Wednesday, 6 April 2022

Production of documents

Emergency Services Telecommunications Authority

Ms CROZIER (Southern Metropolitan) (10:03): I move:

That this house:

(1) notes that the Emergency Services Telecommunications Authority (ESTA) reported over $15 million of consultancies listed in its annual reports since 2014, of which no final reports have been released; and

(2) requires, in accordance with standing order 11.01, the Leader of the Government to table in the Council, within 14 calendar days of the house agreeing to this resolution, all final reports or, if a final report is not available, an interim or draft report for the consultancies commissioned by ESTA since 4 December 2014.

This is a simple documents motion that I am moving today in the interests of transparency and for the Victorian community to understand exactly what has been undertaken—the work that the government has commissioned—through these various consultancies. That is why this motion is important—that we have the release of those various reports.

In moving this motion I would like to say that I do not think this needs to be a long debate. I think there are other important motions on the paper that we need to be debating today. I particularly want to make reference to the important motion that has been put on the paper by Mr Atkinson in relation to the Ukraine conflict, a very important motion that I think the house will want to debate.

I want to make just a few points, and of course the government will want to make their points on my motion, but as I said, I do not envisage this being an extensive debate. The $15 million that the government has spent on the various consultancies for ESTA I think is important for us to understand, as I mentioned. There are numerous reviews that have taken place into the call and dispatch system, the CAD, and various other consultancies that are listed in the ESTA annual report. I want to just highlight a couple, and there are dozens of them—I mean, I have got papers full of the listed consultancies here. I do not want to waste time in reading all of those out, but there was, for instance, $5700 spent for Brockhurst Consulting to offer career coaching and transition-to-retirement advice. There was a $21 000 contract between 2020 and 2022: that was awarded to FPL Advisory to develop a government stakeholder engagement plan and conduct an organisation risk review. Now, I know this may be a little sensitive for the government, because a former Labor candidate, Steve Cusworth, runs FPL Advisory. So I think, again in the interest of transparency, we need to see what some of these reviews are about.

Importantly there is one from PricewaterhouseCoopers, an internal audit service; it was almost half a million dollars—$489 000—for that review. These internal audit reviews are important, because we want to understand—that was undertaken in 2019 and 2020—what the outcomes are from those reviews. Of course with ESTA we know that in 2016 following the storm asthma event, where tragically 10 people died, there was a call at that point to have ESTA reviewed and a need for more people to be within ESTA working on its being able to respond to Victorians when they put through a 000 call.

Of course over the last two years you have heard me in this chamber and outside the chamber speak of the failures of 000 and the government’s lack of preparation and planning to deal with what we have been experiencing in recent months. Sadly 12 people, including four children, have died since October because of the failures in being able to get through to 000, and they are well reported across media. I am not going to reprosecute those cases, but these are failures that are happening now. Over the last two years of course we have had challenges with COVID—no-one is denying that—but do not forget we have had six lockdowns in Victoria, and we were told by the government that we needed to be in lockdown to prepare the health system. Well, 000 is part of the health system. When you have had warnings as far back as 2016 that there is a severe shortage and those issues have not been addressed, then the dozens and dozens of consultancies that have been undertaken surely need to be in the public domain. That is what this documents motion is calling for: that we have that transparency to understand exactly what those reports and reviews were and that the public has an opportunity to understand the findings.

I note that the 2021–22 contracts that have been listed for all of these expenditures do not include legal advice or advice on individual employment-related matters, so that is an additional cost to the $15 million that we know of that has been spent on these consultancies. We do need to understand that—of course Victorians want to understand that—because these millions of dollars could have been put into supporting our frontline healthcare workers such as doctors, nurses, paramedics but importantly the ESTA call takers. That simply has not been done under this government. As you know, I have been speaking about the fact that the federal government has been calling for that because of the pressure put on Telstra around the country with what was happening with the emergency calls in other states; the failures in Victoria were putting pressure on the system right around the nation. It was a concern of the federal minister, Paul Fletcher, who wrote to the minister last year about these very issues.

Now, I say again these are important matters. I do not think I need to say much more. I think it is fairly self-explanatory. There are about 60-odd consultancies listed here, pages and pages of them, adding up to $15 million in taxpayers money. I think in the interests of transparency that they need to be released—not delayed; they need to be released. I do not want any more excuses from the government. We need to see what the findings were, because of the tragedy that has occurred in this state. It is 12 people in the last few months. We know there were other cases—November 2020—where somebody died from an inability to get through to 000. So the coroner will be looking at many of these issues, and those findings will come out. But it is pretty evident that there have been significant concerns, and it is a tragedy that so many Victorians have lost their lives through these failures.

In the interests of what I think is an important motion—this is a simple motion to release these reports—I will conclude my remarks here. I would hope that the government will take the opportunity to support this motion so that very quickly we can then move on to the very important motion that is listed on the notice paper, put forward by Mr Atkinson, and that is for the chamber to also debate the Ukraine crisis.

Ms SHING (Eastern Victoria) (10:12): I rise today to speak in relation to this documents motion, and at the outset I note Ms Crozier’s opening remarks that this is a relatively straightforward motion seeking documentation in relation to the subject matter that she has already taken us through. That is true on the one hand, but then what we hear is a range of matters in the course of Ms Crozier’s contribution which go to the subject matter of the emergency services response and ESTA. So I think it is then incumbent upon me in getting to my feet immediately after Ms Crozier to actually address a number of those issues and indeed a number of the matters which are put repeatedly in this place that are either not true or in fact a source of deep grief, distress and frustration for not only people who have been immediately impacted by the challenges and shortcomings in the system, which I will come to later, that we have addressed in recent announcements but also the call takers, who work under the most extraordinary amount of pressure and who I would suggest, in the course of this debate and discussion and the narrative that has been advanced by those opposite, are being politicised for really improper purposes.

