Tuesday, 7 March 2023

Bills

Statute Law Amendment Bill 2022

Second reading

Debate resumed on motion of Enver Erdogan:

That the bill be now read a second time.

Georgie CROZIER (Southern Metropolitan) (13:27): I rise to speak on the Statute Law Amendment Bill 2022 and in doing so do not intend to say very much in relation to this bill that has come into the house today, because it is largely a technical bill. It is making amendments to various acts to correct errors, references, omissions and ambiguities, and I will come to those in a moment. I do want to thank the minister’s adviser who contacted me and reassured me that there were no issues with SARC, the Scrutiny of Acts and Regulations Committee. I thank her for giving me that assurance in relation to this particular bill that we are now debating.

I note that some of those errors and ambiguities in references apply to the following pieces of legislation: the Aboriginal Heritage Act 2006, the Domestic Animals Act 1994, the Housing Act 1983 and the Terrorism (Community Protection) Act 2003 – important acts that are here in our state. I note that there are other ones, like the Competition Policy Reform (Victoria) Act 1995, which refers to the Trade Practices Act 1974, a Commonwealth act, which has now become the Competition and Consumer Act 2010. Again, it is important to update those and to understand that those acts at a Commonwealth level have also had an impact on these acts here in Victoria. Not only does this bill amend a variety of acts, as I said, it also amends the Sex Offenders Registration Act 2004 to give effect to an amendment that was sought to be made by the Justice Legislation Amendment (Police and Other Matters) Act 2022, but that was thwarted by an error in the Firearms and Other Acts Amendment Act 2021.

As you can tell, this bill is largely technical and corrects these omissions, errors and ambiguities that apply in relation to references to acts in Victoria as well as in the Commonwealth. I note that this is a routine type of bill that ensures that the statutes here in Victoria are clear and that, as I have said, those acts that have been affected have clear direction. It is very much our intention to support this bill so that Victoria’s statutes do operate as intended and that individuals, including of course the courts and the judiciary, understand and know the intentions of this Parliament.

This legislation, as I said, is really largely technical; it is tidying up those ambiguities, errors and omissions. It is not making any substantial changes to legislation. The one that I referred to around the sex offenders act by my understanding is just effecting amendments already considered to that act which were agreed to by the previous Parliament. On that basis and with those few words around this bill, the opposition will be supporting this legislation.

John BERGER (Southern Metropolitan) (13:31): I rise to discuss the necessity of simplifying and streamlining statutes with the Statute Law Amendment Bill 2022 and the perils of blocking incoherent and outdated pieces of legislation. The minor amendments proposed in the Statute Law Amendment Bill are designed to achieve clarity, relevance and accuracy by correcting references to other pieces of legislation, statutory bodies and other authorities and fixing errors to ensure the law is accessible and the statutes are clear and accurate for our community. I can say with certainty that Victorians would expect to have confidence in our laws – that they are clear and remain current. The amendments proposed are good housekeeping.

I want to outline a variety of important updates being made today. The Competition Policy Reform (Victoria) Act 1995 needs to be updated to refer to the Competition and Consumer Act 2010 in various paragraphs. These minor amendments reflect the renaming of the Commonwealth Trade Practices Act 1974 to the Competition and Consumer Act 2010, which has been effective since 1 January 2011. Not only was this act renamed, but it also introduced more schedules. We must account for this by substituting ‘Trade Practices Act’ with ‘Competition and Consumer Act. Clause 6 will clarify the role of the ‘commission’ – the minister referred to in section 8 of the Competition Policy Reform (Victoria) Act 1995 – to be the Commonwealth minister administering part IV of the Competition and Consumer Act 2010. They are necessary and important so that the statute stays up to date, consistent and clear and is maintained in a regular and orderly manner.

Minor corrections are needed to the Aboriginal Heritage Act 2006. Sections 65(2D) and (2E) point to an incorrect cross-reference to section 65(1). The cross-reference needs to relate to the time within which the secretary needs to decide whether to approve a cultural heritage plan. Section 65(1) refers to the criteria for an application. The time specified in sections 65(2D) and (2E) is wrong and should be referred to as ‘65(2)’, which stipulates the time frame to make a decision. It is important that there are no errors to ensure that the meaning of the act can be easily read and understood.

