Wednesday, 25 May 2022

COVID-19

Mr QUILTY (Northern Victoria) (14:04): I move:

That this house:

(1) notes that the government’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic has caused significant harm to Victorians, including:

(a) the loss of liberty and violation of human rights;

(b) economic hardship, debt and consumption of savings;

(c) the deterioration of mental and physical health;

(d) damage to the reputation of public institutions;

(e) reduction in the enjoyment of life;

(f) other expected future harms;

(2) further notes that the government’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic was largely executed unilaterally using public health powers under the Public Health and Wellbeing Act 2008;

(3) calls on the government to establish a royal commission to:

(a) investigate the integrity of COVID-19 public health directions, including:

(i) the evidentiary basis for the directions;

(ii) the consideration of expected harms caused by the directions;

(iii) the influence the government had on directions issued by the chief health officer;

(b) investigate human rights violations that resulted from COVID-19 public health directions;

(c) examine the harms and expected future harms caused by COVID-19 public health directions; and

(d) provide recommendations to protect Victorians against harms caused by the government as a result of the use of emergency powers, pandemic powers and any other related powers.

I contemplated breaking my rule today and speaking at length on this motion. If David were here, I am sure he would have covered things in much more detail; however, in the last two years I have already raised all the issues we will be discussing today. There is far too much waffle and hot air produced in this place that no-one ever listens to, and so as usual I will be reasonably brief.

The last two years have been dominated by the use of emergency powers. We have been banned from leaving our homes, banned from working, banned from re-entering the state, banned from protesting, forced to wear masks, forced to report our movements and forced to take vaccinations. The government deployed hundreds of riot police to break up protests. They fired rubber bullets and pepper spray into crowds. They intimidated people in their homes and made arrests based on social media posts.

The government took control of our lives using emergency powers legislation. Two years on, the government still refuses to give up that power. At no stage did the government try voluntary compliance. Having the big stick of emergency powers in their hand, they went straight to compulsion and force every time. The government extended the initial six-month cap on the use of emergency powers, then extended it a second time and then removed the cap altogether. We are still now subject to these emergency powers. Five per cent of the Victorian population are still being locked out of the economy in direct opposition to the health advice that we have seen, such as it is.

How should this be questioned or brought to account? In theory there are accountability measures around the use of emergency powers. However, none of these accountability mechanisms have amounted to anything. The reports published by the government show nothing of value about who made decisions, why they were made and what information was available at the time. For most of the pandemic the health advice was concealed. The decision-making process was opaque. Was the chief health officer making the health directives based on the best advice? We know that the human rights of Victorians were disregarded when decisions were being made. The words ‘proportionate’ and ‘least restrictive’ very clearly did not factor in the decisions as they should have. We have heard reports from people working in the emergency management team that advice and draft directions were regularly passed through the Premier’s office. They were concerned that political priorities interfered with frank and fearless health advice. This is not the way the emergency powers were designed to run. This must be examined in an impartial process.

The inquiry into the hotel quarantine fiasco was buried under a mountain of ‘I can’t recall’ statements. The findings of abuse of human rights by the Victorian Ombudsman were swept under the rug and ignored. This pandemic has exposed how vulnerable Victorians are to abuse of government power and how emergency powers need proper safeguards to protect Victorians from their government during an emergency.

Putting to one side the human rights aspect of the pandemic response, there remains the question of whether the measures taken under the emergency powers were appropriate and whether over both the short run and the long run they improved the health of Victorians or whether in the long run more lives will be lost. We know in retrospect that many measures taken under the emergency powers did not improve the health outcomes. Locking people in their houses in the early stages of the pandemic and limiting outside exercise was probably counterproductive from a health perspective.

Many measures taken during the pandemic are having long-term impacts on the physical and mental health of Victorians. It seems likely that the long-term health costs of the response will dwarf the actual health impacts of the pandemic. Just the reduction in physical exercise—the pandemic weight gains will be an anchor around the necks of Victorians into the future. Alcohol consumption rocketed during the pandemic and has not dropped back to prepandemic levels. Other medical issues were ignored when they should have been treated, and mental health issues have spiked across age groups and across the state.

A clear example of the breakdown of process that should be examined is the treatment of children throughout the pandemic. Mounting evidence is suggesting that there have been significant impacts on children—higher numbers of students refusing to attend class and a devastating burden on mental health that has impacted many Victorians, but particularly children and teenagers. Just today we have reports that technology used for remote learning may have systematically breached the privacy of students, all of this for a virus that presents less risk to young people than the current strain of influenza that is circulating.

In addition to the questions about whether this was an appropriate response, there are questions of process that need to be examined. How were the benefits and harms assessed? How robust were human rights considerations? Any restrictions are supposed to be proportionate and the least restrictive of human rights. Who made the call, what advice did they act on and what was the process for doing so? Victorians deserve answers, and any future government needs to understand so we can avoid making the same mistakes in any future crisis, but we will not know if we do not look clearly and closely at this.

I have not even touched on the economic costs of the use of emergency powers—the billions of dollars in debt, the small businesses crushed, the lives and dreams crushed. The economy is not just some abstract economic figure; it is the sum of all human activity, all the effort and striving, the dreams and hopes of the people. Two years of our lives and so much more of our future gone.

It is clear that I believe that the way this pandemic was handled by the Andrews government is not a model to be replicated. But even if you think that things were largely managed well, there remain many lessons to be learned and improvements to be made, and I have zero faith that any review that is not entirely independent of this government will produce an honest, dispassionate analysis of the pandemic response, as we have seen all too often when the government investigates themselves.

That is why I am calling for a royal commission to investigate the use of emergency powers. A royal commission will be able to untangle the mess that is the last two years of dictatorial government control. It would expose the problems and reveal where reforms are needed, and no doubt it will also identify what has been done right. If the government thinks they have done well, they should have no reason to fear an investigation. They should welcome this review. It is not about a witch-hunt or finger-pointing; it is about finding truth. Victorians deserve to understand why their lives have been upended for the last two years. Victorians need to know what worked and what did not work, what was justified and what was not. If we do not examine properly what happened, if we allow spin and cover-ups to conceal what really happened, we will be doomed to repeat mistakes, and probably worse than them. We must look at this, really look at it so that we can do better next time.

Ms WATT (Northern Metropolitan) (14:12): I rise to speak on Mr Quilty’s motion. Around the world the impact of COVID on communities and economies is profound. Australia was one of only a handful of jurisdictions around the world that was able to eradicate the virus for long periods of time, thereby reducing serious health risks to the community and protecting our health systems.