I want to put on record our deep thanks, respect and acknowledgement for the hard work, the really emotional work, the really draining and traumatic work, which call takers undertake. This is a job which has ranged in substance from call-outs from distressed, distraught and frustrated families through to individuals concerned about their health and which has also ranged across people who have contacted emergency services for non-emergency-related matters, and as the Minister for Emergency Services in this place has said on numerous occasions, it is really important that 000 is there for emergencies but also that people know about the range of other assistance measures that are available. That has been part of a public campaign, and indeed that is an important part of making sure that emergencies are triaged in the right way to the right areas whereby assistance and support can be provided as needed.

I want to pick up on a number of things that Ms Crozier has referred to on the use of consultants, which is part of the documents motion on the notice paper today. It is more than a little rich for those opposite to talk about the use of consultancies and the assertions being made by Ms Crozier that this constitutes either a misuse of funds or funds that can or indeed should be redeployed or repurposed to fund nurses, for example. What an extraordinary position to have been taken by Ms Crozier on behalf of the opposition. It is not that long ago—in fact it was 2014—that it was realised that the former Liberal government, of which Ms Crozier was a part, had the sustainable government initiative that in fact took 4000 employees from the Victorian public service and outsourced that work to consultants. Now, this is not just something which I am standing here to criticise today in highlighting the hypocrisy of what we see opposite, calling for information about consultants, and I will get to the substance of where we sit at the moment relative to the track record of those opposite. It was something which the Ombudsman actually called into question in a report which found that in fact the proposal of the sustainable government initiative which resulted in this 4000 VPS job reduction, as far as direct employment goes, appeared to fall foul of the Fair Work Act. This is something which those opposite do not really seem to care about—that in fact when it comes to workers, when it comes to employees, when it comes to—

Ms Crozier: On a point of order, Acting President, this is a fairly narrow motion calling on the government to release these reports from the consultancies undertaken. Ms Shing is talking about past history, but it has nothing to do with this motion, so I would ask you to call her back to the specifics of this motion and address them.

Ms SHING: Further to the point of order, Acting President, Ms Crozier began her contribution by saying it was a relatively narrow motion—the same template that Mr Davis uses—and then in fact went on to traverse exactly the same material that she is now seeking I not actually put onto the record.

The ACTING PRESIDENT (Mr Bourman): Ms Shing is the lead government speaker. She is entitled to a little bit of leeway, but I would ask her to try and keep it as narrow as possible.

Ms SHING: Thanks, Acting President. I am looking forward to keeping my response to the lead speaker of the opposition as narrow as possible in responding directly to the matters which Ms Crozier has put on record. I would encourage anyone who is interested in the context by which I have set out the position of the sustainable government initiative to actually have a look at what Ms Crozier has said in her opening remarks, and perhaps people who are watching along can make their own decisions about the extent to which what I have said is relevant—

Ms Crozier interjected.

The ACTING PRESIDENT (Mr Bourman): Ms Crozier! Let us just get this going, please.

Ms SHING: It would appear that whenever this is raised in the context of broader history Ms Crozier is very sensitive, so I am going to move on.

What we see here in the overall expenditure of funding for consultancies is around 1 per cent of the total envelope that is available—that is in fact less being spent on consultancies by this government than the comparator in history that Ms Crozier so stridently objects to being put on the record. We have a lot of work to do, however, and nobody is shying away from that. There is so much work to do in response to the pandemic, in response to events such as thunderstorm asthma and significant emergencies—in relation to the subject that Ms Crozier herself has raised—and in response to the enormously traumatic individual circumstances which have been discussed at length in this place. So I do not want there to be any aspersion cast that there is not a long way to go, because there is. And this work needs to continue across governments and across all jurisdictions, and to that end I am looking forward to there being progress on matters raised at a national level. And I am looking forward to the minister being able to advance the issues, including as they relate to telephony and carrier matters. And I am looking forward to continuing the work associated with funding to address these issues. As the minister has outlined in response to various questions by Ms Crozier and indeed others in this place and more broadly, there has needed to be a response which is not only about recruitment and not only about workforce training and development but also about significant resourcing.

The $115 million which was recently announced to improve service delivery and also to support staff at ESTA is an actual and symbolic recognition of the work that needs to be done. The package which has been announced, which the minister has discussed, including in response to questions from Ms Crozier in this place on many occasions, is about making sure that we can recruit an additional 50 ambulance call takers and dispatchers and making sure that we are also in a position to attract, recruit, train and retain employees in this valuable work. That is about valuing the contribution that people make to the workforce, and that is about making sure that all of these new positions are online by mid-2023.

Back to the narrow motion which Ms Crozier has begun our discussion on this morning, documents motions in this place are considered really carefully by this government. And we have always, in comparison to our predecessors, released more information than they ever did. On that basis we look forward to continuing to assess this documents motion, as we do every documents motion, save for matters such as cabinet in confidence, commercial in confidence and privilege, which Ms Crozier rolls her eyes at but is otherwise very happy to be part of a government which raises the same issues when they sit on this side of the chamber to object in the same terms. We look forward to making sure that this documents motion is given the respect that it deserves and, most importantly, that we provide assistance, funding, recognition and support to all at ESTA—to call takers, paramedics and our health workforce.

