called for royal commissions, they have called for inquiries, they have called for all manner of different things. All that does is delay justice, delay charges and delay the work that needs to be done by these relevant authorities. Australia had a royal commission into this. I was a relatively new union official at the time. It took two years for that royal commission to conclude and it cost the country $46 million, but this frugal lot over there that like to talk about government debt and government spending would like to spend $46 million on a two-year inquiry when at the end of it I am pretty confident there would be not much of a material outcome.

Instead of more talk, as I said, we have got on with strong action, making sure that Victoria Police and the Labour Hire Authority have the tools that they need to charge anybody that is involved in criminal activity but also to deregister, or take licences away from, any labour hire companies that have been doing the wrong thing on government projects. As I said at the outset of this, it is a pretty laughable MPI for several reasons, which I will not go back into. This government has zero tolerance for any criminal behaviour anywhere in our community, in particular on government worksites, and the actions of this government have been swift, have been real and have resulted in arrests and in companies doing this being unregistered.

 Danny O’BRIEN (Gippsland South) (16:32): It is a pleasure – well, it is not a pleasure – to rise and speak on this issue, because, while the member for Tarneit might call this MPI laughable, the 7 ‍million Victorians do not think that $15 billion of their money going up in smoke is laughable. What I think probably was a little bit laughable about that contribution is I sometimes look at ministers on the other side and wonder how they got to that position. Then I hear a contribution like that from one of the backbench members and I understand exactly how they got to that position, because there was obviously not a lot of competition for it in that respect.

Dylan Wight: How many years have you been a minister for?

Danny O’BRIEN: Same number of years as you, old mate.

The SPEAKER: Leader of the Nationals! The member for Tarneit can leave the chamber for an hour.

Member for Tarneit withdrew from chamber.

The SPEAKER: Leader of the Nationals, I ask you to speak through the Chair, and I have already reminded members about imputations.

Danny O’BRIEN: I do need to reflect on some of the statements from the member for Tarneit. We are hearing that the government acted swiftly apparently. I reckon Nick McKenzie from the Age would be pretty interested in that response. He has continued to roll out year after year after year more issues with this Big Build, yet this government says it acted swiftly.

To the question of a royal commission, we saw in the papers today how Victorians want a royal commission: 75 per cent of them understand the issue here, and they absolutely would like to see a royal commission. We hear those opposite say we had the royal commission in 2015 and it did not find anything. When did the Big Build start, everybody? The Big Build started after 2015. This matter of public importance, the Watson report, the corruption that we have heard about in the last couple of weeks has occurred on the Big Build site under this Labor government. It is such a facetious argument to say we had a royal commission and it did not do any good. The crooks had not started doing their crook stuff at that point in time. That was the problem.

Then we hear we have got Operation Hawk. Does everybody remember Operation Hawk? Probably not everyone does remember Operation Hawk. I know the Premier did not remember Operation Hawk, because she was on her way to announce Operation Hawk a few months ago and had to be reminded that it had been going for 12 months already. I understand that people on that side had forgotten about Operation Hawk, but they are out there spouting that there have been 70 charges laid. I know a 15-year-old kid in my electorate that has had more than 70 charges laid on him alone. To suggest that 70 ‍charges has somehow cleaned up the entire Big Build is just absurd for this government to be talking about, saying, you know, ‘Job’s done.’

The other thing that I need to pick the member for Tarneit up on – I am disappointed he is not here, but perhaps a future speaker could enlighten me – is he told the chamber just now that the government has announced an independent review.

James Newbury interjected.

Danny O’BRIEN: What is that indeed, member for Brighton. What is this independent review? Has it just been announced by the member for Tarneit? Is this new policy that we are not aware of? Because we certainly have not seen an independent review. I did hear someone mention the Wilson review. That was done and dusted, and jeez, hasn’t that cleaned the place up! That has made a huge difference already! It was so quick and dirty that the CFMEU did not even notice that it was happening. They went ahead and have continued to do exactly what they have been doing: funnelling taxpayers money to bikies and criminals and seeing every single Victorian have to pay the consequences of that. And it is not just the consequences of the lost money that has gone from our taxpayer dollars, it is the opportunity cost for every single one of us. I know particularly my rural and regional colleagues will say, ‘There are so many things that we have been waiting for this government to spend money on in our electorates, particularly infrastructure, and they haven’t happened.’ Now we find that $15 billion minimum, according to Geoffrey Watson SC, has just disappeared.

I have been waiting for the government to fund the Sale College replacement, bringing it on to one campus and building a new school. We have got roads in an appalling condition. We have been waiting for the Western Highway project to get underway through the seat of Ripon and out to Lowan – all those areas. I know the member for Mildura, after some floods this week, has probably got a few roads that she needs fixing up. I know the member for Ovens Valley spent – how many years waiting for dialysis chairs at Cobram hospital?

Tim Bull: Still waiting.

Danny O’BRIEN: Still waiting for dialysis chairs. All of these are things that we are desperate for at the West Gippsland Hospital. I see the member for Narracan is here. I actually had the Minister for Health today say ‘all the rural and regional hospitals that we’ve been funding’, and when I said ‘Where’s the money for West Gippsland?’ she turned around and showed me her back, not surprisingly, because they have made a commitment to it but it is still not there. Where is the money?

The government stands condemned on the opportunity cost that we have lost because of the corruption that it is overseeing. To have members opposite, like the member for Tarneit, say ‘We’ve acted swiftly and cleaned it all up’ is just absurd and appalling. The government wants to cover it up, the Liberals and Nationals want to clean it up. We have a very strong plan that has been announced over the last couple of weeks, and we are still working through it. That includes ensuring that we have a royal commission. As I said, people in Victoria are saying to us that we need a royal commission. We committed two years ago to establishing Construction Enforcement Victoria to actually have a watchdog on the job on those Big Build sites and other sites around the state and to ensure that the rules are being adhered to. Part of that is reinstating the code of practice for the building and construction sector, which was abolished by this government when they came to power in late 2014, to make sure that there is a code of practice, that the law is respected, that corruption does not occur and that taxpayers dollars are not wasted and to have Construction Enforcement Victoria to oversight that and to enforce that code. We attempted to introduce legislation this morning to deal with that. Surprise, surprise, the government opposed that legislation.

Speaking of which, yesterday we moved to give IBAC the follow-the-dollar powers, which are so critical, that it has been asking for years and that the Premier was advised in 2024 that IBAC needed. We again, through the member for Brighton yesterday, introduced legislation. What did the government do? They voted it down – voting with their feet. You can see exactly what their attitude to this stuff is. It is to oppose anything that will actually reveal what has been going on. As I said, going back to that, the government said, ‘We acted swiftly.’ Well, the Premier in 2024 wrote to IBAC knowing – she must have known or at least should have known – that IBAC did not have the powers to actually investigate this corruption when it comes to third parties. IBAC then wrote back to her and said it did not have the powers. What did the Premier do? Did she change IBAC’s powers? Did she look at an alternative method as to a way the government could investigate these allegations of corruption? No, she did nothing.

James Newbury interjected.