In relation to the Domestic Animals Act 1994, this needs to be amended to clarify that a person or body referred to in section 84M(1), which relates to the recovery of a dog or a cat, is someone who has an agreement with a council under section 84Y. This will make the law clear so that there is a clear set of rules that outline who has the power to recover a dog or a cat, and ultimately this person has the power to seize and dispose of the dog or the cat – it is a serious matter.

Also included in the bill are amendments to the Housing Act 1983. This needs to be corrected to be up to date and reflect the government body, changing ‘the Director’ to ‘Homes Victoria’, making the statute accurate with a change in the name. Other corrections also include errors made in section 37(1) on the issuing of notices, declarations and certificates. The statute should refer to the correct person, being the chief executive officer of Homes Victoria. Again, the law needs to be clear on who has the power to issue these notices, declarations and certificates, as the statutes will affect thousands of Victorians, and the people in charge should be correctly identified in the statute.

The Sex Offenders Registration Act 2004 has a typographical error caused by the Firearms and Other Acts Amendment Act 2021. The Justice Legislation Amendment (Police and Other Matters) Act 2022 removed the relevant reference, and consequently the amendment which Parliament intended to make has not occurred, causing the statute books to be unclear. The commencement date of the Firearms and Other Acts Amendments Act 2021 and the Justice Legislation Amendment (Police and Other Matters) Act 2022 caused the typographical error. The amendment will mean that there is a new class 2 offence: if sentenced this person is automatically registered as a sex offender and will need to comply with the requirements of the Sex Offenders Registration Act 2004. This act assists Victoria Police to keep a check on registered offenders by requiring them to report to Victoria Police. This class 2 offence involves a person using a carriage service – phone or internet – to prepare or cause harm to engage in sexual activity with, or procure for sexual activity, a person under 16.

As the law currently stands, simply planning or preparing to cause harm to a person under 16 years of age with the use of a carriage service is not an offence under the act, because there is not an engagement in sexual activity, and consequently it will not attract a class 2 offence requiring the perpetrator to be placed on the sex offender register. Surely Victorians would expect perpetrators to be stopped in their tracks prior to a crime being permitted. This was Parliament’s intention. This is an important piece of statute relating to children under 16, who are vulnerable and need to be protected, yet the statute does not do this because of a typographical error.

I would like to draw attention to the legal case of the Queen v. Dalwood [2020] New South Wales DC841, where the offender was in breach of section 474.25C. He was arrested and released on bail and then rearrested for a breach of bail after engaging in further communication with the victims and with further images of themselves being sent. This demonstrates the importance of placing a person who has used a carriage service to prepare or plan to cause harm to, or engage in sexual activity with, a person under 16, on the sex offender register and for it to be classed a class 2 offence. This stuff is common sense. These reforms are necessary. Everyday Victorians expect strong functioning laws and the people with the power and the responsibilities to correctly identify them.

We deal with these matters in everyday life. I know a bit about rules as a former union secretary. We often took rules out to deal with ambiguity. This is particularly vital during enterprise bargaining agreement negotiations. With employment matters stipulations of law and provisions are vital. There could be a dispute around rostering, hours of work or meal breaks, or systems of work or processes. If you do not update them and keep them up to date with the modern, changing work environment, you will find yourself quickly caught out as a union secretary, falling short of the standard. You will find yourself falling short of that. I know that clear provisions make it easier to interpret and implement. Poor legislation lends itself to be interpreted poorly and leads to time being lost and wasted, and often in the case of an enterprise agreement you have to go to a tribunal to have the matter determined. This leads to pointless court trials and VCAT hearings.

A few years back the Fair Work Commission went through an important exercise to simplify awards, taking out anomalies to make them more readable. This practice is common and widespread. It is about democratising the law. It is about ensuring that it makes sense. It is about the law being relevant to the time and to the way it is being interpreted. So how embarrassing is it the other way? I imagine someone in this building is currently building a home, or someone here knows someone who is doing that. Let us think about this. If all the specifications are not documented and the nitty-gritty is not documented, it leads to cost blowouts, and most people building homes are not experts in law. It should not require a fancy lawyer to understand it.

I do not expect this law to be controversial. I do not expect this law to be scary. I know this law is about common sense, but this amendment allows me to have the chance to talk about the importance of doing the little things. The purpose of the proposed bill is simple. First, we need to correct inadvertent technical errors; second, there are minor updates to clauses, which I have outlined; and thirdly, and I think importantly here, it goes to the heart of what we are trying to do to make effective laws, and this clarifies that that is our intention.