Ms BURNETT-WAKE (Eastern Victoria) (10:22): Good governance requires transparency. I think we can all agree on that. Ms Crozier’s motion is about transparency, okay? ESTA is failing Victorians. People are dying. People are ringing 000 and not getting through. I have stood in this chamber before and spoken about this. Constituents of mine who are sick, worried, scared and having heart attacks are not being able to get through. $15 million on consultants—we need to know what this money is being spent on. There is a list here—lots and lots and lots of money. Where is all this going? Where is this being spent? We need to know. Victorians deserve better. We deserve a system that works. We deserve to be able to call 000 and get the help and support we need. This motion, again, is about releasing information that will give us information about what is being spent. We need to know. That is all from me.

Mr GEPP (Northern Victoria) (10:24): Eight minutes—oh, my goodness. I thought, ‘Gee, I’ve been given a haircut straight off the top’. Throughout the pandemic we have heard again and again and again from those opposite. They want to question the health decisions that are made. They want to attack the people in the very front lines of our health system: the paramedics, the nurses, the doctors, the orderlies, the ward clerks, the call takers. Again and again and again they walk in here and they say that they are deficient, that they are not doing their jobs, that they are failing Victorians.

Well, we on this side of the house actually do not think that they are failing at all. We do not think that they are failing at all; we think that they have done a superb job. I can only imagine in the last 2½ years the pressure that our nurses, our doctors, our orderlies, our paramedics and our ward clerks have been under—our ancillary care providers, our aged care workers—dealing with a global pandemic the likes of which none of us in this place have ever seen before, and they have been doing such a wonderful job. But what do we get from those opposite, rather than congratulations? I do not think I have heard a thankyou. I do not think I have heard so much as a thankyou from those opposite to those people who have put themselves on the front line.

Mr Leane: The Prime Minister said that he saved 40 000 people.

Mr GEPP: The Prime Minister saved 40 000 people—what, in Hawaii? Bit hard to do it from Hawaii.

Mr Leane: I don’t know. Apparently all those workers you mentioned—

Mr GEPP: Mr Morrison saved them, did he? 40 000, goodness me.

Mr Finn: On a point of order, President, I am just wondering if you could clarify: is Mr Gepp or the minister speaking on this particular motion at the moment?

The ACTING PRESIDENT (Mr Melhem): Mr Gepp to continue his contribution on this motion.

Mr GEPP: Thank you. The minister has talked about the challenges in our health sector. Both the Minister for Health and the Premier, and every other minister in this government as well as every member of the government, have talked about the challenges that this pandemic has placed on our system. Indeed that was the very reason for many of the actions that have been taken over the last 2½ years—because we knew the devastating impact that the pandemic was going to have on our health system and it was so, so important that the health system did not collapse and that we did everything that we possibly could by way of the actions that we took. Whether it was lockdowns, whether it was wearing of masks—whatever it happened to be—everybody on this side of the house has repeatedly got up and talked about those challenges and how wonderfully proud we are of the workforce that have stood on the front line and done their utmost.

Mr Leane interjected.

Mr GEPP: And they have saved tens of thousands of lives, Mr Leane. It is just extraordinary, extraordinary work. Many people, I think, in this place have got family members who are healthcare workers—nieces that are nurses, and my sister is an aged care worker. Many people in our family structures are frontline healthcare workers, and you only have to see and talk to those people about what they have endured over the last 2½ to three years—and they deserve better. They deserve better than for this place to occupy itself with frivolous motions being brought forward by the opposition. I mean, this ought to be a day where the opposition can shine, but I have got to say, in the last six footy seasons certainly that I have been here, what a disappointment. They have been kicking into the wind with a heavy football—

Mr Leane interjected.

Mr GEPP: It is not healthy for democracy. It is not healthy for democracy, and Victorians deserve better. They deserve an opposition that comes in here and really takes it up to the government and advances new policy ideas—new public policy ideas—and does the work. Instead all we get is ‘we want documents’ motions.

Fortunately for me personally I was not here when they last occupied the Treasury benches. But those that were here tell me that in terms of documents, they just refused. I think there were two—was it two? Two in the whole time that they were in government. Yet we on this side release them. Unless there is a cabinet-in-confidence matter or some sort of legal impediment, we release them; we put them out there. But instead what this is about, the motivation from those opposite, is nothing more than trying to create the impression that there is something corrupt, that there is something bad, that there is something evil going on. They want to point their fingers at organisations like ESTA.

Again, I cannot imagine what it is like to be an ESTA call taker. I used to be an adviser to the emergency services minister, so I certainly had interactions with ESTA and had on occasions the need to talk to some of those call takers, and when you hear some of the stories, some of the things that those call takers have to deal with, these are real-life emergencies that our call takers are dealing with. And they do deserve support, and they have had additional support from the government—43 additional call takers, an additional $27.5 million in October last year to scale up activities. We know that demand for ESTA services, call taker services, has skyrocketed in recent times, I think at one point almost reaching 50 per cent above normal capacity. It went off the charts. That is why we provided a further $115.6 million package to bring on more call takers, better support and manage the workforce and deliver recruitment.

But those opposite, they continue with this jihad against ESTA. They continue to criticise those that are on the front line doing everything that they possibly can. Well, we do not criticise those people. We thank them and we celebrate them.

Ms Crozier: We’re not criticising the people, we’re criticising the government.