Danny O’BRIEN: She did not even say that. It was extraordinary that the Premier would come out a few weeks ago and release her original letter to IBAC and not think that perhaps people would ask, ‘Then what happened?’ The Premier can say she referred this, but she referred it to someone who could not do anything about it, and that is the fallacy of it. Now, as this Parliament tries to clean up the mess and to give IBAC those powers, the government is opposing it.

We have also committed to mandatory criminal background checks to keep bikies and criminals off our government worksites. We know from the ‘Building bad’ series and from the Geoffrey Watson report that we have seen criminal activity on worksites. Whether that is drug dealing, whether it is standover tactics or whether it is state-sponsored strippers, all of these things have been happening for years now on the Big Build, and the government has done nothing about it.

We have also committed, on top of Construction Enforcement Victoria, to a police taskforce in conjunction with the AFP and the ATO to seize assets and go after the money, to find the money. I think that is one of the things that Victorians are angry about. The corruption is one thing, but it is the scale of it and the $15 billion of taxpayers money that keeps being repeated to us.

We have also committed to new laws to target the crime bigwigs. We know time and time again it is the organised crime bosses who are not addressed properly, and that is why we will do that. That is a simple plan: enforce the law, find the money and stop the rorts. The Liberals and Nationals have got a plan. We are committed to addressing this, we are committed to cleaning up our state and we are committed to cleaning up the Big Build. The Labor government seem only committed to covering it up, because they oppose every step of the way, they minimise everything and they attack the messengers, people like Geoffrey Watson. They stand condemned for the gross waste of Victorian taxpayers dollars.

 Paul EDBROOKE (Frankston) (16:42): It was a member of the opposition who allegedly shared a lobster meal at the now defunct Lobster Cave with Mr Madafferi, which is a name a lot of people seemed to have heard before, but I personally had not; maybe I was naive. I had not read his name in the paper and had to do quite a bit of research about that. That leads me to today’s MPI. I would not like to echo some of the tinfoil hats, but some people need to do their own research with this. We should be a society that has zero tolerance for criminality. We certainly are a government that have zero tolerance for criminality, and I will talk about that soon. But we should also be inquisitive in this place, and we should interrogate things that we are told to see if they are factual. I believe that with this MPI the coalition probably need to define what they are asking for a little bit more clearly. The proposition is not clear, and it is not clear what it is based on. There are three separate issues that I want to interrogate and pull apart. One is the claim of $15 billion, another is enforcing the law and then following the money and stopping rorts. Let us just look at those separately. I am not offering my opinion here; I am going to offer what other people have said.

We have heard the allegation of $15 billion. I certainly have not seen any evidence to go along with that. I have heard a claim. These claims were in a report and were removed by an administrator because he was not satisfied that they were well founded. From the very beginning it is looking a bit shaky. These claims have also been questioned by other experts. For example, David Hayward, who is an emeritus professor in public policy with RMIT University, I believe, stated that he did not understand why Watson went down the ‘exaggeration path’; that was in the Guardian on 17 February. He also said he did not see any reason to believe the criminality was as financially significant as the redacted Watson chapter suggests. He said overruns were largely due to increased materials and equipment costs and other issues with particular projects.

The economist Saul Eslake, who I think is a former Kennett adviser, said the engineering construction implicit price deflator – which, for the uneducated, is a measure of price growth used in the industry by the ABS – shows costs in Victoria went up by 36.8 per cent between December 2014 and September 2025. From the outset, not everyone believes this claim, and therefore the aim of following money in this MPI would be difficult without some kind of evidence that that claim is true. Again, if we are going to base an MPI on it, this claim should at least be able to stand one day of interrogation in the media if not at least two. I also want to know what the goal of this MPI is when it says ‘enforcing the law’, because as I see it here today, and no-one has yet convinced me otherwise, the only tool that can do that is actually already doing it. If the intention is to investigate and prosecute criminals and get them out of the industry, that is happening right now. If we are talking about royal commissions, a retrospective review like a royal commission does not have the powers to do that.

I guess what it comes down to is: do those opposite want to read a report or do they want to see people arrested? Do they want to see criminals put behind bars and prosecuted for their crimes? Do they want to read a review in three years or do they want action now? That is what it comes down to for me; it is fairly simple. We have already seen with the police 70-plus charges laid and 126 licences for construction builders cancelled. An independent review has been established, the Wilson review, and we are carrying out every recommendation. We have got a tougher labour hire watchdog, wider ranging powers and serious penalties as well. I think there is a school of thought within the group of people I have been asking about this – people who are lawyers and barristers – that when the opposition are referring to a royal commission they believe the existing institutions are failing and the police are not doing their job. Again, I am happy to have my mind changed on that, but I think the police are doing their job, and I certainly back the police and so does this government. Those bodies that are appropriate and empowered to investigate are Victoria Police, the federal police and the Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission. They can execute search warrants. They can charge offenders. They can prosecute criminal conduct. And the truth is that a royal commission cannot do that. If we are sitting here today and the proposition is that we should be cleaning up this industry right now, the only action then is to enforce the law via the police, prosecute criminals, and it does not seem to be what we are talking about today. That concerns me, because if criminal behaviour exists, which we have seen it does, the fastest path to accountability is via the police investigating and prosecution, not a multiyear inquiry. We know that royal commissions take years. What we need is action now, and we have seen that action, and it has been put on the record by various speakers before me.

There is also something that has been raised that I found quite interesting, which was the risk of politicising the justice process. What I would take that as is royal commissions and inquiries like that becoming political theatre. Critics would argue that criminal matters should be determined by courts, not public inquiries, and what can happen is these two things running together can prejudice future trials. Royal commissions hold very public hearings. Witnesses give evidence under oath, documents are released and media coverage is intense, and what that can do is influence jurors, and the accused may not receive a fair trial. Evidence can also be exposed before police use it. Royal commissions publish documents straightaway, I believe. They reveal investigative pathways. They can warn suspects and allow stories to be coordinated before police have the ability to do their job. I would also say that royal commissions can force people to give evidence even if it may incriminate them, however the law provides protections, and there are going to be issues there as well. It creates complex grounds for legal workarounds, and it means that prosecutors can sometimes not rely on detailed admissions made in those inquiries.

Those parallel processes between police investigations or federal police investigations and a royal commission or another inquiry running simultaneously can create a tension between that investigative transparency and criminal procedure fairness, and police may need in their investigations secrecy, controlled interviews and carefully sequenced evidence in their investigations. There is also the issue of trial by media. We never want to white-ant the police in their investigations through a trial by media, running the risk of things like reputational damage before guilt is even proven, putting pressure on prosecutors and also putting pressure on judges and courts as well. I think what we all should agree on in this house is that if crimes have been committed, the place to test that evidence is in a courtroom, it is not in a televised royal commission hearing. If we want action now, if crimes have been committed, the place to deal them is a court of law. The royal commission does not put anyone in jail. It does not have the power to do that; police investigations do. As I previously said, we have seen those police investigations lay 70 charges. We have seen licences suspended. This government has made new laws giving police greater powers with things like firearm prohibition orders.

There is a lot of change happening to clean up this construction industry. The Labour Hire Authority has cancelled 126 company licences, which I think is substantial, but we see the legal side of it in the investigative process with VicPol. We also see some other aspects and initiatives that the government has taken and put in place. I would really hate to think that anyone opposite wanted to see this as an ongoing issue for three or four years without anything happening. I think what we are aiming for today with this MPI is to make sure criminals are put behind bars.