From my understanding, Parliament regularly considers and passes statute law amendment bills to correct ambiguities, minor omissions and errors found in the statutes. This bill touches on a variety of different portfolios. There is treaty and First Peoples, led by the minister in the other place Gabrielle Williams. Then there is agriculture, led by my colleague in this chamber Minister Gayle Tierney. Then there is the minister in the other place Colin Brooks, who deals with a portfolio deeply important to my community, that of housing; my friend in the other place Anthony Carbines, who deals with police; the Attorney-General, Jaclyn Symes; and the Treasurer in the other place, Tim Pallas. Their portfolios are touched by this.

For such a straightforward bill it covers a lot of areas, but I would like to talk about the importance of the area close to my heart: housing. These changes to the Housing Act are administrative in nature. In 2022 amendments were made to the Housing Act 1983 – quite an old act – supported by the evolution of the director of housing, with the formal establishment of Homes Victoria and its CEO. Why is this important? You see, the modern-day era requires a modern-day approach to housing. We recognise that we must modernise the approach of the commission block and work with local communities to grow a supply of local and affordable housing. Nowhere is this more important than in the electorate of Southern Metropolitan Region. There are old commission housing blocks in Albert Park on the corner of Reed Street and Victoria Avenue; in South Melbourne there are Park Towers and Emerald Hill Court; close to where I worked for decades – an area I know well – is Evans Street in Port Melbourne, which houses two buildings; from the old to the new, my electorate office is just a hop and skip away around the corner to the buildings on King Street; on the corner of Little Chapel Street there are two buildings nestled away in a vibrant area; and do not forget those on Malvern Road in South Yarra and Union Street and Raleigh Street in Windsor. My community knows firsthand the importance of public housing.

That is why I am proud that we have committed $5.3 billion for the Big Housing Build, which is the biggest single investment in social housing of all states and territories. But who can be surprised? Victoria leads the nation. It is also our biggest investment as a state in housing. It will deliver more than 12,000 homes, including 2400 affordable homes in Victoria to who needs them the most. It will boost our social housing supply by 10 per cent, a big deal for thousands of Victorians who need it most. But it will not just benefit my community; the flow-on will help regions, with 25 per cent of funding allocated to regional Victoria, and – hardly a surprise for a program of our government – the housing build will create an average of 10,000 new jobs each year, creating new employment opportunities for all Victorians.

The bill is straightforward. The purpose of the bill is clear. The bill will revise the statute law of Victoria to amend grammatical, typographical and other errors in legislation. On the topic of housing, the amendments outlined have no substantive effect on the Housing Act; rather, they correct errors that are relevant to the provisions. It is all about ensuring that Victoria’s statutes remain relevant and accessible to the Victorian community. Our community deserve to have confidence in the clarity and accuracy of the legislation that affects them. I am pleased the Department of Premier and Cabinet worked so closely with the variety of government departments touched by this bill. It is how a government is supposed to work.

Why are there so many errors? Whenever we draft legislation I know, from our side, we approach it with sanctity, with the utmost care and to the highest professional standards. But occasionally all sides of politics, including those opposite in the coalition, make minor errors or may forget to include details or accidentally include irrelevant details in legislation. Put simply: mistakes happen.

We are a government of action, and we are a government that aims to quickly identify any errors and to rectify them as soon as possible. This ensures that our legislation is world standard. Do not forget that the Charter of Human Rights and Responsibilities Act 2006 came into place 23 years after the previously mentioned Housing Act 1983 came into place. Back then there was no section 28 dealing with compatibility rights, and now there is. Times have changed, and we must change with them.

In conclusion, these sorts of bills are passed on a regular basis by the house. It is about ensuring we keep legislation modern, efficient and accurate, and it will help ease the administration of our laws. This bill lapsed at the end of the last Parliament. There has been no statute law revision bill for a few years now, and I think everyone in this room knows we can imagine why. With a once-in-a-generation pandemic there have been other demands and priorities on our government. But now we can keep up with some good housekeeping, and that is why I commend the bill to the house.