The slow progress of the commonwealth’s COVID vaccine program in achieving high population-wide vaccination rates meant that here in Victoria interventions to protect the health of the community, particularly the health of our most vulnerable, continued well into 2021. With the slow progress of the commonwealth’s vaccination program Victoria stepped in and stepped up to deliver over 40 per cent of all vaccinations administered in our state, which is well above the 30 per cent that the state system was responsible for. Our state vaccination system was so successful here in Victoria that it administered more vaccinations than any other jurisdiction. Since the commencement of the rollout, over 6.2 million vaccine doses have been administered through the Victorian government vaccination sites, and as of today almost 15.4 million doses have been administered in Victoria across all state-run sites and through our general practitioners.

Victoria’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic has been no doubt the most scrutinised in the country. For over 100 days the Premier held a daily media conference, together with public health experts, and answered every single question until there were simply no more. Victoria participated in the national contact-tracing review conducted by Professor Finkel, looking at contact-tracing and outbreak management systems and processes in all state and territories. The state officials and experts appeared before numerous COVID parliamentary inquiries for hours on end. The government’s amendments to the Public Health and Wellbeing Act 2008 have delivered the most open and transparent pandemic emergency response in Australia, and since the pandemic declaration on 15 December 2021 the pandemic orders have been published, together with the chief health officer’s advice, the minister’s statement of reasons and a statement on charter assessment compatibility. This is in addition to the hours of media interviews conducted each and every day by our public health professionals.

It is not the Victorian government’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic that needs to be reviewed. As yet the previous commonwealth government has not been held to account for the many failures that exacerbated the pandemic here in our nation. Former Prime Minister Scott Morrison—and I will say that one more time, because I kind of enjoy it: former Prime Minister Scott Morrison—admitted during the recent federal election campaign that his government made decisions that ‘not on every occasion were right’. They were late ordering vaccines, and they failed to provide rapid antigen tests when Australians needed them most. He admitted that they could have communicated more clearly about the risks and challenges when he called for an end to restrictions, including mask wearing, before the omicron wave in December.

Mr Gepp: It was not his job.

Ms WATT: It was not his job, and it is not a race. I think we recall hearing that more times than one, and I am sure other colleagues speaking to this motion will have much more to add. The commonwealth failed. It failed those in aged care. They did not have a surge workforce strategy, and they did not have a plan to support the private aged care system. Instead they sent in the military.

The Victorian government, along with all other states and territories, had to make some really hard decisions to keep our community safe while the federal government, along with those opposite, more often than not chose to play politics. This government and our dedicated hardworking health professionals are the most transparent across the country, and allegations to the contrary peddled by those opposite are wrong and, frankly, should absolutely be called out.

No decision made during the global pandemic has been taken lightly. We understand that the decisions that this government took in 2020 and 2021 to contain the spread of outbreaks and keep the Victorian community safe were difficult for many people across the state. The chief health officer’s decisions—and now the Minister for Health’s decisions—have always been on the basis of proportionate, timely and expert evidence-based public health advice, with the intent to reduce the serious risk to public health caused by COVID-19 driving the exercise of power. Further, the public health directions issued under the state of emergency and the pandemic orders under the pandemic declaration must comply with the principles of the Public Health and Wellbeing Act 2008 and the Charter of Human Rights and Responsibilities Act 2006. The priority for this government is to ensure that Victorians are safe and ensure that we are open, and these powers will ensure that we do both.

In December 2021 the Victorian government passed the new pandemic-specific legislation that provides for a framework to ensure that Victorians can effectively manage the pandemic and any future pandemics. Under this new legislation a state of emergency in Victoria is no longer required to manage the COVID-19 pandemic. On 15 December 2021 a pandemic declaration was made by the Premier when the previous state of emergency ended. The current pandemic declaration expires at 11.59 pm on 12 July.

Under the pandemic declaration it is the Minister for Health in consultation with the chief health officer who considers what measures are required to manage the pandemic and to keep Victorians safe. The minister is also able to consider non-health factors, such as the economic, social and mental wellbeing of Victorians in the consideration of pandemic orders. Since the new arrangements came into place late last year, each set of orders has published online and is available to the public within seven days of the order being signed, together with the chief health officer’s advice, a statement by the minister with the minister’s reasons for making changes to orders and a summary of the human rights assessment.

The Victorian government thanks everyone in the Victorian community who continues to do the right thing, helping to reduce the impact of the virus on the economy, our healthcare system and our broader community.

Pandemic order settings are continually reviewed, including considering the evolving epidemiological and public health modelling to ensure that the appropriate settings are in place to manage the public health risk, protect our health system and keep Victorians safe. I will just note that some changes have come out today, including around second booster access for a range of people with some health vulnerabilities, including those with cancer. So the advice is changing constantly.

Under the new pandemic management arrangements, additional transparency and oversight measures ensure that decisions are open, easily understood and reviewed, including off the back of advice that comes from our national partners. This includes a joint parliamentary investigative committee with parliamentary oversight of any pandemic orders. Further, this contains the Independent Pandemic Management Advisory Committee, which is able to review pandemic orders and provide advice to the Minister for Health.

I am just going to take a moment to talk about our state’s high vaccination rate. Vaccinations have simply made the most profound difference to the course of this pandemic, and achieving high vaccination rates is unquestionably one of the key factors that has enabled us to gradually remove many of the restrictions to prevent the spread of COVID-19 in the community. The vaccine mandates have been crucial to achieving this. First and second doses across a range of sectors were implemented in 2021 and have played a significant role in getting Victoria’s vaccination uptake to such significant and high rates. With the omicron variant in particular, the evidence shows that being vaccinated with three doses matters, and it makes a significant difference to the health outcomes for those who contract COVID. There is clear data showing a third dose decreases the chance of being hospitalised by up to 90 per cent. Between 1 January 2022 and 5 May 2022 across all age groups, 82 per cent of people who died had not received their third dose and 35.4 per cent had not received two doses but make up 5.5 per cent of the general adult population.

This is why after consulting the chief health officer the Minister for Health determined that specific critical sectors, including aged care, health care, disability care and education workers, must all be vaccinated with three doses to continue working, given the high risk of exposure to and of spreading the virus. The pandemic orders required that healthcare, disability, custodial, emergency services, meat- and seafood-processing, quarantine accommodation and food distribution workers must have their third dose by 12 March 2022, recently passed. Workers who were not eligible yet for a third dose on 12 January were required to get it by 29 March 2022.

There is so much more that I could say, but I know that there is interest and profound enthusiasm from other members here in this chamber to speak very strongly about the government’s response to COVID-19 and in particular thank the Victorian people and our excellent healthcare workers.

Ms CROZIER (Southern Metropolitan) (14:22): I rise to speak to Mr Quilty’s motion and in support of Mr Quilty’s motion this afternoon, because it is speaking to the issues that I have been speaking to for many, many months. I have just listened to the government MP spruik the government’s achievements, and whilst I acknowledge the challenges of the government with the COVID-19 pandemic—we all acknowledge that—there were failures, and there were significant failures. There were catastrophic failures, and I want to go to those.