The SPEAKER: Before I call the member for Brighton, I remind members that party-political material is not allowed in the chamber.

 James NEWBURY (Brighton) (16:52): I rise in support of the member for Caulfield’s matter of public importance, an important matter of public importance, in fact the first substantive way this house has dealt with what Victorians know is the worst corruption scandal, the worst instance of corruption, this state has ever seen – a $15 billion corruption of taxpayers money. Victorians have looked on since allegations of a $15 billion corruption have occurred, and they have been watching as the government has been talking down the corruption and has been attacking those who want to blow the whistle to it. They have been watching, and what they have said, I think, is they want to know what has happened. They want to know what has occurred. Allegations have been put forward, and Victorians rightfully want to know what is occurring on these government sites. It is a very fair question.

I think Victorians also want to know how much it has cost them, and the Premier has consistently said it is not the number 15. The Premier has confirmed that corruption has occurred but said repeatedly it is not the number 15. So Victorians of course are asking, ‘Well, what’s the number? It’s our money, Premier – what’s the number?’ The Premier says, ‘We don’t want to know. We don’t want to know as a government what’s happening. We know something’s going wrong. We know that corruption is occurring. We don’t want to know what, in detail, is happening, and we certainly don’t want to know how much of your money it’s cost.’ Well, I think Victorians have said, ‘Not good enough.’ Though I would certainly caution against following public polling as a pastime, you can certainly see today three out of four Victorians say they want to see action on corruption.

Tim Richardson interjected.

The SPEAKER: Member for Mordialloc, you may not have been in the chamber earlier when I warned members who were on the speaking list to be very, very careful.

James NEWBURY: They want to see action, and so do we. At the end of the day – and I make this point repeatedly – every dollar this government spends was first earned by a Victorian through their hard work and sweat. This government did not get this money through some imaginary money tree or earn it themselves. They certainly did not earn it themselves – they took it off Victorians. They took it away from Victorians, and we have seen $15 billion or more lost to corruption. Victorians just want accountability. That is why we have said we must have a royal commission, and that is what the Liberals and Nationals will do. We will chase down every single dollar and we will find every criminal. That is the proposition we are putting to the Victorian people. After the next election, because I see no world where this government acts on the greatest corruption scandal this state has ever seen, every Victorian can be assured we will hold a royal commission, we will chase down every dollar and we will find every criminal. Why? Because we will hold them to account. We will hold every criminal to account.

What we have seen over recent weeks is a shocking, shocking set of allegations, met only with an even more shocking response from a government. We have seen ministers attack experts for calling out what is occurring. We have seen a Premier hide behind a fig leaf of saying nothing other than ‘I’m not going to say anything other than if there’s an allegation to be put then put it to the police’ to the point that she shuts down journalists from talking. Then we discover that the Attorney-General did not put allegations that were put to her to the police, after advising the house that that is what had happened, which forced the Attorney-General to come into this place and give a personal explanation. It is astonishing. I have seen very few personal explanations, because they are rare. I certainly have never seen an Attorney be forced to give a personal explanation. It just goes to show, though, how the government is behaving on these issues.

Today we asked the Premier in question time about links to government contracts in companies owned by or linked with Mick Gatto. The minister responsible for much of the Big Build, the now Premier, simply did not answer the question and said, ‘Refer it off to another agency. Refer it off to another authority.’ Can you believe that questions about one of the most notorious names in modern Victorian history were put to a Premier – someone who, by the way, thinks the Premier is a good person; a mate it might seem, I do not know – and the Premier’s response was, ‘I don’t want to know. I don’t want to know. I’m not going to check. I’m not going to let people know.’ Well, I suspect money is going into Mick Gatto’s pocket, and I do not think that he is the only one. I think it is all going to become clear.

We have a plan to not only clean up corruption by way of a royal commission. We have announced a number of policies and moved two bills already this week to try and do so, including one to give the chief anti-corruption agency the power it needs, because the anti-corruption agency has been calling for stronger powers. The Premier released a letter recently as some kind of fig leaf of defence that she has acted – ‘I wrote to IBAC.’ She never told anybody that two weeks later IBAC wrote back and said it did not have the powers to do anything. Whoops, that was a mistake, wasn’t it? I will tell you what, I bet her media office got a flogging for that one. No-one checked what the response was. The response was ‘We need the powers.’ I would say to every Victorian: yesterday every Labor member of Parliament voted against our bill to give IBAC the powers they need – every Labor member. Remember that, Victoria: every Labor member.

Today we moved a bill to try and clean up these worksites with a proper oversight body, as should be the case. And again every Labor member voted against it. We have announced other provisions to clean up worksites. We want to make sure criminals are off worksites. It seems like an obvious measure, one that clearly the government does not support.

Tim Richardson interjected.

James NEWBURY: The government members are saying we would not have any worksites if we got criminals off them. That may be the case under a Labor government. I take up the member’s interjection. Under this government there would not be any Big Build sites if you removed criminals from them. I take them at their word.

Members interjecting.

James NEWBURY: That is the point. We have a plan to clean up these sites, because Victorians deserve it. Victorians deserve a state that is clean of crime and corruption. That is why Jess Wilson and our team have a plan to clean this state up. I can assure every Victorian as you are looking on and seeing no action from this government, obfuscation from this government, dodging, ducking, weaving and deflection from this government, after November, if you elect a coalition government, you will see a state that is cleaned up with a government that wants to clean it up and will clean it up.

 Tim RICHARDSON (Mordialloc) (17:02): Goodness me, what a performance that was. I know the member for Brighton was not here before 2018, but what absolute hyperventilating from a party that had the biggest PR scandal ever with ‘lobster with a mobster’ from the member for Bulleen. I mean, the irony of the red-faced performance by the member for Brighton with the frontbench performer who sat down at the now closed Lobster Cave with all the gangsters around the table taking their funds and their donations. The gall of the member for Brighton to stand here after the Age did a massive exposé that could have only been leaked by the Liberals themselves – the internal hit job on the member for Bulleen. The gall of the member for Brighton to conclude that they have some sort of standard and integrity is absolutely astonishing.

Where were they when the Wilson review was going on? Where were these experts who come from the flock of the ‘lobster with a mobster’ crew? Where were they? Because those eight recommendations that were put in have been implemented. That independent review that they have been calling for, that was undertaken, that was swiftly announced by the Premier, that was delivered with full force and vigour and has seen reforms in our state. It has done a significant amount to clean up our construction industry, with federal oversight from an administrator as well. That is decisive action. That is not waiting three to five years for a royal commission to placate whatever political base they are going after.

The member for Brighton made a fair point. He said they look at polls from time to time and they are looking at polls at the moment. I had a look at the polls this morning, and I saw that when the member for Berwick was the Leader of the Opposition their polling was at 41. If opposition officers are looking now, because you know they are tuning in across at Spring Street, if they are looking in from their offices now, how does 27 look? How does that look right now, pleading with the One Nation far-right crew? How does it look to be placating the leader of One Nation Pauline Hanson, who says herself she hates Melbourne and hates Victoria? That is right now the base that they are placating. If the member for Brighton goes near polling, they are literally in free fall. They are falling through the floor right now, and they do not know what they are anymore or what they stand for. This is just another attempt to grab the headline from either the Herald Sun or Sky after dark without any factual basis for what we see right here.