Jacinta ERMACORA (Western Victoria) (13:45): The Statute Law Amendment Bill 2022 has a number of purposes. The purposes of this proposed bill are to correct inadvertent technical errors, make minor updates and implement Parliament’s intention to make effective statute laws. Parliament regularly considers and passes statute law amendment bills to correct ambiguities, minor omissions and errors found in statutes. The bill also updates several acts that are impacted by new names of entities or changed names in related jurisdictions like the Commonwealth. This bill is an essential piece of good legislative housekeeping, where clarity, relevance and accuracy of statute law in Victoria are maintained. The updating of references and correction of errors makes sure that Victorian statutes are up to date, consistent and clear and are either able to fulfil their original intention or updated to ensure that new context is taken into account to maintain functionality. It is important that Victorians are able to be confident in the application of the law to themselves and that there are no unintended consequences as a result of minor errors or being out of date. These types of bills also streamline interactions between the Commonwealth, other states and our state of Victoria. The application of what appears to be similar language between different jurisdictions may actually be taken to mean different things.

In particular, this bill corrects minor ambiguities, omissions or errors in the following acts: the Aboriginal Heritage Act 2006, the Domestic Animals Act 1994, the Housing Act 1983, the Terrorism (Community Protection) Act 2003 and the Competition Policy Reform (Victoria) Act 1995. It renames the Trade Practices Act 1974 to the Competition and Consumer Act 2010. It amends the Sex Offenders Registration Act 2004 and provides a correction to schedule 2, where what it sought to do was likely ineffective due to the typographical error caused by section 34(1) of the Firearms and Other Acts Amendment Act 2010. It repeals an ineffective amendment made by section 8(2) of the Justice Legislation Amendment (Police and Other Matters) Act 2022.

You might be forgiven for assuming that this bill is not particularly exciting, but there are many examples of minor errors causing significant unintended consequences. This bill is for the boffins. This bill is for the pedants who say that details matter. This is a bill that will warm the hearts of every academic referencing department in every university in this state, where the placement of a comma profoundly affects the acceptability and credibility of a written document. It is with memories of churlish frustration I remember grappling with commas and full stops associated with such reference tools as ‘ibid.’, ‘loc. cit.’ and ‘et al.’ at 11:55 pm on the due date of an assignment. ‘Ibid.’ means a reference to the same source as already mentioned. ‘Loc. cit.’ means the same title and page number as already mentioned. ‘Et al.’ refers to a citation where there are multiple authors, meaning ‘and others’.

This bill is for the fans of spellcheck and grammar check, of which I am one. I doubt that a grammar check program like Grammarly would have prevented the requirement for most of the minor changes addressed in this bill. Certainly many of the minor adjustments achieved through this bill are not at all exciting or dramatic. They facilitate the smooth operation of legal process in this state. If there was such a program to prevent such errors and omissions, some aspects of this bill may not have been necessary and therefore the need for this speech might have been avoided. This bill is for those who are passionate about avoiding unintended consequences. In this case, it is not the content of an act that produces an unexpected result but the very presence or absence or positioning of a modest grammatical tool like a comma. A humble comma, hyphen or full stop can change the effect or meaning of a sentence, which in turn could change the lives of citizens in this state.

I refer to an article in the Business Insider on 10 May 2019, describing how a number of seemingly minor errors caused massive consequences and even a catastrophic outcome. In 1962 a NASA rocket called Mariner 1 launched on 22 July to undertake a fly-by of Venus. A misplaced hyphen is believed to have caused the rocket’s trajectory to alter. The NASA safety officer responsible had intended to prevent the rocket from crashing back to Earth. Unfortunately 293 seconds into the launch it blew up. The article goes on to say that:

The coding blunder cost NASA $80 million (in today’s money, that’s over $673 million).

That was in 2019, when the article was written. NASA was never clear on the exact cause of the disaster – whether it was a misplaced decimal or a hyphen that caused the error. The article quotes Arthur C Clarke as calling it ‘the most expensive hyphen in history’. So you can see that whilst this bill may seem quite innocuous and not entirely exciting, the importance of ensuring the smallest of details can sometimes have a profound consequence.

A further example cited in the article tells of a Google forward slash breaking the internet. On 31 January 2009 the internet was essentially not working for 55 minutes. Anyone trying to log on received an error message saying ‘Warning! This site may harm your computer.’ It turns out that someone had added a forward slash – that is this one – to a list of harmful sites. Every website includes a forward slash; therefore every website was considered harmful to computers.

The biggest error cited in this article was the loss of $617 billion on the Tokyo stock exchange. In September 2014 a seemingly innocuous typographical error caused the loss of $617 billion in stocks on the Tokyo stock exchange. The article states:

A trader accidentally pressed the wrong button, cancelling stock sales adding up to 67.78 trillion yen. Forty-two separate transactions were cancelled …

According to the … London Evening Standard, the mistake is “thought to be the most extreme example of a trader in financial markets inputting hopelessly wrong figures while working under intense pressure.”