I will go to those, but I want to just make the point that Mr Quilty is speaking about the government’s response and the impacts—the loss of liberty, violation of human rights, economic hardship, debt, consumption of savings, deterioration of mental and physical health, damage to the reputation of public institutions, reduction in the enjoyment of life and other expected future harms. He talks a bit about the powers of the Public Health and Wellbeing Act 2008 and then calls on the government to establish a royal commission. Now, that was something that this side of the house, the Liberals and Nationals, were calling for in September 2020—a royal commission after the catastrophic failures of contact tracing in this state and the loss of 801 lives through the second wave.

But can I just go back to the point about—before I do speak more to that—economic hardship, debt and the consumption of savings. I know that the previous MP was gloating about the loss of the federal government just a few moments ago, quite disgracefully actually when you think about what the federal government did and put into JobKeeper, really assisting so many small businesses and providing that assistance that kept them going through COVID-19, especially here in Victoria. The former federal Treasurer Josh Frydenberg himself and his family were caught up in the Victorian lockdown—the lockdown after lockdown after lockdown, the six lockdowns to prepare our health system. That never happened. We are in the worst crisis that we have ever seen because of the failures. The government might gloat about that, but those issues for businesses would have been far more profound had the federal government actions not occurred.

But let us go back to this motion, because a royal commission is needed. I am reminded of the 2009 Victorian Bushfires Royal Commission into the terrible Victorian bushfires. I was reading the reasoning for why the commission was conducted. I want to read this, and I know you, Deputy President, know this more than most in this house, because you were in the Parliament at the time and you were in those communities at the time, after such a very significant tragedy:

The Commission conducted an extensive investigation into the causes of, the preparation for, the response to and the impact of the fires that burned throughout Victoria in late January and February 2009. As Commissioners, we concentrated on gaining an understanding of precisely what took place and how the risks of such a tragedy recurring might be reduced.

They went on and spoke of who they heard from at the opening hearings and who they spoke to, because they said they wanted to understand how we might avoid the risk again. That is why a royal commission is needed. That is why we called for one in September 2020. But since September 2020 so much more has happened; we have had far more lockdowns since then. And it was not just me calling for a royal commission at that time. There was the AMA. Victorian president Julian Rait said:

In life, unless you’re prepared to acknowledge mistakes you won’t grow and that’s my concern about some of our institutions, particularly the Victorian government where there is this long-standing culture of defensiveness.

He is right—the secrecy, the ongoing obfuscation about the information that every Victorian deserved to have. There was no transparency. The government says, ‘Oh, there were orders’. There was no transparency. Who made the curfew decision? No-one knows. But we all do know—it was the Premier. The chief health officer did not give him that advice; he said so himself. Who berated people watching a sunset go down? The Premier, Daniel Andrews, did. Where was the advice coming from just a few months ago? Who made the advice allowing Novak Djokovic to get an exemption to come in and play tennis out of the Department of Health? No-one knows. No-one has given that advice.

Members interjecting.

Ms CROZIER: Listen to the government MPs spruik over there. Listen to them carry on. I can tell you that Victorians know that this government is the most disingenuous government of all time. There are multiple failures: contact tracing; on the vaccination program that Ms Watts spoke about, the botched booking system that delayed the vaccination program being rolled out in the state centres, with the Premier not even acknowledging that pharmacists and GPs would do it; the curfews; and the playgrounds. Who could forget the playgrounds? Taping off playgrounds for goodness sake—who made that decision? Good God. We must learn from this. We must understand what exactly went on, because the restrictions in this state were the worst of any others in the country, with the worst outcomes. The number of deaths in Victoria has exceeded every other state and territory. On the restrictions, Melbourne was the longest locked-down city in the world. The ramifications are the mental health aspects that Mr Quilty spoke of on children—the shadow pandemic. It is a pity you lot did not listen to the Pandemic Declaration Accountability and Oversight Committee last week when the Shadow Pandemic Victoria representatives came in and spoke of the mental health impacts: the suicides, the attempted suicides of children, the self-harm, the eating disorders and the gang rapes of young girls.

Ms Terpstra: You’re a disgrace.

Ms CROZIER: That is the evidence that was provided, Ms Terpstra, in the committee.

Members interjecting.

The DEPUTY PRESIDENT: Order! Can we just have a bit of quiet. Ms Crozier has the call.

Ms CROZIER: I note the interjections from the government MPs—that they say this is a disgrace. That was the evidence provided to the pandemic committee the other week from Shadow Pandemic. These are mothers with children; 20 000 people came together to give their experiences. The mental health impacts on children are profound. They were shut out of school for months.

Members interjecting.

Ms CROZIER: The government MPs scoff at this. It is just astounding. You have no idea of the impacts of your government’s decisions and policy decisions. This is the biggest failure of a policy decision by any state government in the history of Victoria. We need a royal commission. That is why we called for it in September 2020. That is why I am supporting this motion of Mr Quilty.

There was the Coate inquiry, the farcical Coate inquiry, where the Premier, 10 bureaucrats and three ministers could not remember, could not recall. What a disgrace that was. It was a disgrace to every Victorian that they could not remember and recall who made the decision about the security guards for hotel quarantine, where the second wave started and led to the tragedy of 801 Victorians losing their lives. This is the true reality and nature of what happened in this state. This is what happened. You can be in denial, government MPs, but this is what happened. And here we have that Coate inquiry report, where Justice Coate herself was scathing about the government’s handling. It says the decision was:

… made without proper analysis or even a clear articulation that it was being made at all.

On its face, this was at odds with any normal application of the principles of the Westminster system of responsible government. That a decision of such significance for a government program, which ultimately involved the expenditure of tens of millions of dollars and the employment of thousands of people, had neither a responsible Minister nor a transparent rationale for why that course was adopted, plainly does not seem to accord with those principles.

That is what Justice Coate said about the hotel quarantine program; that is what she found. And yet we have had failure after failure after failure since then, and the impacts are profound, as Mr Quilty said—the economic impacts, the social impacts. There were those Victorians that were locked out of their own state in New South Wales. They could not come back to Victoria to attend family members’ funerals. They could not come back to have medical appointments, for goodness sake. The Ombudsman found that.

I could say so much more. I am frustrated that I do not have more than another 30 seconds, but what I will say in conclusion is the policy failures of this government through the last two years of the COVID response need a proper response, and the only way to do that is to have a royal commission so that those failures may never happen again.

The DEPUTY PRESIDENT: I call Mr Gepp.

Mr GEPP (Northern Victoria) (14:32): Thank you, Deputy President. For the 50th time, it is Gepp, and I would ask you to show some respect and pronounce it correctly.