We have had reviews, we have had oversights, we have had federal royal commissions that cost tens of millions of dollars, maybe even more – into a nine-figure sum – that did not lay any charges and basically for two years ran around the countryside. We have already acted. We have already taken decisive action with the Wilson review and the additional strengthening requirements that we have been putting in place. That is what decisive action looks like. That is what standing up and showing leadership looks like. It is worth remembering the nuance in this discussion, because the entire cost that has been talked about and the lines that have been used by the opposition go straight to the heart of workers – the 144,000 CFMEU construction workers. The organisation is in administration, but they are still working in construction and on projects. So when you tarnish every construction worker, when you go after every person that works in construction, you are going directly after their outcomes, their wages and their conditions. That is irrefutable when you look at that and the actions by the opposition, because we know absolutely what they would do to working people time and time again. They had reviews when they came into government under Baillieu and Napthine. Remember they reviewed everything for three years, changed their leader, did nothing, had no big build and had no projects, and then they put some stickers on the ground out at Southern Cross station. You might remember that was their big build. They had sticker contracts at Southern Cross. All these amazing tourists got out. They walked to the edge of the platform, and they nearly found themselves in Tottenham, because the stickers said the airport was out that way. That was the level of big build and construction that was going on at the time.

Some of the things that have been exposed in the reports and the absolutely outrageous behaviour are something that we absolutely condemn in the strongest possible terms, and our Premier has done that directly. The notion that there has not been action does not stack up in fact, but do not let facts get in the way of a Liberal Party discussion. They never feature; facts do not matter. Facts do not worry anyone on that side of this place, because we have seen 70 criminal charges already laid by Victoria Police’s Taskforce Hawk. So the demonising of Victoria Police members in saying that nothing has happened is once again punching down on the people in our emergency services and police. Those opposite have form. When it suits them, they will undermine a police commissioner. They will go after our police services –

Danny O’Brien interjected.

Tim RICHARDSON: The Leader of the Nationals is like a fish jumping on the hook itself without bait. In comes spinner. Here we go. The Leader of the Nationals is right here undermining police. There have been 70 charges laid, and there have been 126 construction licences cancelled as part of the Labour Hire Authority. I know that those opposite literally see Sky after dark and Paul Murray gives them their thinking and talking points – their thoughts for the day. They do not get up at 5 am. They literally do not get going until 8 or 8:30. They read the clips, and then they go, ‘We’ve got our doorstops for the day.’ That is literally how question time runs, because there is no systemisation, there is no thread of a tactic, there is not a pinch of salt of strategy or tactic in their performance at all. You see those talking points because you would know that the Wilson review happened. You might provide some commentary. You might put forward some notions of why the eight recommendations agreed in full and implemented that have led to these outcomes, that have strengthened the safety and protection of workers and outcomes, is an interesting point.

But there is an even more important point. We have got the member for Sandringham here, and it is almost like this was part of my speech – it was meant to happen. It is converging right here. The member for Sandringham is a massive fan of the former Premier and Treasurer of New South Wales, are you not, member for Sandringham – Dom Perrottet, who was the former New South Wales Treasurer and Premier? People might know that person. He has done a couple of events for the member for Sandringham over time, maybe one or two – a big fan, the member for Sandringham. Well, New South Wales cost escalations on construction projects – big build projects, because they did a few tunnels, they did a few major projects – were more than Victoria and more than the national average. So Victoria and New South Wales were under the construction escalation costs compared to the rest of the nation, which was around about 40 per cent. Victoria was around 38 per cent; New South Wales, 39. I am just wondering if the member for Sandringham is asking for Dom Perrottet and Gladys Berejiklian to be in a royal commission, some of the heroes of the Liberals. Wouldn’t they be up and about if they had a Gladys or a Dom just walking around the chamber and the corridors here? Wouldn’t that be nice? I know some of the former ghosts of the member for Gippsland South, the Leader of the Nationals, like Barnaby Joyce. I do not want to rake over anything at the moment. One Nation’s leader might be running for prime minister. But just going there makes them a bit nervous, if Barnaby walks across the Murray. They are just a bit edgy, these Nationals – a bit edgy. You know they were talking a big game that they would take out everything and they would run into other seats. Now they have just come in a little bit with all their hubris, because One Nation’s on a tear and taking them to pieces.

The member for Sandringham has got a drink of water. He has got the notes ready. I am just wondering if the member for Sandringham has the same contention that Dom Perrottet, his absolute hero – I think he would love to be like Dom in that frame – or Gladys Berejiklian, maybe a hero of the member for Kew, should be up in a royal commission. Are they saying the same things about those former Liberal Premiers in New South Wales? No, they are not, and there we go; we have belled the cat.

Danny O’Brien interjected.

Tim RICHARDSON: Come in, spinner, the Leader of the Nationals. Is he suggesting that –

Brad Rowswell: On a point of order, Deputy Speaker, I am not expecting you to give me an elephant stamp for this, other than to note that I am being entirely consistent with the standing orders in not interjecting on the rubbish coming from the member for Mordialloc’s mouth at the minute, and I would like you to note that.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Your point of order is?

Brad Rowswell: I would simply like you to notice I am behaving myself.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: That is not a point of order.

Tim RICHARDSON: I think there is an element of truth in what he says there – rubbish – the inverse of what, actually, he says. He is a very big fan of Dom. But no-one is saying that there suddenly needs to be a royal commission in New South Wales, who had worse cost escalations on construction projects than Victoria. It was said by Dom Perrottet at the time he was Treasurer that a part of doing business on the eastern seaboard was cost escalations and you have to barrel through, you have to charge through, and get these projects done. That is what was said by a hero Liberal Premier that has done nothing other than attend a fundraiser for the member for Sandringham and give him a pump-up.

When you look at that, you go, ‘What is this really about?’ and we have belled the cat here. We have actually figured out what this is really about. It is about populism and politics right there – a three- to five-year royal commission when charges are being laid and when the Labour Hire Authority has cancelled 126 construction company licences. We are not trying to get a political grab. We are acting while they are protecting their Liberal mates in other jurisdictions and calling for things that they will not call for anywhere else. Those are the absolute facts here. People have been charged. Contracts have been cancelled for labour hire. And that is leadership on behalf of this Premier.

 Brad ROWSWELL (Sandringham) (17:12): There are a couple of things to clear up from the member for Mordialloc’s contribution. If the member for Mordialloc is suggesting that the former Liberal Premiers of New South Wales – Perrottet, Berejiklian and Baird – have anything at all in common with the former Premier of this state, Andrews, and the current Premier of this state, Allan, well, he is more deluded than perhaps his colleagues, by the look of their faces, give him credit for, frankly. There is absolutely no similarity between the achievements of those giants of political contribution in our country and the failure of leadership that we have seen in this state for almost 12 ‍years, and thank goodness in November this year Victorians will have an opportunity to put an end to it once and for all and for the benefit of every single Victorian.