Not all errors produce a negative consequence. Whilst a typo caused an enormous loss on the Tokyo stock exchange, the article points out that Google makes money from users like you and me making simple typographical errors when we are searching. I am sure most of us have experienced being taken to a slightly different webpage unexpectedly, only to discover we typed one of the words incorrectly. Whilst this seems a small momentary mistake, the article goes on to explain that these webpages are referred to as typosquatting sites. According to a Harvard study, Google’s annual income from these types of typos is $497 million, because they are what I would call opportunistic advertising, and apparently they pay for top billing in Google’s search results. Whilst this is bad news for consumers, typosquatting is good news for Google’s bottom line.

So if we return to the Statute Law Amendment Bill in question here today, some of the corrections are innocuous, even mundane. For example, one amendment provides an update to reflect the updated name of the Department of Justice and Community Safety to allow the act to work as intended. This bill also amends the Justice Legislation Amendment (Police and Other Matters) Act 2022. The bill repeals section 8(2) of the justice legislation amendment act, which effectively amends the Sex Offenders Registration Act to include a new class 2 offence under the act. This repeal will occur ahead of the automatic repeal date in 2025 under the justice legislation amendment act. The new class 2 offence intended to be made by the justice legislation amendment act is now being included under this bill. The amendment to the Sex Offenders Registration Act is proposed to give effect to section 8(2) of the justice legislation amendment act and satisfy the position of the Ministerial Council for Police and Emergency Management and Council of Attorneys-General, which states that territories should expand their registration and supervision schemes to apply to Commonwealth child sex offenders as soon as practicable. This bill gives effect to Parliament’s intention, expressed in section 8(2) of the justice legislation amendment act. These amendments are likely to increase, ensuring that sex offenders are registered in the way that they are intended to be across the country, and in doing so may provide clear information for citizens who need to make decisions based on that information.

This bill also makes minor changes to the Aboriginal Heritage Act. The bill amends section 65(2D) and (2E) of the Aboriginal Heritage Act so that it cross-references the correct provision. This is a positive change to the act and will result in efficiencies in the course of the development and the land use planning process. Section 65(2) relates to the time within which the secretary must decide whether or not to approve a cultural heritage management plan. Section 65(1) refers to the criteria for an application for a cultural heritage management plan and is not relevant to the time period referred to in section 65(2D) and (2E). The government is of the view that there will be no substantive effect on the act from the passage of the bill.

As recently as December last year the Minister for Treaty and First Peoples welcomed 18 new graduates who had completed their certificate IV in Aboriginal cultural heritage management, a course that is funded by the Andrews government and delivered in partnership with Victorian Aboriginal communities and La Trobe University. The Aboriginal Heritage Act empowers traditional owners as protectors of their cultural heritage and the world’s oldest continuing culture. We know that traditional owner knowledge of our natural landscapes and biodiversity is strong and unique, and these courses will strengthen that knowledge base in our state.

So to sum up, the bill is an essential piece of good legislative housekeeping, where clarity, relevance and accuracy of statute law in Victoria are maintained. The updating of references and correction of errors makes sure that the Victorian statutes are up to date, consistent and clear and are either able to fulfil their original intention or updated to ensure new context is taken into account. This bill is an acknowledgement of all those practitioners, no matter their discipline, who love the details and are passionate about the things that seem insignificant to the rest of us but in actual fact are extremely important.

Tom McINTOSH (Eastern Victoria) (14:00): I rise to contribute to the debate on the Statute Law Amendment Bill 2022, which is before the Legislative Council. The bill is the result of the regular review of Victoria’s statute books and makes minor amendments to acts to ensure everything is up to date, aligned and clear. It is unavoidable that through the thousands of lines of legislation considered in this place there are, very rarely, technical errors, ambiguities or omissions, and making these updates maintains the accuracy of our legislation and ensures that this information remains relevant and accessible for all Victorians. I want to thank the member for Western Victoria for her contribution and highlighting the absolute importance of correct grammar and the unexpected outcomes that can occur if amendments like the important amendments in this bill are not made.