I rise to speak on Mr Quilty’s motion. Gee whiz, you think you have seen it all in this place and then you hear the contribution that has just been made by Ms Crozier and the one preceding it by the mover of the motion, Mr Quilty. I just checked on the World Health Organization website to refresh my memory about where things are up to in terms of COVID around the globe. Globally there have been 526 million reported cases of COVID and 6.28 million deaths. And I thought, ‘I’ll have a look to see where Australia sits. Where does Australia sit in terms of COVID?’. We have had 7.03 million reported cases of COVID and 8178 deaths, and we all feel dreadfully sad about each one of those lives that has been tragically lost to COVID.

How does that compare statistically to other countries around the world? Just on the table from the World Health Organization website, Japan has had 8.63 million cases, so a bit more than Australia, and 30 336 deaths—almost four times as many deaths. The Netherlands has had 8.16 million cases and 22 328 deaths. Iran has had 7.23 million cases—very close, very close indeed, to Australia’s number—but the number of deaths is 141 000 in comparison to our 8000 deaths. Colombia has had 6.1 million cases and 140 000 deaths, and it goes on.

This motion calls into question some of the things that this government has done, particularly around things such as the vaccine mandates. I would strongly suggest to the house that if the government had not taken the action that it did take in relation to vaccine mandates, the numbers against our country’s name in the World Health Organization table would be significantly higher. We do not apologise. We do not apologise for putting the health and safety of our citizens first and foremost. The Premier from day one when he first fronted the media about the pandemic said clearly—very, very clearly—that this government’s priority would be the health and wellbeing of its citizens. First, second and third, that would be the focus of this government. We knew that there were going to be consequences of the decisions that we were taking. We understood that there was going to be an economic impact, that there was going to be an economic downturn. We understood that. We understood that it was also going to have an impact on things such as the mental health and wellbeing of our citizens.

So we acknowledged that, but we also acknowledged that if we could not keep our citizens safe, if we could not keep our citizens well, if we could not protect the health sector, if we could not protect the fundamentals of our health system here in Victoria with the measures that we were about to adopt and that we would take based on the best medical advice that we were receiving at the time—if we could not do that—then we were going to be in all sorts of strife, that we were going to be in all sorts of trouble. We understood that each and every time we took a decision in relation to this pandemic there would be consequences. Of course there were—there always will be. But if we had not taken the measures that we took—if we had not taken those measures—then the number of deaths against the number of cases according to the World Health Organization table that I just referred to would be a darn sight worse.

You would think, wouldn’t you, given the contributions from Ms Crozier and Mr Quilty that we are the only ones in the world that dealt with this. Well, just about every other country in the world wrestled with the same issues, wrestled with the notion of lockdowns. And we saw it again and again and again, right around the globe. We saw airports become vast desert wastelands.

Mr Melhem interjected.

Mr GEPP: China has just introduced some more lockdowns; that is absolutely correct, Mr Melhem. So this bunkum that we hear from those opposite, including Mr Quilty, again and again and again fails to recognise the facts. Had the Victorian Labor government under Daniel Andrews’s leadership followed the advice of the Liberal Party and the Liberal Democrats, I can guarantee you that we would be in a whole lot worse trouble in terms of our health system. Our health system would be non-existent because it would have collapsed in on itself. It would have absolutely collapsed in on itself had we followed the advice and the urgings of those opposite and Mr Quilty, none of whom were acting on any scientific advice, none of whom were responding to the medical advice that was coming through on a daily basis. All the time the Premier was standing in front of those news cameras day after day after day explaining to the Victorian people the depth of that advice we had the chief health officer standing next to him every day explaining to the Victorian people—understanding that the decisions we were making would have some consequences further down the road—that the first priority of the government was the safety and the health and wellbeing of our citizens. When you look at the statistics on the World Health Organization COVID-19 table, I would say that we have done pretty well.

I just want to digress for another moment. The other thing that often gets overlooked is that when you look statistically at where the majority of cases actually occurred in the Victorian population, and indeed around the country and around the globe, it was working people. It was people who did not have available to them a vast amount of means—those people who had no choice but to go out and perform their insecure job because if they did not they could not put food on the table. It was those people who were the ones at most risk—the most vulnerable people in our economy. If you want to talk about economics, it was those people that were the most at risk in our economy. If you want to talk about kids, right from the outset the world was saying, ‘This virus doesn’t impact children as it does others in the community’. We knew that. But what we also knew was that the kids were the biggest carriers and they were the spreaders, and in early days the science was still out about the longer term impact on the children. What were we to do? Were we to just throw open the doors and say, ‘Let’s have life’s natural selection processes take place here’? Because we know what would have occurred: it would have been the most vulnerable in our community, those that could not protect themselves, who would have fallen over.

In my last 50 seconds, before we finish up this Parliament and before it ends its life in a few short months, I would rather, whenever we have this debate in this place about the pandemic and our response, that we all stand as one and that we just applaud all of those workers who put themselves, day after day, minute after minute, hour after hour, between us and that pandemic. When we did fall ill, they were the ones who went to work, masked up and treated us as best they could. Let us have that debate. Let us stand up and let us applaud all of those healthcare workers, those transport workers, those supermarket workers and all of the supply chains. Let us say thanks to them instead of the drivel that we get from the Liberal Democrats. I oppose the motion.

The DEPUTY PRESIDENT: Thank you, Mr Gepp.

Mr GEPP: On a point of order, Deputy President, that is the second time within 10 minutes that you have mispronounced my name. I corrected you earlier, and I would ask you, respectfully, to pronounce my name correctly.

The DEPUTY PRESIDENT: Thank you, Mr Gepp.

I notice that in the upper gallery we have a former Deputy President, Khalil Eideh, and also a former minister, Andre Haermeyer. Welcome.

Dr CUMMING (Western Metropolitan) (14:43): It is easy to come after the government. If this government has nothing to hide, why don’t they open their books? Why don’t you allow us to go into the department? Why don’t you show us the science? Why don’t you show us the medical advice? Why don’t you show us and the community all of the information behind your decisions? Why are you so afraid?

A member: We’re not.

Dr CUMMING: Oh, well, then have this inquiry. Get up and vote in about 2 minutes and say, ‘Yes, we agree. We agree that the community should have the medical information. They should have the science behind our decisions. This government should be transparent and accountable’. Why don’t you show us that before the next state election? Why don’t we have this? The UK government was able to have an inquiry in the first 12 months of COVID so they could learn from what they were doing—their responses. But this government—oh, no, not at all. We cannot get the medical advice. We cannot see the science. It is made up as you go along. It has been an absolute propaganda show by this government. Why would this government actually come in here only a couple months ago and have us vote on the chief health officer getting immunity if he did not do anything wrong? Oh, that is right. This government did that. They came in here and they made an amendment to the Public Health and Wellbeing Act 2008 to make sure that the chief health officer gets immunity for all of his decisions in the last two years. Wow. Nothing to hide. Who does that? Who actually does that? This government, the Daniel Andrews government.