The assertion the member for Mordialloc made that having the position we have formed to rid this state of crime and rid this state of corruption, especially on Big Build projects in this state, somehow means that we do not give a stuff about workers could not be further from the truth. A royal commission in this state, the establishment of Construction Enforcement Victoria and giving IBAC follow-the-money powers, in my view and in our view, would in fact protect the rights and the dignity of construction workers in this state. I am very exercised by this. The assertion that we do not give a stuff about workers could not be further from the truth. Our target is not those hardworking Victorians who are doing their very best to provide for themselves, to provide for their families, to pay their increasing school bills, to pay their power bills and to figure out how the hell they are going to deal with another mortgage increase because the federal Treasurer cannot get a grip on inflation. We actually want to support those people, and we do support those people. The best way to support those hardworking Victorian workers on those construction sites is to have a royal commission to get to the bottom of –

Danny O’Brien interjected.

Brad ROWSWELL: Correct, Leader of the Nationals – to weed out the crooks, to rid our state of those crooks, to rid our state of crime, to rid our state of corruption and to run things in a way that they should be run. It should not be a ‘getting a deck of cards and tossing it into the air and hoping it all lands in one place’ circumstance. No, there should be order. This appeals to the conservative within me. There should be order, and there is not under this government. There has not been order in this state since the election of this government. If it was not so tragic and if it was not so serious, it would be absolutely and utterly laughable, but it is not. It is not laughable at all. $15 billion has been rorted – Victorian taxpayer dollars. Hardworking families have contributed with the highest taxes of any state in the nation. Victorian families, Victorians around the place, are experiencing the highest property taxes, the highest business taxes, the highest unemployment and the highest debt. This is serious stuff. We clearly need a change of government.

This is why earlier today I sought to introduce a bill to enable Construction Enforcement Victoria. This is why we need to establish a code of conduct on Victorian building sites, because when Labor were first elected almost 12 years ago, one of the first acts of that Labor government under the leadership of the former Premier – when the current Premier was a cabinet minister sitting at the table, contributing to the decisions that were made and contributing to the decisions that have led to crime and corruption running rampant on Victorian Big Build sites at the hands of this government being funded by innocent, hardworking Victorian taxpayers – was to scrap the building industry code that was established by the former coalition government. It was one of their first acts. It was good enough ‍– it is good enough, present tense – for the New South Wales Labor government to have a building construction code, so why not in Victoria? What are they afraid of? We will do the right thing by Victorians. We will do the right thing, not just by Victorian taxpayers, not just by those head contractors to give them the certainty that they desperately need but by the workers on those sites that deserve to be respected by their government and deserve to have the dignity of work implied in the actions of their government without being subjected to the criminality and the corruption that we have experienced and that we know has been taking place on Big Build sites since this government was elected. Every Victorian deserves so much more than what this government has offered.

This government is not interested in cleaning this up. It is not in their DNA at all. The Independent Broad-based Anti-corruption Commission, IBAC, the independent integrity watchdog, has been calling on this Labor government for more resources and for greater powers for some time. During the last parliamentary term, between 2018 and 2022, I had the privilege of serving with a number of other members present in the chamber as deputy chair of the Parliament’s Integrity and Oversight Committee. In that role, we heard time and time again evidence from IBAC, who said to us, ‘We don’t have the powers that we need. We don’t have the funding that we need, and we need more.’ I heard them, and it is quite clear that the government did not. There was recently a call in a parliamentary committee report – not a partisan political report, a parliamentary committee report – produced by the Integrity and Oversight Committee, of which the member for Brunswick is the chair and the member for Mildura is a member. That parliamentary committee called for follow-the-money powers for IBAC. They called for it. IBAC called for it. Yesterday in this place we introduced a bill to give IBAC those very powers, and every member of this government, every member of the Labor government, voted against it. They would not even enable the debate to be had. Our democracy is stronger when ideas are discussed and ideas are debated. Deputy Speaker, you know that and I know that. We should know that, but quite clearly we do not, because at first pass, at the sniff of just introducing a bill to have a conversation, to have a debate to expand IBAC’s power, something they have been calling for and a parliamentary committee has been calling for, the Labor government did not want to even consider the concept.

I have been asking myself a question. A question I have been asking myself is why, why, why does this government not want to progress with what is right? Why? Why does this government not want to progress with a royal commission, with giving IBAC the powers that it is calling for, with establishing Construction Enforcement Victoria and restoring integrity back onto the Big Build sites? And we have our answer. As the Herald Sun reported on Sunday 21 February:

The state opposition has taken aim at $1.5m in “tainted money” poured into ALP coffers by the disgraced Victorian CFMEU last term, as it ramps up calls for a royal commission.

That is right: between 2018 and 2022 the Victorian branch of the CFMEU contributed close to $1.5 million to the Victorian branch of the Australian Labor Party. So I will tell you why they do not want a royal commission and they do not want to strengthen the powers of IBAC, because as soon as they give just a millimetre of acknowledgement to do what is right, what they actually do is open up a Pandora’s box of problems for Premier Allan. That is exactly what they do. They are running a protection racket. They will continue running a protection racket, because it is all about them and not about Victorians.

 Lauren KATHAGE (Yan Yean) (17:22): Listening to people discussing this matter of public importance, I think we really need to recognise that at the heart of what we are talking about is workers. Listening to what has been said today, I could not help but think about the different workers and family members from Big Build sites that I have met around my electorate – for example, the office manager at a local school whose husband worked operating cranes in the Metro Tunnel and how proud she was that he was involved in building this infrastructure that is transforming our state. Just this Saturday at netball one of the netball mums was late. She was hustling to get the kids there because her husband had left early to go down and work in Mordialloc on the train there. She said, ‘It’s a long day but it’s good money.’ He is working hard and his whole family is wrapping around to keep life functioning and to support him to bring that money in for the family. And my brother-in-law, who has left and headed down to the south-west coast for a week or two to do fencing work on the Big Build, leaving behind his partner and their two kids, who have special needs, and all the extra work and difficulty that entails, and he is not doing it for fun; he is doing it because it brings in good money for the family, and that is money that they need with all the extra costs that they have. When the new elephant enclosure opened at Werribee Zoo, my whole extended family went down to see that, not to see the elephants but to see the enclosure, because my brother-in-law helped build the fence. He has done a good job. Onya, Wayne.

I think about the apprentice formworker that I met, helping to build a new bridge over the Plenty River at the Bridge Inn Road upgrade. In my office, in pride of place, is a photo from that same upgrade, the Bridge Inn Road upgrade. It is a photo of me with a group of female workers from that site – engineers, apprentices, concreters and traffic controllers. We joined together and had a good chat about their work there helping to transform the Mernda and Doreen communities. On behalf of them and of all my constituents, I am absolutely outraged that women would experience disrespect or any sort of harassment on worksites. Anybody who harms or disrespects a woman on a worksite should face the full force of the law, for the women onsite themselves and for women who may want jobs in construction in the future.

Because we are a government that protects workers rights, stands against corruption and has a strong focus on the wellbeing of women, we acted immediately when allegations surfaced. We established an independent review, the Wilson review, and carried out every recommendation. We gave police greater powers to deal with bikies and organised criminals. We made a tougher labour hire watchdog to break up any system that might be being used to benefit some at the expense of others. We will not accept that. We also made it easier for people to complain by setting up a complaints pathway and putting in support around whistleblowers. Our plan is working. We know it is working. Look at the outcomes: 70 criminal charges laid by Taskforce Hawk, 126 construction company licences cancelled ‍– 126 dodgy operators gone from sites – and the construction complaints referral service being operational.

