Tuesday, 29 July 2025

Bills

Roads and Ports Legislation Amendment (Road Safety and Other Matters) Bill 2025

Second reading

Debate resumed on motion of Harriet Shing:

That the bill be now read a second time.

Joe McCRACKEN (Western Victoria) (16:46): I rise to speak on the Roads and Ports Legislation Amendment (Road Safety and Other Matters) Bill 2025. This bill basically makes a series of changes to a number of acts relating to roads and ports, most of which are uncontroversial; however, there are concerns about a few of the proposed changes. The amendments related to the Road Safety Act 1986 are largely uncontroversial. The changes around allowing professionals to be approved for taking blood samples in the case of drink driving offences do not warrant concern. And the changes that allow the Chief Commissioner of Police to authorise unsworn Victoria Police employees to issue infringement notices for offences detected by road safety cameras – we are talking fixed cameras such as those at intersections that are identified as trouble spots – seem logical given this is largely an administrative task. Sworn officers can then have this workload taken away so they can focus on other matters, and there are plenty of other matters that they can focus on where sworn officers are needed.

You only need to look at the youth crime crisis to know that the justice system is swamped and cannot cope. Sworn officers can be redeployed to incidents. We have seen crime rise rapidly over the last 11 years, to the point where we have got people afraid to even go to shopping centres. They do not feel safe walking home from a night out at dinner. They certainly do not have trust that community safety is a priority of the government. Victoria Police are struggling to recruit officers, which means resources are stretched even further amongst those that are still in the force. Allowing unsworn officers to undertake largely administrative tasks is a very small step to overcoming the huge challenges that are faced.

I met with police veterans recently in Ballarat – last week, actually – and they were reflecting on the days when they did not have to worry about criminals being released on bail every 5 minutes. Under the ‘toughest new bail laws’ – certainly not the case at the moment – they have lost faith in the justice system. In Ballarat there has been a reported increase in car theft, which is the most common one. Family violence is, sadly, increasing as well, along with petty crime. The latest stats do not paint a good picture, so I say again: redeploying sworn officers to tackle these matters as opposed to them issuing fines with cameras that are stationary will be a very, very small way of tackling that huge problem of crime in the state. We must make sure that we stand with Victoria Police as they battle the crime crisis in this state. There can be absolutely no equivocation on that.

The reforms to consent for works on roads are a bit more problematic because the proposed changes give the government and councils more time to deal with works applications on and around roads. Under the changes, they can effectively stop the clock on applications for works and remove the deemed consent for some applicants where consent is automatically granted after a period of time. The proposed reasoning for this is about risk mitigation, ensuring safety is minimised and the damage is minimised on infrastructure when a clear and detailed process is followed, effectively stopping the clock, as was argued. This process is about doing that work. However, it is also the case that these changes can ease pressure on the Department of Transport and Planning, and in that process of stopping the clock time and therefore cost would be added to projects and important works that are needed for the community. These works can include but are certainly not limited to roadworks, utility relocations and works of a similar nature, usually involving property developments and housing. When we asked the minister’s office and the department there were no examples provided of why the stop-the-clock provisions were needed and what had prompted the change, so we can only make the assumption that the stop-the-clock changes are more about easing pressure on the department than actually mitigating risk and issues of that nature.

I must say, roads have never been in a worse condition than they have been in my electorate in recent memory. Driving down the Western Highway to come to Parliament this week, it was clear that the maintenance program is well behind. There is one section near Ballan, in the seat of Eureka, where they literally get you to slow down to 80 k’s an hour, not for any reason other than rough surfaces. Locals know that this section of road has been like this for a while and it has continually got worse because more signs have been put up than actual shovels in the ground to make a meaningful change, and locals just see the rough surface signs as an excuse not to fix the road. Sadly, this is all too common across many parts of my electorate and many other areas across country Victoria.