At this time of the pandemic why wasn’t the priority around our healthcare system? Why didn’t this government produce the ICU beds that it promised at the start of the pandemic? Why didn’t it put money into our ambulance services? Why did it allow for the shutting of elective surgery? Why? Why would you have health professionals sitting at home during a pandemic and create a massive backlog? Why wouldn’t you allow people who could go out to get the diagnostic services that they required? Now we have an increased load of people presenting with cancers that are beyond help because of this government. Did they redirect their funds during COVID to build a hospital or with the hospitals they had on the books throw more money at them to get them up and running quickly or increase the capacity of those hospitals? No, they did not.

Where is the science? Where is the medical advice? Where is this magical medical advice that shows us that the unvaccinated currently cannot work? They cannot work according to this government. Every other state allows them to work, but not this state. How is it science when the unvaccinated can go into a shop but they cannot work there? How is that science? It is not, not at all. And the government will not lift the mandates—seriously, 10 months in. They are happy to have the worker shortages that we have across the state, all over. They are happy to have people leave Victoria in droves to work in other states due to fears of more lockdowns because they have not given assurances that they will not do it again—not at all.

The government could have protected our children throughout this pandemic. It did not. We could have had the most beautiful bubble around our children. They could have gone to school. They could have gone to playgrounds. We could have looked after their mental health. But no, we had to have an increase in the sexual abuse of children at home. In addition, sitting at home, it was encouraged by this government for people to drink as much as they wanted—Uber drinks. So those children had to sit in that, as well as the amount of domestic violence that increased due to the lockdowns—the pressure on those marriages, the pressure on those families. The government did nothing to protect our children throughout this pandemic. They could have had a normal childhood, but the government refused. The government absolutely refused to look after our children, to make sure that they went to school, that their mental health was looked after.

We knew that this was a virus and we needed to protect our most vulnerable. The government did not. It did not protect the aged, not at all. It kept saying it was somebody else’s job. It knew that our number one job was to look after our most vulnerable, but it did not.

Now where are we? We are at a place where people cannot afford food. The long queues for food vouchers, for food bundles, for soup kitchens are enormous. They are nothing like I have ever seen in my whole entire life. Come down to the mall in Footscray and see how long the queues are. Come and have a look. They are humungous. When Foodbank opens their doors the cars are around the street and up the road for blocks and blocks. Queuing for hours for food—for food!

The government allowed the community to lose their businesses and their homes and to not be able to go and get jobs or to work and be able to provide for their families. What government does that, under the guise of mandates? What kind of stupidity is that? And the government continues it. It continues to say in one breath it is about workers but then it does not allow people to work—work that is essential for their health and for their mental health and to provide a roof over their heads and to buy food. But the government does not care; it absolutely does not care. Why would government members not vote for this? Why wouldn’t the government establish a royal commission and investigate all of its decisions if it has nothing to hide? Why wouldn’t it?

We have had a loss of liberty. We have had so many lockdowns. People are in the worst amount of hardship with their mental health and their physical health. They cannot go to a hospital. Show us what you have done. If the government is so strong about its decisions, show us the working behind all of those decisions. Because I know that they are not right.

The government popped up a tent near Highpoint and allowed people to get tested and just walk through Highpoint when it could have had long-lasting infrastructure. That money could have been put into community halls or community facilities and been spent on those buildings for the next 50 years. But no, the government chose to put up tents. It could have put that amount of money into the community for a proper, long-lasting response, for infrastructure that we could have had forever, but it chose not to. The government had a disposable response. It really should, if it is not worried—it constantly crows in this place—show us. Be accountable, be transparent. That is what the community wants. But government members know that they cannot because there is nothing. The government made it up as it went along. It has not got anything.

It was clear with the pandemic bill that the government wanted to continue to have verbal advice, so there will not be any paper trail apart from hopefully a whole heap of receipts and a lot of debt. Do not worry: one day the government will be made accountable. It will be in November and it will be next year. There will be a proper inquiry when people are in this place and able to hold the government to account.

Mrs McARTHUR (Western Victoria) (14:53): I rise in support of Mr Quilty’s motion requiring a royal commission into the Andrews government and its handling of the pandemic and the catastrophic consequences for this state. Why do we need a royal commission? We would not normally need a royal commission, but the fact of the matter is we simply cannot trust this Premier. The people of Victoria cannot trust him, so we need to have a royal commission into the consequences of the pandemic.

The Premier hollowed out this Parliament. He sidelined the safeguards which the legislature traditionally places on the executive with the cancellation of parliamentary sittings, the inability to institute a virtual Parliament and voting as there was in many other countries, and the suppression of committees, including the Labor chair of the Scrutiny of Acts and Regulations Committee abdicating that committee’s important role to investigate legislation thoroughly before it comes to this Parliament. The Public Accounts and Estimates Committee was eventually given an oversight role, but with a Labor chair it is next to useless. In other jurisdictions subscribing to the Westminster model opposition members chair oversight committees like this, as happened in the federal Parliament, for example. The Premier used this hollowed-out Parliament not just to avoid scrutiny of his decisions but to pass legislation which granted him even greater powers.

The pandemic bill, which we have already heard so much about, is the prime example. We have seen just how ineffective the Independent Pandemic Management Advisory Committee is. In months it has achieved absolutely nothing. It is not just parliamentary scrutiny the Premier has cut out; it is scrutiny from outside—independent oversight bodies. The Victorian Ombudsman has recently and rightly announced a critical review into the politicisation of the public service and has investigated the pathetic performance of the government on the border permits fiasco. At IBAC, where the Premier now has a frequent flyer pass, budget were cut again despite record levels of investigation being required, largely due to his party’s rotten culture. It is for these reasons that this royal commission is necessary. In a normal world it might be trusted that the government could learn lessons responsibly. But every bit of this Premier’s record tells us he will not. That is why we need an independent external and expert commission. We simply do not trust the Premier. There is no-one to blame but yourself, Premier.

Where else in the world, where else in this country, have we had lockdowns to the extent that we have had here? Where else in the world did we have curfews like those on innocent Victorians? Anyone would have thought that the Victorians who live in Melbourne were criminals of the highest order. I mean, we think very seriously about locking down criminals for 23 hours. But no, innocent Victorians were locked down. What damage did that do to people? Think of those people locked up in housing commission towers or in flats who were not even able in the end to allow their children out into the playground. I heard stories of mothers and grandmothers with their children being chased out of parks when the ruling came that children could not be in parks on swings. What nonsense is that?