These projects that are part of the Big Build are so important for my community. Unlike when the Liberals were in government and invested zero dollars in infrastructure in Yan Yean, this government has invested so much. I spoke about the Bridge Inn Road upgrade, which is complete. Currently underway is Yan Yean Road stage 2, and there is only a stage 2 because we did stage 1. There was the Plenty Road upgrade previously. The Wallan ramps and the North East Link are underway. These are projects that are transforming my community. Going back to talking about workers, it is making life easier for all workers across my electorate to get around, to get to jobs and to school and to have better transport. These projects, as I said, are so important for my community, and the jobs on these projects and around the state are relied on by families in my community. They are good, honest workers providing for their families and building a better community for us all.

I am sorry, but I just get a sense that those opposite have a problem with blue-collar workers. They have a bias against blue-collar workers. We can see it in the way they are talking about them in this place, but we can also see the evidence in what they did when they were last in government. With the cuts that they made to TAFE and with the cuts that they made to the apprentice pathway, we saw massive reductions in people taking up trade apprenticeships, with a 30 to 40 per cent drop in building and construction, carpentry, bricklaying, concreting and wall and ceiling lining. The numbers are there for anyone who wants to go and see the massive drop in apprentices because of the changes they made when they were in government. They have got a problem with blue-collar workers earning good money for their good families, and we are not just going to stand by and let them use anything they can to again attack these workers and again take away what has been built up over time for them. It is not something that we are willing to accept.

Going back to the women in the photograph in my office and all women that are on worksites around Victoria, we have got a special focus, as I said, on the wellbeing of women. Our government has invested $7.9 million to diversify the male-dominated construction industry – and I think that is really important – and developed and implemented Victoria’s first women in construction strategy and four-year action plan. The plan identified barriers for women to being a part of the industry and advanced interventions to help them get into the construction industry, because it is fun and it is good work. Under Labor it is well paid, and those opposite do not like it. They do not believe blue-collar workers deserve a good wage. We also established Victoria’s first building equality policy, mandating targets and gender equality for government-funded projects over $20 million.

It is important that we do this work. It needs to be a twin-track approach of bringing more women into the construction industry, but at the same time building in supports to make sure that there is safety and respect to women on the worksites as well. That is why, as part of the new complaints referral process, we have got the regulator monitoring trends to indicate any patterns of behaviour that depict gender discrimination.

If we are talking about discrimination in this place, can we talk about the discrimination of those opposite against good people earning good money for their good families? Trying to tar them with a brush that is totally illogical and unfair shows us who those opposite really are. As I said at the outset, at the heart of this matter of public importance are workers, and those on this side always stand with workers. We will not cop any excuses from those opposite to try to take away the rights and entitlements of workers, and that is something important for all Victorians.

 Tim READ (Brunswick) (17:32): In response to the member for Caulfield’s matter, I would like to focus on the first part, which is the government’s failure to address corruption. I think the fact that there has been failure to address corruption is incontestable. For those who have not read the Watson report, I highly recommend it. It is not boring. Parts of it do actually read like a crime novel. I also think that the Watson report is in many ways quite measured. It accepts, for example, that the $15 billion is an estimate. People are bandying the figure around like it is a certainty, but there is no question that a fair amount of money has gone missing – a large amount of money has gone missing. The other point that Watson makes is that the union was no longer functioning as a union, that the executive was completely taken over by the Setka and Myles cliques. He was left, he says – this is Watson writing – at the end of his investigation:

… with the empty feeling that the Setka-led Victorian branch of the CFMEU was no longer a trade union, it was a crime syndicate.

There has clearly been a failure to address corruption, but the Greens want some good to come from this failure. There is no reason why we have to turn this into a continuous and seemingly never-ending shouting match. It is very clear that the anti-corruption agencies in this state need to be strengthened, otherwise this problem would not have festered and worsened over more than a decade before it was exposed by Nine media and then by a series of investigations.

I want to just focus a little bit on some recommendations from the Integrity and Oversight Committee’s inquiry into the adequacy of the legislative framework for the Independent Broad-based Anti-corruption Commission – that is, IBAC’s powers. The committee reported in December. It was tabled I think on the last day of Parliament last year. We know that IBAC’s powers are highly relevant to this issue because the Premier referred this problem to IBAC, and she likely knew, or should have known even then, that IBAC cannot currently investigate anything other than public agencies. It cannot investigate anything other than that which it suspects is an indictable offence or bribery or misconduct in public office or perversion of the course of justice. Some of those things clearly have happened as part of this Big Build corruption scandal, but those are only bits of what happened. A lot of what is alleged and a lot of what has occurred falls short of an indictable offence. It does not involve public officials because it is essentially an outsourced government project involving the funding of private companies, who in turn engage subcontractors and so on, to the point where it is out of the reach of IBAC.

It is also worth reflecting on the fact that IBAC, Victoria’s anti-corruption commission, cannot make findings of corrupt conduct. It is not allowed, understandably, to make findings of criminal guilt, nor should it be able to. Its purpose is to expose corruption. Why can’t it make findings of corrupt conduct? It is actually related to the fact that it cannot investigate anything other than an indictable offence. IBAC is greatly restricted not only in what it can investigate but in what it can do. I want to explain this a little bit. Corrupt conduct in the Independent Broad-based Anti-corruption Commission Act ‍2011 is required to be a criminal offence, and it is defined as causing dishonest performance of the duties of a public officer or body, a public officer breaching public trust, a public officer misusing information, or someone corruptly obtaining benefit from a public officer. All of that makes sense, and it is all restricted to the public sector. But it is the last eight words that are the catch. All of that is followed by the phrase ‘being conduct that would constitute a relevant offence’, which, as I described before, is an indictable offence or any of those other offences – pervert the course of justice, bribery or misconduct in public office. In other words, a great deal of maladministration, the misuse of public power or resources or threatening an employer that if they do not use this particular labour hire agency the site will be shut down is stuff that is not covered by that definition.

Simply removing those eight words, the requirement for corrupt conduct to be a relevant offence, was recommended in our inquiry by no less than IBAC itself; by their oversight agency, Integrity Oversight Victoria; by Accountability Round Table; by the Centre for Public Integrity; and by the Victorian Bar. The Law Institute of Victoria had another solution that had the same effect. Experts from around the country all recommended the removal of those eight words or something similar because they all recognised that Victoria’s IBAC is so restricted that it cannot investigate a great deal of the corruption that has been alleged or that is likely to occur in the future or that has occurred elsewhere. As a result, it cannot even make a finding of corrupt conduct. That is why the committee, with four Labor members, one from the Liberals, one from the Nationals, me and one from Legalise Cannabis, unanimously recommended that the government remove the requirement that corruption constitute a relevant offence and that we include things like a serious disciplinary offence, misconduct worthy of termination or breach of public trust. Our bill, which was debated this afternoon in the other place, basically contains that. That is all it does; it simply removes those eight words. The New South Wales legislation does not require corruption to be an indictable offence. The federal National Anti-Corruption Commission does not require it to be an indictable offence. If New South Wales and the federal government can do it – and the NACC was created after about six months – then surely Victoria can do it. So the question for the government is: why do you not support this legislation? And the question for the Liberals is why did they support it in 2023 but are not supporting it this year? Has the scent of possible victory clouded their judgement? Who can say.