I have got to say it was absolutely awful to see two deaths along the Western Highway, one at Buangor and one at Warrak, both occurring between Beaufort and Ararat, which is in my electorate as well. I want to acknowledge the loss that has been experienced here. Every death on our roads is a tragedy. To the families I pass on my condolences. My understanding is that both incidents involved locals travelling along the highway and that the individuals, who I will not name, will leave a big hole in their communities. There have been calls for safety upgrades for a sustained period of time. Although that particular section of the highway was supposed to be duplicated quite a time ago, it has been delayed, which has resulted in a less than ideal stretch of road. Some have even labelled that part of the road the most dangerous stretch of road in Victoria, if not Australia.

Any delays associated with doing roadworks which are vitally needed could delay the implementation of safety upgrades as well. The Victorian Transport Association opposes the changes to the stop-the-clock provisions, noting the changes could be used to delay roadworks, while anecdotal discussions with planners and developers indicate that this is the exact sort of bureaucratic red tape that lengthens and delays projects, particularly housing developments. The longer a housing development is delayed, the more holding costs like land tax are felt before a developer can actually go to market and put a house out for sale – even a block of land. In essence, unnecessarily making these processes longer could mean it takes longer to bring new houses onto the market. When we are already in the middle of a housing and homelessness crisis, the government should be pulling every lever possible to responsibly ease the pressure on the housing market.

We all know that in Victoria there is a housing crisis – that is not in any doubt. The regulations around ownership of a second property in Victoria are cumbersome and excessive and disincentivise those who have a second property to do anything with it except sell it. There are 130 regulations for rental providers, which can be very difficult to navigate, which is what we heard in the rental and housing inquiry earlier in this term of Parliament. We also know that land tax is having a huge impact on the holding costs of property owners. The vacant residential land tax and windfall gains tax are all having a real impact on the private sector bringing property, whether that is houses or land, to market.

I do not think anybody argues that there should be absolutely zero regulation. However, there is certainly over-regulation. This is felt by renters in particular, who pay higher rents when the costs are passed on to them. That is why young people are struggling to break out of the rental cycle and save up for a deposit for a house. Extra provisions, such as the provision in this legislation which allows somebody to stop the clock on roads in residential developments, only make the time it takes to bring a house to the market longer. It is another piece of regulation which elongates the process. The Urban Development Institute of Australia had similar concerns around the inefficiencies and delays, noting that growth areas’ coordinating road authorities can often be under-resourced and slow to respond and that stop-the-clock provisions do not encourage timely responses. We therefore seek to introduce amendments to remove those clauses. If the clerks could distribute those amendments now, that would be appreciated.

Amendments circulated pursuant to standing orders.

Joe McCRACKEN: In the Road Management Act 2004 there are significant requirements for consent that already protect safety and mitigate risk to infrastructure, and although there was no government consultation when stakeholders were asked about this aspect of the bill, no contentious issues were raised.

I want to talk a little bit about ports as well. The introduction of the licensing scheme to regulate mooring services providers is supported by the industry and seems logical given mooring and unmooring are high-risk activities with regard to safety, potential damage to infrastructure and the general movement of vessels. Currently there is no prescribed fee for mooring services licensing, which will likely change in the future as ‘any prescribed fee’ is referred to in this bill. However, this should not be an opportunity for blatant revenue raising. Fees should be set in consultation with the industry. Changes in fees over time should be moderate and known well in advance of when they are set to be implemented.

When I was a councillor at Colac Otway Shire we were also the committee of management for the port of Apollo Bay on behalf of the state. I remember when I was mayor advocating to then Minister Pulford in this place for upgrades and support to enhance the structure of the port itself, given that it had been let go over a significant number of years. I have to say that at that particular point in time there was a very clear, distinct lack of interest in the port itself, and we actually wrote to the department saying, ‘No, we’re not going to continue as the committee of management for the port,’ because the state at the time was not willing to invest in the infrastructure to actually get it up to even a very basic standard, which was a great shame. We were not asking for infrastructure like gold-plated bollards or anything like that; we were asking for infrastructure literally to save the seawall from collapsing into the sea, because it was in urgent need of repair. Thanks to our advocacy and the campaign that we ran with locals, community members, the seafood industry and council we managed to secure some funding – it was not everything that we would have hoped for – in order to at least get the seawall into a state where it was not going to collapse into the sea, which according to engineers at the time was a very real concern. The then federal government committed millions to support the redevelopment of the harbour precinct under the Geelong City Deal; however, there was still work to be done on the state front. I have to say it was good to have a partner in the then federal Liberal government, which invested in regional communities, even port infrastructure.