The damage to mental health has been extreme. Otherwise why would this government introduce a new tax on businesses to cover the mental health issues that they themselves have created? The problem has been of their own making, so businesses now are taxed extra to cover the mental health issues that the government themselves have created.

There are health issues. We have now got at least 80 000 people on waiting lists to get surgery. What is the cost to the people of Victoria who have forgone heart surgery, cancer surgery or orthopaedic surgery? We have all had constituents, I am sure, who have complained to us about the fact that even though they have saved all their life to have private health insurance just to be able to get surgery when they require it, they have had their surgery cancelled two and three times and are in excruciating pain—some in wheelchairs waiting for surgery. Small babies and children cannot get surgery. Patients that need eye operations cannot get surgery. What will be the cost down the track of these health conditions that have not been addressed because you closed down hospitals and could not manage the pandemic properly in a health situation? You promised us 4000 beds. What happened to them? Why are we in a situation where people cannot get the surgery they require when they require it?

The loss of education for children was massive. How on earth are they going to recover? Children and students could not have proper tuition for two years. I know of so many students who basically lost those two years of their lives in an education sense and cannot go on to further education because they could not cope with online learning, let alone the parents who were put in a situation of having to try and teach their children while trying to hold down a job, maybe with small, preschool children underfoot. That cost is immense. It cannot be measured now, but it will be measured in the years to come.

The economic hardship, as one of the clauses in the motion raises, is massive. So many businesses closed, and businesses are still fighting nonsensical worker mandates—absolutely ridiculous—where they cannot get workers. We are short of workers in every industry and yet there are still mandates on workers and they cannot go to work because they are not triple vaccinated or some ridiculous nonsense. We have encouraged Victorians to do the right thing: go and get vaccinated. What is their reward? They cannot work. They cannot put bread on the table because their job might have gone, and those who want to work but cannot for one reason or another be vaccinated are still without work even now with 95 per cent of the population vaccinated. What was the point of all that?

So much damage has been done. There was the extraordinary case of police barging into a constituent’s house in Ballarat, arresting and handcuffing a pregnant woman, a mother, because she suggested on social media that we should somehow make a case against what was happening to everybody. Is that the sort of state we want to live in? Is nobody going to be accountable for this? Let alone the tens of millions that were spent on the Coate inquiry. I found out and was assured in the Public Accounts and Estimates Committee that the legal fees were being paid by the state insurer—that means the taxpayers of Victoria footed that bill. All we learned from the Coate inquiry was, ‘I’ve had a memory loss; I don’t recall’, and one minister ‘doesn’t read emails’. We learned nothing, achieved nothing, from the Coate inquiry. Nobody was responsible for ensuring that unqualified bouncers became hotel quarantine inspectors, resulting directly, as it was ascertained, in 801 deaths. That is a responsibility of this government, yet nobody is taking responsibility.

The government lacks accountability, it lacks transparency. I will happily support Mr Quilty’s motion to ensure that a royal commission is conducted so we can get to the bottom of how this whole pandemic was so badly managed.

Mr TARLAMIS (South Eastern Metropolitan) (15:03): I also rise to make a contribution on Mr Quilty’s motion today, and can I begin by saying, ‘Wow’. I do not know how else to begin my contribution. There is a lot to unpack in the contributions that have been made so far, but ‘Wow’ is pretty much the way I would begin this contribution. I have been in this chamber on many occasions on a Wednesday when we have seen various motions come to this place on opposition and crossbench business day but also on other sitting days when we have had various questions in question time and when there have been pieces of legislation debated and many questions asked around the pandemic, and there has been a lot of information forthcoming as through other processes as well. But you would think from the contributions of those opposite that, I do not know, we have not been experiencing a global pandemic, there have not been challenges created by that global pandemic and there have not been consequences that have arisen because of it. This has impacted the world. All communities and economies have been impacted by COVID. No-one has been immune. To suggest that the Victorian government have taken the decisions that they have lightly and have basically not been cognisant of the fact that they would have repercussions is just ludicrous. Of course we knew that there would be repercussions from the decisions that we made. Very tough decisions had to be made to slow the spread of COVID and to protect Victorians, and that is what it was all about. It was about protecting Victorians and keeping them safe, and all those decisions were taken after careful consideration and based on medical advice.

Quite frankly, these comments that are thrown around here and these statements and claims that workers cannot not work, that we refuse to look after children, we refuse to look after the vulnerable and we do not care about people are just absolute garbage and rubbish. There is no substance to any of it whatsoever. There are these throwaway lines about, ‘Why don’t you follow the science?’, and then every time we produce information that does have evidence, if it does not back up what they believe, they just dismiss it. They are just farcical some of the statements that have come out of the mouths of some of the people here.

As for Ms Crozier’s contribution, I mean, it is what we have come to expect from the opposition consistently throughout the entire pandemic. It has been inconsistent and all things to all people. One day they have been claiming one thing, the next day they have been claiming the opposite. The inconsistencies—

Ms Crozier interjected.

Mr TARLAMIS: That is fine. The inconsistencies are on the record for everyone to see. Do not take my word for it, go back and have a look at the various press conferences. They are there in the public domain to see. Go back and have a look. You can see for yourself. They are all on the public record, the inconsistencies. One day there were claims that this was their position, then they had a subsequent different position. It is all on the public record. They were trying to be all things to all people and were chasing popularity. That is not what the government sought to do. The decision-making process that the government went through, in terms of the actions that they took to protect Victorians and to get them through this pandemic safely, was based on medical advice and was based on careful consideration. It was not based on what was going to make us popular. If we were trying to be popular, we would have taken a very different path. The decisions that were taken slowed the progress of the virus, and unlike many jurisdictions around the world we were able to eradicate the virus for very long periods of time, reduce the serious health risks to the community, slow the spread of the disease and protect our health system, and that is what we intended to do.

But again, at no point did we hear those opposite criticise the commonwealth. At no point whatsoever did we hear them step up and criticise the commonwealth for their lack of action on anything. When it came to quarantine, which was a responsibility that they should have stepped up for, they washed their hands of it. There was nothing but silence from the other side. When it came to the vaccination rollout, there was silence from the other side. When it came to rapid antigen test availability, there was silence from the other side. There was basically nothing from the other side. We delivered more vaccinations than we were originally intended to do, because the commonwealth could not get their act together and there was nothing from the other side. And every time the states did step in, to take the lead, deliver more than they were supposed to and basically get out there and pick up the pieces where the commonwealth fell short, they copped criticism from the commonwealth government about what they were doing. They sought to politicise things and criticise the government, yet during the election campaign you had the former prime minister out there basically saying, ‘Oh, look how great we are. Look how tops we are. Look at the great job that we’ve done. We’re owning this. We got us through. Look at all the people that we saved. Because of our leadership, we got you through’. Point to the decision that he made to help get us through. He could not. When he stepped up and said, ‘Vote for me for my leadership during the pandemic’, well, the public had a look and could not remember what he did, and they basically voted accordingly. I am sorry, you lot opposite did not call out the federal government once.