This bill corrects minor ambiguities, omissions or errors in the Aboriginal Heritage Act 2006, the Domestic Animals Act 1994 and the Housing Act 1983 and updates a reference in the Terrorism (Community Protection) Act 2003. It also makes minor amendments to the Competition Policy Reform (Victoria) Act 1995 to reflect the renaming of the Commonwealth Trade Practices Act 1974. It amends the Sex Offenders Registration Act 2004 – the SOR act – to give effect to an amendment to schedule 2 of the SOR act that section 8(2) of the Justice Legislation Amendment (Police and Other Matters) Act 2022 sought to make but which was likely ineffective.

In my contribution I will not have time to talk to all of the above, but I would like to refer to some areas of interest to my constituents in Eastern Victoria and highlight the Labor government’s work in some of the policy areas affected by these amendments.

Nicholas McGowan: On a point of order, President, as the member is slavishly reading from those notes, I ask that those notes be tabled.

The PRESIDENT: There is no point of order.

Tom McINTOSH: I will continue, following on from the member for Western Victoria. I have already highlighted the incredible work she did in highlighting the importance of the amendments that occur in this bill, because if we do not address the finer details that many people would not understand are in these amendments, or not notice or not realise are in these amendments, then there could be consequences that we do not realise will occur.

Firstly, I want to talk to the Aboriginal Heritage Act. It is timely to discuss the protection and management of Aboriginal cultural heritage in Victoria. The Aboriginal Heritage Bill 2006 received royal assent on 9 May 2006 after being drafted and passed by the Bracks Labor government. Fundamentally, the bill sought to protect Aboriginal cultural heritage in Victoria. I would like to remind the house of the purpose of this important act – to provide for the protection of Aboriginal cultural heritage and Aboriginal intangible heritage in Victoria, to empower traditional owners as protectors of their cultural heritage on behalf of Aboriginal people and all other peoples and to strengthen the ongoing right to maintain the distinctive spiritual, cultural, material and economic relationship of traditional owners with the land –

Nicholas McGowan: On a point of order, President, there are long-held rulings from your chair in respect to slavishly reading from documents. If it is to be the practice of this place that members just rise and read word for word, then I would suggest that that is inconsistent with those orders, and I ask you to bring the member to order.

The PRESIDENT: Mr McGowan, it is a practice. It is not in the standing orders, but I have been pondering this practice. I have been here for many years, and I have seen people on either side of the chamber read a fair part of their speeches. So I will take into account your point of order. I have asked the clerks to consider all the practices that may have been practices 20 years ago and to consider if they have been practices in the last 10 years.

Tom McINTOSH: Thank you, President. I will return to discussing how the bill seeks to protect Aboriginal cultural heritage in Victoria and detail the purposes of the act, of which there are four. I will admit I do not know them word for word, but I will go through them individually again:

(a) to provide for the protection of Aboriginal cultural heritage and Aboriginal intangible heritage in Victoria; and

(b) to empower traditional owners as protectors of their cultural heritage on behalf of Aboriginal people and all other peoples; and

(c) to strengthen the ongoing right to maintain the distinctive spiritual, cultural, material and economic relationship of traditional owners with the land and waters and other resources with which they have a connection under traditional laws and customs; and

(d) to promote respect for Aboriginal cultural heritage, contributing to its protection as part of the common heritage of all peoples and to the sustainable development and management of land and of the environment.

These purposes are important statements about the value of Aboriginal knowledge and culture. The statement that struck me most was objective (b), to recognise Aboriginal people as the primary guardians, keepers and knowledge holders of Aboriginal cultural heritage. The act gives traditional owners a say on what happens in areas that are culturally significant. It lays out in Victorian legislation the right to have a say on matters that affect cultural heritage. These may include – I will lay these out; they are tabled in the act – ancestral remains, secret or sacred objects, and Aboriginal places and the activities that take place at these places. Aboriginal cultural heritage legislation sits alongside native title legislation, and both have a focus – and rightly so – on land and land management, so the right to have a say about what happens in significant places or places where there is native title is codified in law.

These are great achievements and steps towards reconciliation and a fairer and more just Australia, but there are other areas of government policy and activity that affect Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people where they do not have direct representation. Right now Victorians are considering how they respond to the proposed referendum on the Indigenous Voice to Parliament. This is an opportunity to unite and consider a change to our constitution that will promote respect for Indigenous Australians and their culture once again. Constitutional recognition of Indigenous Australians has been considered directly by the Australian Parliament for more than 15 years. It has been advocated for by the community for much longer than that. Once again the advice back from Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people is that they want a say on what happens on policies and laws that affect them, just like this cultural heritage act.