Mr GEPP: Well, just as well you are not in New South Wales, Ms Crozier, because wouldn’t you be challenged right now? What would you do with the nurses responding to the government’s lack of support up there for the nursing sector? They have taken the only action that is available to them. Wouldn’t it be challenging for you? What would you do? You would be very, very conflicted. What would you do? Would you do what you did when those same challenges were confronting you a few years ago? We know exactly what you did. You crossed the line, you did not support those people. You are not supporting them now. Shame on you. We want to thank and congratulate the ESTA workforce—

Ms Crozier: On a point of order, President, this is a simple, narrow motion. It is not an opportunity for Mr Gepp to attack the opposition like he is. This is a simple motion about $15 million of consultancies and for the government to release those documents in the interests of the Victorian community, and I ask you to draw him back to this very simple motion so that we can move on to the very important Ukraine motion.

The ACTING PRESIDENT (Mr Melhem): I think Mr Gepp has got 20 seconds to conclude his remarks, but I just remind members, with notices of motion people have got a bit of leeway to expand things, but to get back to the motion is important as well.

Mr GEPP: I will come back to the motion, Acting President. Thank you for your guidance. I will just say that the simplicity of this document motion just underscores the fact that we have got the worst opposition in this state’s history.

Ms TAYLOR (Southern Metropolitan) (10:34): Here we are again, but anyway. So first of all, I think what is disappointing with regard to this motion is we are seeing yet again this kind of scattergun approach. It really is about political pointscoring at the end of the day. It is not a search for anything in particular. It is a search for evidence that the opposition can use in that regard, and it is a demand that would require ESTA to spend time and resources going through years of reports that may not even relate to the issue at hand at a time when they need all hands on deck.

What does this actually do? What does this actually mean? This pulls people off the floor to put them in a back room trying to find minor consulting work done almost a decade ago. Well done to the opposition—that is a terrific achievement. Gee, you are really helping the ESTA staff with this motion, and thank you so much. I say, as we are here in this chamber, I know they do incredible work. It is very emotionally demanding. They are obviously dealing with some of the most precarious situations that we could possibly imagine. But that is great—take them off the floor. Put them out the back to go on this scattergun hunt for something you can raise, put on a tweet—I do not know, whatever it is—and move away and distract from the issue at hand. We, on the other hand, think that we should help ESTA here and now, improving call answer speeds and supporting frontline staff. That is the position that we take on our side of the fence, and our government has backed them in to do this with record funding and support as well as strong public messaging—whilst those opposite have sought to undermine their efforts and send ESTA staff on increasingly bizarre research projects. I am just stating it for what it is. It may be unpalatable to those opposite, but if you are going to open the door and you are going to ask questions we have every right to address them with facts.

Now, the opposition are looking for evidence that we have not supported ESTA in reports that may not relate at all to the call-taking and dispatch services. Why would they do that? I mean, why? ESTA has experienced significant demand in the past during the thunderstorm asthma events. I note that that was mentioned, and that is fair enough within the context of this discussion—absolutely. Those thunderstorm asthma events occurred back in 2016. There was an inspector-general for emergency management (IGEM) review into this event. That is publicly available, and the government provided a response with clear actions to improve ESTA services. So when the matter of transparency is raised, can we just make that clear on the table?

I note further—and this is a critical point because when we are nuancing these particular issues and events we have to be very, very careful within the context of what we are speaking about—when we are talking about the IGEM review with regard to the thunderstorm asthma events in 2016, that was over a 24- to 48-hour period. It was incredibly significant, so I am not in any way diminishing the impact of that particular weather event. However, we are talking about ESTA experiencing that level of demand and more for months, so can we be very, very factually correct? When you make strong statements in this chamber, noting that those ESTA staff are likely to be listening to the debate and hearing very strong criticism of outcomes, ultimately it would be naive to think they might not feel somehow that they are being maligned as well, and they should not in any way be maligned. But that is the grave risk when we go on these scattergun kinds of witch-hunts. We have to think about the real consequences for those out there who are doing the real hard work to save lives.

We note that those opposite, if I come to the specifics of the motion, are looking for evidence in consultancy reviews. We have delivered major investment to support ESTA, and we have commissioned a review into ESTA by former police commissioner Graham Ashton. I know that is well known, but I am emphasising it here because we have groundhog day. There is a bit of a nuance here because we are talking about consultancy reports, but fundamentally it is about smashing up ESTA—and it is not a pretty debate at all. Do those opposite think many of these reports the motion seeks will have any impact—and this is what I think is really important—on the effects of COVID-19, staff furloughing in the omicron wave or surges in demand of 30 to 40 per cent? Do they really think that this exercise, this political exercise here, will achieve any significant outcome in that regard? I proffer no. In fact I am going to say emphatically no. That is what we are dealing with, and we have immediate measures in place, a review underway and strong ongoing oversight from IGEM.

I also understand that the Minister for Emergency Services met with Tony Pearce, the inspector-general for emergency management, just to give a full explanation to IGEM, as I stated previously, to give assurance that the government is doing everything and that ESTA is doing everything it can do to fix the crisis. Not only was the answer yes, but there was a further message that the opposition should pay heed to: we have put in place immediate measures, continued to meet with agencies and provided record funding, and IGEM is 100 per cent satisfied that government and ESTA are doing everything that can be done to address the unprecedented level of demand.

We know throughout the pandemic that those opposite have done everything they can to pretend there is no pandemic, to dispute health advice and to undermine health advice every step of the way. I do not know how many debates we have had in the chamber with, ‘Get them out the back’. Every time: ‘Masks—don’t wear masks. Don’t do that. Heaven forbid you should prevent the spread of COVID-19. Don’t wear the masks. Oh, my God. Don’t do that. Oh, my God’.