We stand by our record on what we did. Basically we took tough decisions, unlike you lot, who basically took the populist route, which was inconsistent and all over the shop. It is on the public record for people to see, and that is fine; you can own that. And you sought to politicise everything with the amount of misinformation and the scare campaigns that were run. I mean, you talk about people’s mental health—you have got some responsibility you have to take for that as well. Members opposite were out there putting out misinformation and scaring people and making them think things were happening that were not happening and scaring them. They were running scared thinking that things were going to happen that actually were not going to happen because of the things that you were putting out there in the public domain. And then you sought to blame us for the misinformation that was being spread. The only people that politicised this issue were the Liberal-Nationals and the Liberal Democrats, who were aiding and abetting them. You lot have a lot more to answer for than us.

When it comes to transparency and integrity, every time you lot get up and talk about transparency and integrity—I mean, have you guys got amnesia? Don’t you recall your time—

Ms Crozier interjected.

Mr TARLAMIS: Oh, so now you are confining your claims of integrity and transparency to certain inquiries. You do not want it to be across the board, because if we go across the board and we look back at your track record, we will see just how hypocritical you are. You were really transparent and your integrity was really great when you were in government—absolutely.

Ms Crozier interjected.

Mr TARLAMIS: Yes, that’s right. Come on, make some more accusations against me. That’s fine, go for it. That’s fine. Make some more accusations against me. That’s fine. You can make all the accusations against me that you like. It does not bother me, because I know that the Victorian government has been open and transparent during the pandemic. We have released information. The Victorian people do not want us to conduct more of these sorts of—

Ms Crozier: They do actually.

Mr TARLAMIS: They do not.

Ms Crozier interjected.

The DEPUTY PRESIDENT: Order! Through the Chair!

Mr TARLAMIS: Yes, they want integrity and trust from you because they believe that you are the bastion of integrity and trust. I am sorry—if people believe that, good luck.

Ms Crozier interjected.

Mr TARLAMIS: We do not support this motion, and the fact that Ms Crozier is having to shout out those sorts of interjections means that her integrity is being called into question and she has to do that. That is fine; it does not worry me. When we call your integrity into question from the time when you were in government, you have got no leg to stand on whatsoever. This government have been far more transparent than your government ever was, and basically there is no comparison whatsoever. We will not be supporting this motion.

Mr LEANE (Eastern Metropolitan—Minister for Local Government, Minister for Suburban Development, Minister for Veterans) (15:14): I just find it amazing that we have people in this chamber that are all angry and blowing up about a health system under pressure. The same people that spoke about health measures when it came to COVID-19 and trying to control it spoke about and against every health measure. And now we have this narrative that the health system has been overwhelmed by the same people. We listened to contributions from people speaking against every health measure that was prescribed by experts in the field to contain a virus before we had been vaccinated—every measure—and now have motions like this saying that those measures should be investigated.

Well, I think the measures proved themselves to be correct to the point that the previous federal government claimed those measures during the campaign. The previous prime minister claimed those measures and said that those measures saved tens of thousands of people’s lives at a period of time when people had not had the opportunity to get vaccinated. I can say firsthand for very close family members of mine, one who is very, very young and one who is closer to my age, that I witnessed them having the virus to a great extent as far as affecting their health goes, and it was terrifying—the older person was triple vaccinated—to the point that I am not too sure if they would have not been on a ventilator if they had not been vaccinated, they were that ill.

I feel like we get these lectures from a couple of anti-vaxxers—well, they are vaccinated anti-vaxxers—that actually encourage people not to get vaccinated. They stood at rallies because they thought it was the popular thing. This chase for the anti-vaxxer vote is madness, because there are well over 95 per cent of adults who are vaccinated anyway, and these groups are chasing this anti-vaxxer vote. I have known people who genuinely are against vaccinations if they can do without, because that is their lifestyle. They have been like that for decades. They believe it, and I respect that conviction. But these are opportunistic anti-vaxxers who made money. The people who led these groups were doing it for money and notoriety. They attracted other people to their cause—made money off them—but the people were not even real anti-vaxxers. They were just like a cult that got formed together and got taken advantage of. So then we have political organisations chasing this tiny little thing. It got proved on the weekend that it does not matter.

There are no mines here. There are no mines for Palmer here. There is no money for Palmer here in Victoria. Palmer is gone from Victoria. He did not have a win. His win was for the preferences to go to the Liberal Party, to maintain the Liberal Party in the federal government and therefore have a big win on a mining licence in Queensland—not in Victoria. There are no mines for him, so he is gone. So this group are chasing this tiny little vote, and it was proved on the weekend that it was all to no avail. As Mr Tarlamis said, the previous prime minister tried to claim the health measures in Victoria and other jurisdictions and tried to claim that he saved all these lives. He actually took ownership of the health measures here. We have a Liberal opposition that go the opposite way, but then as a whole party the Liberal Party have this thing where, ‘We’ll still run these lines, because in Victoria we’ll make political gains because Daniel Andrews is so unpopular because of the health measures that were taken’. That is what they were claiming. It is all weird, I know, but they were claiming that Daniel Andrews is really unpopular. Well, I tell you what: the Victorian Liberal Party would love to be as unpopular as Daniel Andrews. As proof of the pudding from this election, they would absolutely love to be that unpopular. The result in Victoria—losing the federal Treasurer; losing four, possibly five seats in Victoria—is just due to an amazing effort of people that have convinced themselves that the media outlets that bang on about this are right. Well, they have been proven wrong—they have been proven completely wrong.

Our frustration in the government is that we did not like putting in place the measures—we did not like it. We did not like the lockdown. It is not like we thought we would be popular because we had locked down the community to stop people from getting a virus while they were not vaccinated and dying. We did not like that we had to do that. We did not want to do that.

I think this is where this argument from people in here is just completely moronic. Maybe they should just listen back to themselves sometimes. Maybe they should look at their contributions made in here and listen back to themselves. I have hope that maybe it will dawn on them how absolutely moronic the position they have taken is. It is moronic because it is not politically popular, and it has been proven. It is moronic because where it is politically popular there is a tiny percentage of the electorate, and there are a number of groups fighting for that tiny little bit. And wouldn’t they have worked out that is not the stairway to heaven by now? But no—maybe we should hold out hope, but maybe we should not hold out too much hope, because all the arguments for the health measures have been proven right, and I have seen it firsthand. I have seen it firsthand. I am so thankful that the people I have seen get COVID in recent times have been vaccinated. I shudder to think what it would have been like if they were not, to the point that they reckon they might not even be here anymore.