Victoria has been the first jurisdiction in the nation to action voice, treaty and truth, the three elements of the 2017 Uluru Statement from the Heart. We have long been guided by the principle of self-determination in our work with First Peoples and will continue to work in partnership to deliver on these elements. We are proud of the progress that has been made under our government, including the historic establishment of the First Peoples’ Assembly, the establishment of the Treaty Authority, the launch of the Yoorrook Justice Commission hearings and the launch of the stolen generations reparations package. Generations of First People across the country have advocated for voice, treaty and truth, and we deeply respect the historic consensus of the hundreds of First Nations leaders who wrote and endorsed the Uluru Statement from the Heart.

Victoria is already on a path to truth and treaty. In 2019 we established the First Peoples’ Assembly of Victoria as the first democratically elected body of Aboriginal Victorians. The Assembly is the voice for treaty in Victoria. The prior establishment of a voice has been critical to our journey towards treaty and truth, and progress in Victoria could not have happened without the Assembly, its diverse and elected membership of Aboriginal Victorians and their steadfast commitment to representing their community to the Victorian government. Victoria’s experience has shown just how much we all stand to gain from enacting voice, treaty and truth. A federal referendum on the nation’s first Voice to Parliament is a simple but profound measure which will give First Nations people a say in the decisions that affect them. This year we all have the historic opportunity to vote yes to a better future together as Australians and begin our national journey towards voice, treaty and truth.

By way of example of the importance of cultural heritage and how much we all have to learn by listening to and learning through our First Nations communities, I consider the Budj Bim Cultural Landscape, part of the beautiful Western Victoria Region. The State of Victoria’s Aboriginal Cultural Heritage Report 2016–2021, a report published by the Victorian Aboriginal Heritage Council – the body established by the Aboriginal Heritage Act 2006 – has this to say about the Budj Bim Cultural Landscape:

In 2019 Budj Bim Cultural Landscape was recognised as having “outstanding universal value” and was listed as a UNESCO World Heritage site. Budj Bim is the first landscape to be listed in Australia solely for Indigenous cultural values.

Budj Bim Cultural Landscape is Gunditjmara Country with an area of over 7,000km²in south-Western Victoria. Budj Bim features a ‘highly productive aquaculture system [which] provided a millennia-long economic and social base for Gunditjmara society’, and is recognised by UNESCO for its ‘exceptional testimony to the cultural traditions, knowledge, practices and ingenuity of the Gunditjmara’. Some of the features of the World Heritage Site include all the aquacultures at Tae Rak (Lake Condah), Tyrendarra …

The continued connection, management and control over the landscape by Gunditjmara people was a feature that amplified UNESCO World Heritage Site recognition, with UNESCO stating that the continued cultural connection to the landscape is an ‘outstanding representative example of human interaction with the environment and testimony to the lives of Gunditjmara’. Budj Bim Cultural Landscape is owned and managed with respect to Gunditjmara customary and legal obligations by Gunditjmara Traditional Owners, and was recognised on the National Heritage List in 2004. Budj Bim is also legally protected under the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 …

This piece of Aboriginal cultural heritage is a state-, national- and world-renowned asset that we all have much to learn from. We know that with over tens of thousands of years of continuous care for country by Aboriginal Victorians there are more landscapes out there like Budj Bim, and I look forward to learning about the sites in Eastern Victoria that have been cared for and managed by the Bunurong and Gunaikurnai for so long. One site with significant cultural heritage in Eastern Victoria is Knob Reserve, by the Avon River in Stratford. From the Gunaikurnai Land and Waters Aboriginal Corporation, GLAWAC, who I caught up with near Lakes Entrance last week:

The Knob Reserve … demonstrates the living culture of Gunaikurnai in the present as well as the past: a traditional gathering place used by five clan groups for thousands of years; a place of clandestine resort in the 19th and 20th centuries to maintain connections with family, separated during the mission era; and the location of the ceremony to confer Victoria’s first native title determination in 2010.

The Avon River:

… was a major travelling route between the high country and the Gippsland Lakes, as well as providing eel, bream, flathead and prawn.

The bluff above the –

river –

… was a significant campsite. Axe heads were sharpened on the sandstone grinding stones beneath the bluff. The resulting deep grooves are rare and significant in Victoria. Evidence of site scatters, scar trees and camps are also present within the reserve.