I want to explain a little bit more about why IBAC cannot make findings of corrupt conduct. It is simply because they cannot be seen to imply that someone is guilty of a relevant offence, which they are prevented from doing. As the current IBAC commissioner explained in a public hearing in September:

… because of the way the Act says you cannot make any comment that includes that a person has committed or may have committed or is guilty of an offence. Because our corrupt conduct jurisdiction requires a relevant offence …

I put it to all the members of this place: think about where you will be in five years time. Some of us will be in opposition, some of us will not be in Parliament at all, but not all of us will be in government. There will be some new corruption scandal, and many of us will have wished that IBAC had the power to investigate it. I urge government and non-government members alike to really consider IBAC’s powers and why a government might refer matters to it knowing that it is not capable of investigating them. That explains also recommendation 24 of the IOC’s report that the government amend the act to empower IBAC to make findings of corrupt conduct.

Others today have spoken about follow-the-dollar powers and the need to clarify the definitions of ‘public officer’ and ‘public body’. All of these things are important. Funding of integrity agencies is the other side of the coin, and we heard yesterday or rather on Monday that the Ombudsman has half as many complaint officers as the New South Wales Ombudsman. They are all important, and I think we need to see corruption as worth tackling.

 Sarah CONNOLLY (Laverton) (17:42): I too rise to speak on the matter put forward by the member for Caulfield, and I have to say, ‘Well, well, well.’ I have been wondering when that rabble over there would bring this here into this place to have an MPI debate. I do have to say it is so important to have a look at the state of the house, because those opposite, aside from the member for Ovens Valley, are not in the chamber. I am going to give a big shout-out to all those Libs and Nats watching ‍– come to the chamber, stick by your MPI, have something to say and back up your members. Be here. Show up. Show some passion. Where is the Leader of the Opposition if this is something she takes so seriously? Perhaps she is having a really good think about her failed housing policy and the failure of announcing a so-called fix to the housing crisis here in Australia. What a joke.

Those opposite want to talk a big game about our Big Build program, which is delivering projects, let me tell you – I am going to talk about them – that are absolutely vital for this state. And no-one benefits more than Melbourne’s western suburbs. But at the very core of the issue that we are talking about today, like others have said, is a really inconvenient truth for those opposite. Deep, deep down – and I will say it to the camera because hopefully some of them will be watching their serious MPI that they have put forward before the house but did not turn up for – it is an inconvenient truth because deep down they hate working people. Let me tell you, the western suburbs are made up of busy people and working families. The workers are the backbone of this great state of ours. Those opposite absolutely hate that the Big Build projects provide workers and labourers with great wages and employment opportunities – employment that was not there under the four years of darkness when they were last in government. And I say darkness – we have talked about, here in this place, the contrast between the jobs created in the four years that those opposite were in government and here today. The numbers and the contrast and the difference are extraordinary – and it is extraordinary through things like our Big Build projects. The allegations they have made are just another opportunity for them today to come and attack workers’ pay and conditions. Well, I note they have not turned up to attack and stand by their MPI – the chamber is completely empty – but let us not point out the member for Ovens Valley.

The Leader of the Opposition has tended to speak a lot about the Big Build projects lately, and I have to tell you a story. I always tell stories in the MPI. Well, let me tell you another story about the Leader of the Opposition. She thought she would find her way to Melbourne’s western suburbs, and I just happened to be there this weekend just gone. It was great to see the member for Kew come all the way over and dip her toes into a place called Footscray, the gateway – get this, people – the gateway to Melbourne’s west. She did not come that far, she came just far enough to get her toes wet. Now, this was at the mighty Lunar New Year festival that was being celebrated with our Vietnamese community. It was very, very well attended, and I have to say when I sat down to watch the Vietnamese singing and dancing and the culture and entertainment, I could not help but think, ‘I wonder if the member for Kew knew what she drove past – if she drove, maybe she caught the train – on her way to Footscray.’ Well, I did not have the opportunity to take a lot of time to speak with the member for Kew, because I would have pointed out some of the transformative projects – the Big Build projects – that have helped revolutionise and change Melbourne’s west forever. In coming to Footscray, she would have probably driven past something – just a little wee thing – called the West Gate Tunnel. I say it is the West Gate Tunnel built for westies, but every now and then we have interlopers from the other side of town – like Kew for one of them – come across and join us in the western suburbs to see just what a great place it is to live.

Of course when the member for Kew came across, she might have seen something ultra big in the sky. There is something really exciting that has happened in Footscray. And what do you think that is? That is Footscray Hospital – $1.5 billion in a brand new hospital in the gateway to Melbourne’s west. I cannot explain to you how incredible this hospital is. The western suburbs need more hospitals and, guess what, Labor is building them. A $1.5 billion state-of-the-art hospital. In fact the former Premier used to say that all the construction cranes in Victoria were in Footscray working on that hospital as we took it from nothing in the ground and built it and opened it a couple of weeks ago – absolutely extraordinary – but she might have missed that.

Another Big Build project she would have seen if she did not drive is Metro Tunnel. You can cross town now using Metro Tunnel. Metro Tunnel has revolutionised commuting on rail for westies. We are able to get where we need to go more often. There are more services running across town and in and around the city to the places that we want to go. I will also note that it is unfair of me to say that the Leader of the Opposition has only dipped her toes into Melbourne’s west. She actually went a bit further quite recently, and I had a bit of a chuckle, because she was accompanied by the ‘special envoy for the western suburbs.’ I have to laugh because we all know that the area that Mrs Deeming represents is the western suburbs, so perhaps the member for Laverton is a special envoy for Labor in the western suburbs. How about we make that a bit of a reality?

I know it is a rare occasion for the Leader of the Opposition to head that far into Melbourne’s west – the west is a big place – but I cannot help but wonder if the member for Kew realised the big, big projects that Labor has built; the big infrastructure projects that matter to the western suburbs that she would have had to drive past on her way to Werribee. The member for Kew would have driven past, no doubt, Werribee Mercy Hospital, where we are doubling the capacity of the ED there. We are a growing community. We need more beds, we need a bigger ED, and that is exactly what we are doing. I keep saying to tourists like the member for Kew who keep coming to Wyndham – she would have driven past Wyndham law courts ‍– ‘Go and visit Wyndham law courts, the biggest law courts outside of Melbourne’s CBD, because they are absolutely amazing.’ If she continued to look on the left, she would have seen the brand new cop shop – a super big one, one of the biggest cop shops outside of Melbourne’s CBD – in Werribee, the Werribee police station that we built with the former member for Werribee. I have to say the member for Kew would have also driven past – I had to count these up, and someone will have to fact-check me because I have probably got it wrong – about four level crossings that have been removed under our government over the past almost 12 years. In fact the removal of the Hoppers Crossing level crossing when I was the member for Tarneit I think was one of the best things to ever happen to Wyndham, but I was a bit biased as the member for Tarneit back then. She would also have driven past, but may not have been able to see in the distance, another three level crossings that we had removed as well as another four that are underway. The Werribee line is going to be level crossing free in fact. It is absolutely extraordinary. These are Big Build infrastructure projects. These are the projects that are changing lives and that matter to people in the community.