Members interjecting.

Ms TAYLOR: And there is another clear message in all this: let us let ESTA do their job—how about that? Instead of inflating ourselves with self-importance in this chamber over this very politicised debate, let us let them just get on with the job. How is that for a change? Instead of telling ourselves we are really doing something magical in this motion, let us actually let them get on with what they are doing.

We have been saying in this place for some time now that we are providing record support and we all need to back ESTA—all of us. How about we all get on and back ESTA and back those workers who are doing an amazing job on our behalf, instead of smashing the crap out of them in the chamber, to be blunt, because when you go over and over and over reworking and reworking an issue with a political angle that we cannot give credence to—

Ms Crozier: On a point of order, Acting President, I know the member is quite animated in her debate, but I do not think that last line, using an expletive in here, is parliamentary. Also it was completely inaccurate, and I would ask you to ask the member to withdraw.

The ACTING PRESIDENT (Mr Gepp): Ms Taylor, I would ask you to withdraw that comment.

Ms TAYLOR: I will withdraw. If we come back to the issue of consultancies, I would note that since 2014 less than 1 per cent of ESTA’s total expenditure has gone towards consultancies. So we just need a bit of perspective on this issue. But it is not a huge surprise that those opposite would raise consultancies, given their familiarity with them, having spent a huge $360 million on consultants in the short time when they were last in office. Just a little bit of perspective—I know this is a really sensitive point in the chamber, but let us just have a little bit of perspective on that issue. On their watch ESTA spent more per year on consultants compared to the period we have been in government. $2.1 million per year was spent on consulting by ESTA between 2010 and 2014, while $1.8 million per year has been spent since 2014. I am just providing some perspective with regard to the documents motion that we have in front of us.

In that regard our government wholeheartedly backs in and supports ESTA workers. We know the very difficult job that they undertake on our behalf, and we thank them—and this is an ongoing gratitude—for the incredible sacrifices that they make to save Victorian lives.

Mr MELHEM (Western Metropolitan) (10:44): I also rise to speak on this motion, yet another documents motion by the opposition. Funnily enough, it is not from Mr Davis; normally Mr Davis is the chief of documents motions for the opposition. Ms Crozier was allowed to put up a notice of motion about documents.

I just go back to the time Mr Davis was in charge of this place as the Leader of the Government. He would have had the numbers, 21 to 19 from my recollection—I was here. Every single documents motion that was moved either by the opposition or by the Greens, by anyone, was denied—denied, denied, denied. Now I hear the opposition from time to time talk about, ‘Well, what have you got to hide? We’re only asking for documents. Give us the documents to have a look at’. Well, we are not hiding anything. In fact we have probably broken the record for any government releasing documents to the opposition and to the Parliament, and we have not blocked any documents motion. I could be corrected, but I do not think we have, to my recollection. We have provided documents.

Where I have got a problem with this particular motion is that it is not actually requesting documents in relation to cabinet issues or ministerial stuff. In fact in this most difficult time we are facing in Victoria, with the pandemic and the pressure on ESTA and the hardworking emergency services personnel, particularly those directly employed by ESTA, who do a terrific job—they are working so hard under difficult circumstances to deliver the best service possible to Victorians—this motion is actually attacking their integrity and their credibility. This motion is basically saying, ‘We want to know. We want you to stop doing your day job. We want you to drop everything and go and look for documents that we want to look at, going back to 2014’. It is not asking a minister for basically ministerial documents about consultants the minister may have engaged; it is asking ESTA. Lawfully they actually do as part of everyday business actually engage consultants from time to time to provide legal services, specialised services and so on.

As a matter of fact, I think as Ms Taylor pointed out, looking at some of the numbers, funnily enough they are only looking back to 2014—so just the term of this government—so you can tell they are not interested in what the documents may have in them; it is just basically a political stunt, trying to find something in there that they can use for political ends. They have done that pretty well in the last 2½ years; they have challenged every single bit of medical advice, every decision. If we had left it to this lot, I tell you, we would have had mayhem in the street, we would have had more people dying from COVID and we would have seen the economy totally collapse.

I mean, look at their chief leader, the Prime Minister. National cabinet, the national medical officer and all the medical officers in the country have said, ‘You should maintain isolation for seven days’. He comes out and says, ‘Oh, no, I agree’—with those opposite’s beloved team and coach—‘that we should actually suspend the seven days isolation’. I mean, he is the leader of the country, a member of the Liberal Party, like Mr Davis and Ms Crozier. Basically they do not care about the medical advice. Their own chief medical officer said, ‘Maintain it’, and they say, ‘Oh, it’s the premiers’. I mean, seriously, are these people fair dinkum?

We talk about ESTA spending $15 million since 2014 on consultancy reports. I just briefly looked at the record: I think from 2010 to 2014 the average when they were in charge and Mr Davis was the health minister was that they spent about $2.1 million per year; ESTA currently averages about $1.8 million. So it is not like suddenly, ‘Oh, God, ESTA is spending a lot of money on consultants, and therefore we need to find out. Maybe because they’re spending so much money there are not enough resources to actually answer the calls’. If they are coming from that side of the debate and that is what they are thinking, maybe you could say it is a fair point—but they are not. They are just looking for dirt, if they can find any dirt, and that is really disgusting. That is appalling. We should be out there supporting our emergency services. We should be supporting ESTA. The government is currently having a review conducted by one of the most respected public servants—which everyone can agree on—Graham Ashton, to tell us what further improvements we can make.