The site is now owned by the Gunaikurnai people and is one of 10 jointly managed parks and reserves in Gippsland. To continue the work of protecting Aboriginal cultural history the amendments in the bill provide necessary housekeeping to the act. The bill amends section 65(2D) and (2E) of the Aboriginal Heritage Act so that it cross-references the correct section. Section 65(2) relates to the time within which the secretary must decide whether or not to approve a cultural heritage management plan. Section 65(1) refers to the criteria for an application for a cultural heritage management plan and is not relevant to the time period referred to in section 65(2D) and (2E).

The bill is a result of the regular review of Victoria’s statute books and makes minor amendments to acts to ensure everything is up to date, aligned and clear. Making these updates maintains the accuracy of our legislation and ensures that this information remains relevant and accessible for all Victorians. The bill makes minor corrections to the Aboriginal Heritage Act 2006, the Domestic Animals Act 1994 and the Housing Act 1983 and updates a reference in the Terrorism (Community Protection) Act 2003 to ensure the meanings of these acts are clear and accurate and reflect the intention of the Parliament. The government has a proud record in these areas and is continuing to build on this good work with voice, treaty and truth and record investments in social and affordable housing.

Nicholas McGOWAN (North-Eastern Metropolitan) (14:15): I was not going to speak on this bill today, but given the contributions thus far, I was compelled to do so. It would be remiss for Victorians in the future to look upon this bill and read in Hansard that this is, among other things, simply the product of typos – I have heard the word ‘typos’ many times today – mistakes, housekeeping, correction of errors and cross-referencing mistakes. This is ‘Nothing to see here.’ I think what we have seen here today in actual fact is a concerted effort, in a scripted way, speaker after speaker, to make amends – apologise, if you will – for what is sloppy lawmaking. That is what it is; that is what it should be called out for. I would welcome the fact that now at least Victorians can reflect on the fullness of Hansard and realise that this sort of lawmaking is not standard and should not be the kind of standard any Parliament should seek to accomplish in its time here.

I should put this in context. This is not to say that in any way, shape or form I do not welcome the changes, because of course that would lack common sense. It is important from time to time when any governments make errors that they make those corrections that are necessary. But this is a litany of errors – and what concerns me perhaps more is that the litany continues.

I look no further than just sometime ago in this place and at – it is now an act – the Racing Amendment (Unauthorised Access) Bill 2022. I give the chamber and the people of Victoria this example: new section 32C, ‘Offence to throw or kick projectiles or cause object to be within restricted racing area’. That says, as an example:

A person must not, without reasonable excuse, throw or kick any stone, bottle or other projectile into or within a restricted racing area …

and so forth. That is yet another example, because arguably – it is always arguable; we are in a world of lawyers and disputes and challenging these things – if I was to roll a grenade, then that would be perfectly fine. In fact that would not be covered by section 32C of the act. Isn’t that absurd – completely absurd? That is the very point I am making. Words have consequences, and no more so than when we legislate in this place.

I will give you another example. When you go to new section 32F(3) of that now act of Parliament, it talks about how:

A person who has left a restricted racing area or race-course after being directed to do so by an authorised officer under section 32E must not –

there are two, (a) and (b), and listen to the difference, if the chamber would:

enter or re-enter the restricted racing area or race-course for the duration of the race-meeting or official trial meeting; or –

and the words continue there ad infinitum almost:

attempt to enter or re-enter the restricted racing area or race-course for the duration of the race-meeting or official trial meeting.

In other words, it is superfluous. They could simply have added the words ‘attempt, enter or re-enter’ and so forth. So to this sort of utopian approach by the government that these amendments are nothing more than good housekeeping on their behalf and this is the routine work of government – no, it is not; I differ. These are late, in some instances tardy and in other instances appropriate – and I will concede that there are appropriate and welcome changes; that is not the point, as I have said before. But let every Victorian know, when they read Hansard and when they look at this bill, that it is actually the result of sloppy work and nothing more other than them trying to cover their tracks when they do it.

Motion agreed to.

Read second time.

Third reading

Lizzie BLANDTHORN (Western Metropolitan – Minister for Disability, Ageing and Carers, Minister for Child Protection and Family Services) (14:19): I move, by leave:

That the bill be now read a third time.

Motion agreed to.

Read third time.

The DEPUTY PRESIDENT: Pursuant to standing order 14.25, the bill will be transmitted to the Assembly with a message requesting their agreement.