Once again, it is appalling, moronic politics. I still do not understand where these people think it takes them. If they want to carve up that tiny little percentage and fight over it, well, good for them. I think the federal election outcome kind of proved, as I said, that there is no great stairway to heaven for anyone there. The worst thing you can do politically is insult the majority’s intelligence, and that was proven on the weekend. People were going around insulting people’s intelligence. People knew. We are the same as them—we did not like the lockdowns; we did not like having the lockdowns, but people knew that it was the right thing to do to protect the people closest to them. I think that we have been through a journey. Despite these measures that, as I said, no-one wanted, no-one enjoyed, I think that it was shown on the weekend—people agreed that the right thing was done.

Anyway, we will leave others to themselves if they want to keep fighting for that little, tiny bit of the electorate—good for them. We will continue to do the right thing by everyone. And I think, after seeing firsthand certain instances recently, I am very, very glad we did.

Ms TAYLOR (Southern Metropolitan) (15:24): I have to sort of count to 10 when we have this allegation about more scrutiny: ‘We need more scrutiny on this issue’. Victoria’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic has been the most scrutinised in the country, and I think this is not about that. It has nothing to do with getting more scrutiny. No, it is really about them wanting to keep that position, that issue, that narrative alive so we do not have to look forward, we do not have to recover and we do not have to think of Victorians into the future. They just want to keep this dead and awful and negative, and actually factually incorrect, narrative alive because they do not want to go forward—because they ain’t got a vision; they have got nothing. This is all they have got, and they want to hang there, on this. Well, let me tell you, for the sake of our country but also for the sake of Victoria, let us start thinking of fellow Victorians and thinking forward.

Now, I know—and I share the sentiments of my colleagues as well—that nobody likes a pandemic. Furthermore, nobody likes having to take these very difficult health measures to survive the pandemic. But that is the point: it was about saving lives. I do not think those opposite get that. I do not think they actually care. I do not think they actually understand that health measures are necessary because, consistent with what Mr Leane has said, at every step on the journey they defied and went against every health measure that was implemented as a necessity, not something that we wanted to do. This was about thinking about fellow Victorians—thinking about my mum, my relatives, my constituents. Sorry for being so selfish and thinking of others and their health.

Now, the other thing is I think the opposition—I know it is the Lib Dems’ motion—are a bit blind to the world, because I had conversations with cousins who work in allied health in the States. They also had to do remote learning with their kids at home. Who knew it was not just in Victoria? But the way this debate is going it is as if we live in this strange and bizarre reality, this alternate reality. I can also speak other languages, not that you need to. I would watch French news and I would watch German news, and they were having similar debates, similar dilemmas, similar challenges—excruciating, yes. Guess what, when you are in government you have to make really tough decisions. You do not have the luxury of saying, ‘Look, it’s all a bit hard. It’s inconvenient. Let’s just do nothing. Let’s sit on our hands and pretend it’s not happening’, because that is exactly the narrative that was being perpetuated by those opposite, and it was horrifying and it was frightening, when in fact we knew that we were doing what had to be done in order to preserve the lives of fellow Victorians—plain and simple.

I know there are issues alleged by those opposite about accountability. Well, let me tell you about accountability and what that really means. Let us look at former PM Scott Morrison, who admitted during the recent federal election campaign that his government made decisions that not on every occasion were right. They were late ordering vaccines. They failed to provide rapid antigen tests. He admitted they could have communicated more clearly about the risks and challenges when he called for an end to restrictions, including mask wearing before the omicron wave in December. The commonwealth failed those in aged care. They did not have a surge workforce strategy, and they did not have a plan to support the private aged care system. Instead they had to send in the military.

If we are talking about accountability, didn’t I mention from the outset the extraordinary degree of scrutiny? I do not know. Didn’t those opposite, the Lib Dems, see the Premier? For over 100 days the Premier held a daily media conference together with the public health experts and answered every single question until that were no more. Victoria participated in the national contact-tracing review conducted by Professor Finkel looking at contact-tracing and outbreak management systems and processes in all states and territories. Victorian officials and experts appeared before numerous COVID parliamentary inquiries for hours on end: the joint investigatory committee’s 2020–21 inquiry into the Victorian government’s response to the COVID 19 pandemic—forgive me for rushing but I think I have to allow 5 minutes for the summing-up, so I am rushing a little bit—the Public Accounts and Estimates Committee’s COVID-19-specific hearings; the new Pandemic Declaration Accountability and Oversight Committee; the hotel quarantine inquiry; and it goes on and it goes on, and there are still accountability measures continuing. We have the Independent Pandemic Management Advisory Committee as well. We also have a joint parliamentary investigative committee with parliamentary oversight of any pandemic orders.

See? It is not about scrutiny. That is not the issue here. It is about wanting to go back to a really negative and a factually incorrect narrative that suits them politically. This has nothing to do with the health of Victorians, let me tell you this. This is just about perpetuating a very destructive and retrospective narrative, and that is it. It is time to look ahead and remind ourselves about what really matters here, and that is fellow Victorians and caring about their health into the future.

Mr QUILTY (Northern Victoria) (15:30): I will be brief in closing. The case for a royal commission is straightforward. We are all tired of hearing the word, but it is true: the response to COVID was unprecedented. It was extraordinary, and it deserves extraordinary scrutiny. There are questions that deserve answers, problems that need solutions and improvements that need identifying. This motion is merely the acknowledgement that we should try and find those answers, address those problems and make those improvements.

Governments are always reluctant to have their actions examined and investigated, but it is important for the integrity of our democracy that the use of extraordinary powers is matched with an extraordinary level of accountability. The government speakers today are exhibit A in why an independent review is necessary—no substantive engagement with the motion at all, only repeatedly arguing that they did a wonderful job and there were no problems at all caused by their pandemic management. Also, because there were no problems, all the problems were caused by federal incompetence. But there were no problems. This assessment is far from objective, to say the least. It is obvious that any government should not be trusted to provide an honest account of their own management during the pandemic.

Government speakers were eager to suggest that we do not need a review because Australia has suffered few COVID deaths. This attitude demonstrates another problem: that government members were single-minded in their pandemic response. As Mr Gepp put it, reducing pandemic deaths was the first, second and third priority of this government. They ignored all the other costs of their decisions, they are still ignoring them, and that is exactly why we need to talk about them.

We will not know what the right thing is unless we review our response to COVID properly. And no, it is not over; people still cannot work today. We cannot put it behind us because it is not behind us. It is still in front of us. We need an independent review. Perhaps a royal commission should be a built-in requirement whenever the government decides it is going to use emergency powers. We certainly need more transparency than we have now. I believe the government should be accountable to the public. If members believe this too, I encourage them to demonstrate that belief by supporting this motion.

Motion agreed to.