Wednesday, 12 August 2026

 Matt FREGON (Ashwood) (17:46): I think we can sum up a lot of today with the George Costanza line that has been used before in this house, that it is not a fabrication – I have changed the word – if you believe it. I have no doubt that members believe what they are saying, because all members are expected to be factual at all times. I think this is my first grievance debate this term. It was about four years ago when I did my last one. It is funny, I was thinking about it today. It is serendipity, because I remember standing over there about four years ago doing a grievance debate, grieving for my parents, especially my father, who was a lifelong Liberal voter, and feeling sorry for him.

A member interjected.

Matt FREGON: He was a smart man, you are right, but not everyone gets everything right. I remember standing there and talking about grieving, which is not really grieving, let us be honest. It is a silly name for the thing; it might as well just be called a whinge-fest afternoon. I was standing there, and I said the word ‘guys’ here, and the former member for Kew picked me up on that on behalf of the ladies in the chamber and thought I was being disrespectful. It is just me; you are stuck with it. I just call everyone ‘guys’. It is just a thing. I apologise if it is offensive. Anyway, I thought today, when I was thinking about that, because I had a grievance –

A member interjected.

Matt FREGON: Am I going well? I thought, the last time we heard from the member for Kew, he was talking about pot plants. Remember that? The pot plants – the COVID inquiry was very important. I am not suggesting we should not be careful with money that is spent in departments and organisations ‍– this is very important stuff – but I do find the fascination with pot plants a bit weird. Why not desks? Why not lights? Why not anything else that is in a normal office that anyone pays for? It just seems a bit odd that we come back four years later and nothing has changed. I think it was our Premier who said today, when talking about the census last night, ‘Five years ago, same thing’, and five years ago I can also remember members on the other side counting us all out on this side, and we are still here.

Wayne Farnham interjected.

Matt FREGON: You never know, member for Narracan, you may be right. I would not usually discuss conversations held outside the chamber here, but as I have said before, earlier we had a little chat, and I do not think you will mind –

Wayne Farnham: On a point of order, Speaker, I would just like to draw your attention to the state of the house.

Quorum formed.

Matt FREGON: I love an audience, so I appreciate everyone coming in for me. You do not have to worry, member for Narracan. All I was going to comment on was the statement I made to you, rather than the other way around, this morning that it is a little bit like Schrödinger’s politicians in here at the moment. We are all alive and dead at the same time, because you guys think we are dead, we think we are alive and vice versa, and it is a bit of a mess. But that is what it was like four years ago, and yet here we are. I think when we move through the next three months there are going to be a lot of people thinking about futures and a lot of people thinking about measuring some curtains, but we might want to wait till the people decide. We will see how that goes, because what we know is at the end of November the people will make a choice, and whatever choice that is, that will be the right choice that they make. We are here to serve the people that we represent for as long as they wish us to be here – the old Starship Troopers line ‘until you’re dead or I find someone better’.

But I know that people will be concerned when the figures start coming out about the cuts that are potentially at play if those opposite find their way to the Treasury benches. We will forget about One Nation for a moment, but I will come back to that. Obviously we think there is a commitment of about $40 billion of cuts. It is fair to say that people on the other side say that is not right – okay, fine. So how much is it? How much are the cuts? There has been a commitment to cutting revenue, and there have been commitments for spending. The member for Narracan just talked about one of the things they have committed to spending on. So where does it come from? At some point in the next three months those opposite are going to actually have to say, ‘This is what it’s going to look like,’ because people will start to pay attention to what they are actually saying, and it does not add up.

I will give you an example. They have said they will cut public service workers. They have said that on retirement or whatever they are not going to replace them. Let us believe that for a moment. I heard members earlier when this was talked about saying that the Silver review put forward other redundancies. Yes, that is correct – that is obviously common knowledge. But whatever they are committing to is extra; it is more. Think about some of the programs that the back office people in departments enable in our state. We all know that last time the opposition were on this side of the house they famously cut Fresh Fruit Friday, which cost very little, but amongst the cuts they made at that time that was done. That was their decision; it happened. Since our government has come in we have had the free breakfast program, which has done millions of breakfasts. That is organised by people behind the scenes working with Foodbank and working with others to make sure those breakfasts arrive at the schools for kids. If the back office staff retire, leave, move, whatever, and are not replaced, those programs will over the course of time be less likely to be performed, unless you outsource them maybe, but that is not going to save you money either. I could spend another 15 ‍minutes on outsourcing. It is one possibility that they see it just slowly die off, if not in a hurry. The Smile Squad in schools – dental programs for schools – is another program that, for kids who may not otherwise see a dentist early in their life, can be a game changer for their whole life because of their oral health. Again, it is organised by back office staff that need to do the work to get the trucks and the dentists and other people in the schools.

The free Glasses for Kids program in schools – I have been wearing glasses since I was about four. We could afford it, I had an optometrist, we had glasses, but there are a lot of families who, through no fault of their own, either cannot afford the glasses and the optometry or may not know that their kids have an issue. I put it to you that a program like this is crucial to the children who it benefits for the rest of their life, because if we pick up one child, for instance, in a school and that child gets glasses in order to see the board – the whiteboard, the smartboard, the TV or whatever it is these days. If that child can then see the board, do the work and learn properly, that child has got a future like any other child who does not have a sight issue. If that child does not get those glasses that year and maybe it takes another year or two, three, four or five, their learning is stunted. It is not really a surprise; it is logical. All of these programs – they are just three examples in our schools – are probably not what you would call core education, but they are crucial to the education of Victorian children and therefore the families who have those children.

Again, I will not say ‘grieve’, but I worry about whether the potential – or, as the member for Narracan said, certain – government from the other side have thought this through, because if you are not going to borrow and you are going to cut the revenue, you have got to cut spending. That is not cutting the spending of other things that have been borrowed. That is cutting the ongoing spending that is in the budget. The budget at the moment is at an operating surplus. Debt is increasing for capital programs. We can have an ideological, philosophical and economic argument about the benefits and pros and cons of that, but that is the reality. Presuming that you are going to stop borrowing for the capital program, you have still got a finite amount of revenue that you are then reducing. If you are going to spend more on hospitals or other things, maybe you borrow for that. That would be a choice for the government, whoever the government is. There is going to be a cost somewhere, and it is going to affect Victorians in the change. Every time we hear a commitment from the opposition on what they are going to spend on or what they are going to cut in taxes and revenues, at some point Victorians need to know how this all adds up, because in my mind it does not.

The member for Hawthorn was referring to the Auditor-General. He has his opinions about the budget, but the budget is there every year. I do not know if there are any commitments from the other side to completely rewrite book 4. I am not sure what they have promised there. Again, if you are going to say you do not like the way the budget is, what are you promising to do? These are the things that will have to be said.

One of the advantages of being on the government side is that it is open and clear what we are doing and what we are not doing, and I think we are the first ones to say that no matter where we are we can always do better. I remember four years ago. I think everyone was counting me out then too, by the way, until I Steven Bradbury-ed my way through it – and do not undersell Steven Bradbury. The guy made it to the final, and he is an Australian hero.

A member interjected.

Matt FREGON: I will take the interjection. Just to be clear, I am not comparing myself to the Australian hero that is Steven Bradbury. That would be very unfair on him. But I am seriously concerned about the prospect, and I have not even got to One Nation. If I was cheeky enough, I would ask for an extension of time, but the rules are pretty clear, so that is not going to happen. But people are concerned about what is coming if that is what is coming.

Question agreed to.