When we are talking about construction workers, think of the number of construction workers that have worked on these projects – some of them big, some of them ultra big and some of them kind of small. I did not even get to talk about the 16 brand new schools that we have opened in Wyndham as part of the 100 brand new schools. The construction workers are the very backbone and the people that have built these places that will benefit future generations for years and years to come. To talk down workers here in this state is absolutely shameful. The fact that the Leader of the Opposition and her new so-called team – the ‘united team’ – are not here in the chamber to hear, discuss or debate the MPI put forward by the member for Caulfield is absolutely disgraceful.

 Tim McCURDY (Ovens Valley) (17:52): I am delighted to rise and make a contribution as my colleagues come in. I think that they did not want to listen to you was the problem, member for Laverton. I think that is where the problem was. I think we need to be clear about that. Can I say that Victorians need answers. They deserve answers. The corruption in this state has been absolutely rife for 12 years. Now we see in today’s paper that 75 per cent of Victorians want a royal commission. They want to clean up this corruption. I note the members for Laverton and Yan Yean did not mention corruption at all during their contributions of 10 minutes each. They did not. The backbenchers are too scared to. They look away. They do not want to mention it. They do not want to whisper it. They just do not want to know.

We know corruption has been occurring in all aspects of this grubby government. Everyone could see it, particularly the Premier. The Premier could see. She is the worst offender when it comes to being able to say, ‘I knew there was a problem.’ What did she do? She wrote a letter. Oh, well, she needs to come out and say that the letter she wrote got a response and that in that response IBAC said it did not have the powers to investigate her claim. But she wrote a letter, so she feels good about herself. If that is her defence, well, that is a disgrace. What happened after that? From then on she just looked away. She does not want to know anything about a royal commission and nor do the backbenchers. Imagine if every other MP in this place knew there was a crime occurring in their community, whether it be domestic violence or whatever it might be. Is it a defence if you turn around and say, ‘Oh, I wrote a letter. I just wrote a letter.’ ‘Who did you write it to?’ ‘Oh, I don’t know; I just wrote it to the RACV or something. I just wrote a letter. I didn’t care.’ They would have written back and said, ‘This is not in our remit.’ We hear the Attorney-General, the member for Carrum, has come out and said she knew there was corruption on the Big Build sites back in 2022 and claimed that she referred it to the responsible authorities and to Victoria Police. The Attorney-General has come out recently and said, ‘Well, that was a pork pie. I misspoke; I misled Parliament.’ You cannot make this stuff up. They knew about the corruption and did absolutely nothing about it.

When I spell out the word corruption, the capital ‘C’ is for the CFMEU – organised crime, thugs, standover merchants and beneficiaries of the corruption that has been going on. The ‘o’ is for the opportunity cost, as the Leader of the Nationals said in his contribution, of the $15 billion. What we could have done without that opportunity cost. That is $170 million in every one of the electorates of the 88 MPs that sit in the lower house. What we could do for our communities with $170 million each. The first ‘r’ is for rip-offs. We know that every Victorian has been short-changed and ripped off. The second ‘r’ is for rorts. This is the red shirts all over again. It is the red shirts on steroids. The ‘u’ stands for unethical. The ‘p’ is for prison. These people must go to prison. We need to track them down, find the money and send them to jail because that is what they deserve. We are talking $15 billion. The ‘t’ stands for tabletop dancers. That is just a disgrace, with the strippers, but it is what has gone on in this Big Build. The ‘i’ stands for integrity, and we know that Labor has none of that. There is nothing to see here. The last ‘o’ is for OTT, over the top. The Premier, the Deputy Premier and the Attorney-General all knew, and they just turned their backs on it and hoped it would go away. Well, it is not going away. The ‘n’ at the end is for never again. Labor should never govern again, because we know they are rotten to the core. The corruption that has gone on in this state proves that. It is not only the corruption but the fact that you do not want to chase it down and find out who did it and where the money went.

A Wilson–O’Brien government will bring back integrity to Victoria. We will search for the $15 billion, and we will find it. We will find the Ford Raptors, the jet skis, the boats, the dodgy deals and the stolen cash, and we will make the crooks accountable. Should any money make its way back to the Labor Party fundraisers out of this $15 billion, Labor should be decommissioned, deregistered and banned from being a political party. That is what could be found when we do this royal commission, the royal commission that you are all too scared to do anything about.

When you lose $15 billion and when you allow someone to steal $15 billion, first of all, you need the will to want to find it. Well, there is no political will on the other side to even look for it. There is no thirst to find out where the money went. They do not care. In fact it is ‘Shut up, turn your back and say nothing, because we do not want to know.’ I mean, even the former Premier would not have gone down this path. He would at least have had a fake inquiry and said, ‘No, there’s nothing to see here. We’ve had an inquiry. Let’s just move on.’ But I think that ship has certainly sailed and the current Premier will not be able to do that.

We have a plan to clean up the mess, whereas Labor wants to cover up the mess. We will give IBAC stronger powers to follow the money and establish Construction Enforcement Victoria and a taskforce to stamp out organised crime on government worksites. We will recover stolen taxpayer money and introduce new laws for targeting criminal bosses. I mean, they are the sorts of things that we on this side of the house want to do, whereas the member for Mordialloc is happy just to turn his back and say, ‘Let’s just hope it all goes away.’ Let us compare the pair. What will Labor do? First of all, they will deny there is a problem. We have heard that today in the MPI. Then they will stand side by side with their crooks and will wait for the dust to settle, and then they will do it all again. We saw that with the red shirt rorts years ago. Let the dust settle, pay the money back and then do it all again. We have seen COVID cover-ups. We have seen branch stacking. We have seen $600 million for the Commonwealth Games and a $1 billion contract that got ripped up. What we have seen is just disgraceful. But I am sure the Premier would have been looking back laughing when all those things were going on and saying, ‘You ain’t seen nothing yet. Wait till you see what we do with the Big Build.’

This is the greatest robbery in Victoria’s history. Even Ronald Biggs, the great train robber, would pale into insignificance against the $15 billion, or maybe more, that has gone missing to allow bikies to get rich and crooks to prosper. Yesterday we introduced a bill to start this process, but Labor said, ‘No, no, no, no, no, no.’ They were all disinterested. Every Labor MP voted against it and looked away, and I look at those Labor MPs in the seats of Bass and Hastings and Ripon and Glen Waverley and Bayswater and Yan Yean. They will be sitting there thinking they could very well lose their seats over this because they did not stand up for their communities. Seventy-five per cent of their communities say they want a royal commission, and they did not stand up for their communities. We will find out in November whether that was a good decision or not a good decision. They were all too afraid to stand up.

We have got a plan to protect Victorian taxpayers money. We want to chase the money, and we want to stop the rot. Labor has no intention of stopping the corruption, just looking away, and as we said before, the opportunity cost is astounding – what we could do with that money. Everyone can remember the previous Premier, who said, ‘The standard you walk past is the standard you accept.’ You would not hear this Premier saying that; I will just about guarantee that. This is a stain on this government, and a royal commission must be held to find out where the money went.