We have got a new person in charge of ESTA and also doing the review—Mr Leane, an excellent public servant—trying to find the best way we can improve that. We have put in additional resources to make sure that we employ more people. We know we have got a problem. We know there is an issue. We need to be able to cope with things like pandemics. That is why the government has put in the extra resources and investment to make sure we employ more people to be able to answer the calls. Fifty people being put on now will be trained at a dedicated training centre to make sure there is an extra 50 people able to answer these calls, and they will be ready to go in the next six to 12 months. To become an ESTA operator is not something you can just pick off the shelf—just employ someone off the street and, bang, you are fully qualified and now you can actually perform these duties. No, it is a very complex process to be able to select the right people to be able to do that job. That is why we are establishing a training centre to make sure we are going forward. That is one of the learnings from what happened recently—to be able to fully train people going forward. They will have a certificate II, I think, to be able to do their job properly.

The opposition is basically not interested in how we can fix the ESTA situation, how we can support these dedicated staff who are actually doing tremendous work. They are more interested in picking dirt and finding a fault here or there. Going back to what I said earlier, I get it. If you make a documents motion about cabinet decisions about something or a minister hiring heaps of consultants to do something, we can say we can see where they are coming from. But with this one they are basically seeking—with an agency doing tremendous work at the most difficult time; they are under enormous pressure—to me, to question the integrity of the people working at ESTA. They are questioning their hard work. That is what that tells me, and that is really shameful—that is shameful. Get on with the program. Stand up and defend these hardworking people.

I would be happy to be on the same ticket as them if they came back and said, ‘Look, we’re not doing enough. We need to do more. We need to support all these people. We’ve got all these bright ideas and suggestions for how we can improve the working environment and make sure ESTA can operate at a higher level and be able to respond to all these calls’. Come up with constructive ideas instead of trying to use this for political pointscoring and as a political football.

But as Mr Gepp said earlier, they cannot even kick straight, they cannot even kick the football—it is like it has been really wet. Basically these guys are all over the place. Thank God they are on the other side and they are not occupying government benches. And the way they are going, they will probably never get there. I think in this difficult time our role as parliamentarians is to support emergency services workers, not to pour a bucket of—no, I had better be careful here; it could be ruled out as unparliamentary. Instead of sort of rubbishing the work of our emergency services workers we should be supporting them. We should be out there defending them. We should be congratulating them and honouring the work they do on our behalf to keep us safe. With these comments, I will just leave it at that. I will say to the opposition: just get on with it. Stop playing games. Stop playing politics.

Mr TARLAMIS (South Eastern Metropolitan) (10:54): I also rise to make a contribution on Ms Crozier’s motion. Well, it is another Wednesday, it is another documents motion, and it is yet another attempt from those opposite to score cheap political points at the expense of our hardworking staff who are doing everything possible to respond to the unprecedented pandemic and protect our state. It is such a disappointing thing to see that such an important issue would be politicised, but unfortunately it is what we have come to expect time and time again when we come to this place on a Wednesday: the politicisation of such important issues.

It is consistent with what we have seen throughout the pandemic from those opposite: they choose to question every single health decision and every single effort by frontline workers, who are seeking to protect Victorians. They pursue political agendas as opposed to the health of Victorians. Time and time again over consecutive sitting weeks for as long as I can remember the minister on this side of the chamber has spoken at length and answered many questions from the opposition about ESTA and the surge in demand that is currently being faced. She has not sought to duck any of these questions. She has answered questions consistently. She has provided explanations, she has provided advice, she has responded to questioning, and yet again there is this consistent barrage of misinformation being spread, misconstruing of information and continuing to mislead the public about what is going on. There is no doubt that the ESTA workers are under immense pressure and that there has been a massive increase in the number of calls as a result of the pandemic and what is being faced. No-one is hiding from that; no-one is denying that. Everyone has been up-front about that, and steps are being taken to address that. But those opposite seek to continue to try and find more fodder and spread misinformation on social media. It is about filling their social media channels and cheap political pointscoring rather than anything else.

It is factual: there has been a huge spike in call numbers, and that has meant that some calls are waiting too long. Both the interim CEO, Stephen Leane, and the minister have made it clear that any delays are unacceptable. That is why the government has been getting on with the job and backing in the amazing staff at ESTA, introducing immediate measures to improve call-answering speed and hiring more call takers and dispatchers. We have provided additional funding and additional workers to take calls and additional support to assist them. But the opposition’s scattergun approach and attacks on ESTA have not helped the situation, and they will not help the situation. It is not supporting the staff. It is creating even more stress for the staff, who are already doing it tough and working hard and working tirelessly to assist people.

Creating this misinformation and demonising the workforce, which you have been doing, is not providing any assistance. It is not assisting in this space whatsoever. It is simply making the circumstances worse. You are not helping. It is just highlighting the fact that you are irrelevant and you are not an alternative government. You are sending a clear message to the public that you are not fit to govern. I mean, we already knew that you were not fit to govern. We already know that you do not stand for anything. That is clear to us, but you are simply putting that advertisement out there for everyone else to see. We see it each and every day, but you are putting it up in neon lights for everyone else to see. Time and time again when the rubber hits the road you are found wanting, and you take the low road and criticise every single issue that comes before us.

This is not seeking solutions or seeking to address the issue or the underlying causes of what is going on here. This is a search for anything—it is just a scattergun approach to try and find anything to add to your social media feed so that you can continue to talk about any old thing that satisfies your own egos rather than trying to assist with anything that might help Victorians or trying to address the issues or the uptake in the surge of calls that is occurring at ESTA. You do not even know what you are actually looking for. This scattergun approach to requesting these massive amounts of documents will actually pull people—workers—off the floor and put them in back rooms trying to find minor consulting work done almost a decade ago. You do not even know what you actually want from these reports, but these workers will trawl through these reports. It will take them off the floor, which again will not solve any problems whatsoever.

But again, you are hopeful that you might come across something that you can use, as opposed to addressing any issues whatsoever. We think that we should help ESTA here and now to improve call answering speeds and support frontline staff. Our government has backed them in to do this with record funding and support as well as strong public messaging, while those opposite have sought to undermine their efforts and send ESTA staff on increasingly bizarre search projects for these mythical documents just to satisfy their political agenda. The opposition, as I said, is looking for evidence that we have not supported ESTA in these reports that may not relate to any call-taking or dispatch services or anything like that. Our record stands for itself. We are supporting them—we have supported them and we are supporting them—and having ESTA workers trawl through reports to try and prove that we are not supporting them is just farcical. But, again, it is what we have come to expect from those opposite.

As I said, ESTA has and is experiencing significant demand, and we have acknowledged that, whether it be the thunderstorm asthma event in 2016 or whether it be the pandemic. No-one is denying that, and we have been up-front about that. The minister has answered questions repeatedly in this chamber about that, and we are doing all that we can to support the workforce and will continue to do that. We will continue to give them the resources that they need to do the important work that they do. Additional resourcing and support has been made available to them, and we will continue to do that.

Earlier this month the government announced $115.6 million to immediately improve service delivery and support staff at ESTA. This record package will fund more than 50 new ambulance call takers and dispatchers. A comprehensive recruitment campaign is already underway to fill the new positions to build a bigger workforce to draw on during peak demand times, to train other call takers and to better deal with, support and manage teams. All the new positions will progressively come online by mid-2023. This extra capacity will mean more consistent and stable numbers of call takers rostered on each day, and more workers will draw on the overtime and extra shifts to meet higher call volumes. So we are supporting them and we are giving them additional resources. That new funding is on top of the $27.5 million package in October 2021 which has meant flexible rostering to support peak times, money to train more call takers and support staff, facility improvements and operational initiatives. The last budget also funded an extra 43 FTE positions, all of which are now operational and helping answer more calls, more quickly. So those opposite can sit there and talk about how nothing is happening and nothing is being done, but it could not be any further from the truth.

So as I said earlier, another Wednesday, another documents motion, another political agenda, more misinformation and more politicking. I am sure there will be lots more social media posts that will flow from today’s debate as well. It is pretty much all they have got left. They come in here, they move a motion, they misquote comments that are made and answers that are given and furthermore they ask a question in question time, that question is answered and they then put up a tweet which does not reflect the answer that has actually been given. It is misquoted, and then they basically pat themselves on the back and say, ‘Woo hoo, what a win today, look at us. We’re fantastic!’. All they are doing is talking to themselves and patting themselves on the back. They are irrelevant. No one is listening to them except for themselves, and we will see how that works out for them. You continue talking to yourself, because no-one else is listening. Continue being irrelevant and we will treat this motion like we do all the motions you bring on a Wednesday: with the contempt that it deserves.

Mr BOURMAN (Eastern Victoria) (11:04): I rise to speak in support of this motion. I note that it is asking for the documentation regarding, basically, the result of what has happened with the $15 million spent in consultancies listed in its annual reports, and they want to see some of the reports, which is a fair call. I made no secret of the fact that I actually worked for the predecessor to ESTA, and I think a few people have made this next point clear, but I want to make sure that we are 100 per cent clear on it: the people that work at ESTA are not the issue here. The people that take the calls, the people that dispatch the cars or the trucks or whatever it might be are not the issue.

The issue here is there is a problem. The issue here is that the problem is costing lives. It is good to see that the government is actually working on it, but I think one of the things that I am taking out of this whole thing is that in the long term I see this happening in various instances: we wait till there is a problem before we fix it. Governments really do not like spending money on these sorts of things, but I think it is a precaution against this sort of issue arising. The pandemic was very difficult to predict, obviously—impossible to predict. But the fact that the numbers of people in the emergency services really are not keeping pace with the growth of society and the fact there is no surge capacity—the surge capacity for any of the emergency services is basically zero—when something big happens, something gives. Something has to give. There is enough generally to do the job at the moment and nothing else.

The pandemic, when it started—I remember it fairly clearly—was more a scare than anything, because we saw what was happening in the rest of the world. We took precautions, and we did all sorts of things. But as time went on people got—well, I will not say ‘into the swing’, because having the whole state locked down is hardly something that you get into the swing of—used to it and operated with it. Then we had the problem that people were worried. They would make a call to 000, and then things started to take time. There was that little bit of capacity, and then as things went on it got worse and worse. I have noticed it has actually hit its peak as we are coming out of the pandemic problems. I am finding the issue is that now, when we have had time to deal with it, we are stuck with it, and we are stuck with people not being able to get through. We are stuck with people driving themselves to hospital or whatever the case may be.

Having been in an emergency service I know there are times when this just cannot be predicted, but I think it is a fair and reasonable thing for this chamber to see what reports have been delivered to be able to at least give the public confidence. There is lots of talk in here about what they are spending, but the public needs confidence that there is something this is based on. These reports will be interim reports or draft reports. I guess to a degree there needs to be a bit of latitude given to this because some of the reports will not be in a position or in a fit state to be presented to the Parliament, let alone the public, but I think for peace of mind for everyone we need to see something. It is clear that money needs to be spent. The government is spending money, but we also need to see the nuts and bolts behind this issue. And I think we need to see that ESTA, the authority, is being given the tools, the money and the manpower—person power or whatever we call it these days—or staffing to deal with this issue into the future, because it is pointless just glossing over this for now. It is pointless just saying, ‘Oh, well, we’ve got this problem now; we’ll fix it now’. Let us hope there is not a next pandemic, but the next time there is a problem we do not want there to be a problem. We want enough to have been done between now and then.

So these documents—and $15 million is not an inconsequential amount—I think are quite important. I will be very interested to see what does get released, and I look forward to the response from the government. With that, I commend this motion to the house.

Dr CUMMING (Western Metropolitan) (11:09): I rise to speak today on the opposition’s motion calling for documents for the Emergency Services Telecommunications Authority, which is ESTA, so the community can have the $15 million of consultants’ reports listed and their annual reports since 2014. I cannot believe the government have come in here and believe that this is some kind of social media exercise instead of understanding that the community want transparency. They want accountability, and they believe that there should have been an inquiry over the last two years into the COVID response so we could have learned from it. But this government has chosen not to be transparent, not to produce the health advice and not to show anything to the community so they can have a level of understanding as to why the Premier and the Minister for Health have come out with the directions and the mandates and why our hospital system is the way it is. I was in question time yesterday hearing this government continue to try to deflect from their own inability to actually make sure that we were ready for this pandemic. Jenny Mikakos clearly at the start of the pandemic wanted to do that, and unfortunately she never got the opportunity.

For me, this government has continued to run an extreme fear campaign with masks. I produced documents here in August 2020 to say that the only mask for this virus was the N95 mask, but this government continued down the path of having cloth masks, having surgical masks worn, to this day, by our schoolchildren, with no scientific evidence for that to continue on and to occur. In this place they have mentioned, ‘Oh, well, 100 years ago there was the Spanish flu’. Well, 100 years ago, government, there was not the science around the N95 mask.

I have continued in this place to try to make sure to keep this government accountable, wanting them to be transparent. For me, I cannot for the life of me understand why they have continued on with their mandates, why they have continued on with their fear messaging—and they are here wondering why calls to 000 are not being answered and ambulances are taking hours to actually attend and about the amount of code reds we have seen. They do not realise the fear and the mental health of our community, the amount of calls that have been made by teenagers, by children, calling 000 because of their own mental health, by other people within the community calling because of the fear that this government has put them under with the continuation of their lockdowns, which were unnecessary, locking up healthy people. They are oblivious—oblivious—to their impact on the mental health of Victorians and wondering to this day why people are calling up 000, not really understanding why they should have been calling when they have COVID and what was going on. This government never handed out, like other jurisdictions around the world, COVID-ready kits. Brazil and other Third World countries were giving out COVID-ready kits for people when they had COVID at home, knowing exactly how to deal with it.

Let us talk about this government and what they have said on social media. Of course this government’s social media, when just last week ministers and the Premier had COVID, as well as the federal ALP, just showed a little box: ‘I’m at home, and here’s my Panadol’. Really? That is your COVID-ready kit? In this place in 2020 I was requesting that, before there was a vaccine, from what the science was showing us and how they were treating it overseas, we be prepared. Our community could have absolutely gone in with confidence, when they had COVID, about what to do. But no, we had to continue with some communications and media rubbish and the contempt with which this government has actually treated the community.

Let us go on about also the 000 calls about vaccine injuries. In this place no-one in the government wishes to recognise the vaccine injuries that have occurred, the vaccine injuries in the way of calls to 000, and the stigma that they have created. Even the people who are out there and suffering vaccine injuries so that they cannot work—this government makes them feel bad that they cannot even get the help that they need.

Let us talk about the elective surgery that this government chose to stop throughout all of the lockdowns that were not needed, all of the elective surgery and all of the diagnostic medical care that should have been continued and been available when there was little, if not no, COVID within the community. We had surgeries everywhere and doctors sitting at home and dentists sitting at home—appalling, extremely appalling.

So I do support today this motion to actually have all of those reports for the community and others to read. And to actually hear from this government, ‘Oh, this is actually drawing people away’—excuse me; they are already written. You cannot get your hands on them? They should be just readily available. It should be the most easy thing to do today to produce all of this and to hand it over to the community—to this Parliament so we can actually see what needs to be fixed.

I commend the opposition for bringing this up. I commend at any time anyone here on the crossbench or the opposition who wants transparency, wants accountability or wants an inquiry, because this is what the community wants. This is what my constituents want. Allow them to have all of the information at their hands so they can make their own health decisions and we can actually fix what is broken rather than you continually sweeping it under the carpet and pretending that it is not happening, because on the ground I can assure you my community are sick of calling up 000 and not getting the responses that they require.

We are talking about ambulances, but there are also police responses in the last two years—and even to this day people who are wanting urgent police attention are not getting it. For me, hearing from my community that due to the lack of police confidence they are telling people when they call up 000 to ask for the fire brigade is appalling—that this government has allowed all of the good years of our police force and the community goodwill to be eroded in such a small amount of time with this government’s absolute fear campaign around masks, absolute fear campaign about fining people and saying that they cannot operate, that they cannot gather when they are healthy. Shame on you—and produce these documents.

Motion agreed to.