Fees for the use of ports assets currently exist. This bill seeks to clarify that ports are able to charge commercial rates and that ports can charge for services outside of port waters. We believe that the intention is cost recovery – and again, the fees should not be used to gouge money from the industry. This was certainly one of the concerns that locals raised when those discussions were happening, as I outlined before, about handing over the Port of Apollo Bay management back to the state. Locals feared that the state would ramp up fees, and there was anecdotal evidence to support that in the conversations that locals had had with various people in state departments. If the government does intend to use that as a revenue-raising opportunity, I strongly urge the government to reconsider that. The commercial fishers and the recreational fishers will be up in arms – let alone locals, who understand that the impact a port can have on economic activity in a small community is very significant.

The suggested changes made in relation to ‘abandoned things’, namely vessels, could include other items. This relates to vessel removal, identification, establishment of ownership, disposal and the proceeds of sale. There are a significant number of abandoned vessels, so these changes are going to be supported.

With regard to the changes allowing the appointment of a CEO on a full-time or part-time basis, it was advised that in practice having a part-time CEO of a major agency would not happen, and there has been no such request for these arrangements.

In closing, we will not be opposing the legislation, but we hope to secure support for the stop-the-clock amendments regarding road infrastructure project amendments and to ensure that works are not unnecessarily delayed.

Jacinta ERMACORA (Western Victoria) (17:00): I am pleased to speak in support of this bill today. This bill reflects our government’s commitment to public safety. It introduces important changes to safety on our roads, in commercial ports and across waterways. I will speak briefly about the roads and then focus on the ports.

This bill delivers important reforms to improve safety enforcement. The bill broadens the range of health professionals who can carry out drug and alcohol testing. Until now only medical practitioners were permitted to perform these tests. For rural areas with greater distances between health services that has been a challenge. Allowing other health professionals such as registered nurses and paramedics to conduct testing is a commonsense reform. This bill also extends the time limit for prosecuting hit-and-run offences from 12 months to 24 months, giving investigators more time to gather evidence. Another commonsense change is to allow non-sworn police employees to issue infringement notices for offences picked up on camera. Our qualified and skilled police officers have better things to do with their time than that. Streamlining approval processes for works on declared roads is also an important improvement to safety. The rules about which body is responsible for maintaining specific road infrastructure do not always reflect the reality on the ground. Often there are multiple authorities involved. This bill will mean that the responsible authority can be delegated. To fix this, the bill introduces a stop-the-clock function, a little bit like the planning scheme process. That is going to provide more clarity quicker around waiting for further information.

Moving on to ports, I want to focus particularly on the changes in this bill that relate to safety at ports. Australia is an island, and famously our national anthem says we are girt by sea. Our ports have been a central part of local and national economic life for millennia. The Gunditjmara people have a long and rich history in Portland, with evidence of their presence dating back for over 30,000 years. Portland and the coast around it were important sources of shellfish and other maritime resources. It is therefore unsurprising that the port became a focus for colonisation and the conflict it brought. Today Portland is a major shipping hub for bulk commodities, including grain, aluminium, minerals, fertiliser and animals, as well as a key facility for the local fishing industry and the tourism industry.

The Port of Portland is the largest sustainable hardwood chip export port facility in the world. Overall, the port employs 60 staff and handles $2 billion in trade each year and in doing so plays a major economic role in Portland, in the south-west region and indeed in our state. With the upgrade of the Maroona line thanks to $150 million from the Albanese Labor government the port will provide even more direct international export services to most parts of western Victoria. It will also mean that the Port of Portland is on the national rail freight grid. While Port Fairy and the port of Warrnambool are owned by the state and managed by their respective local councils, the Port of Portland was one of those things that was sold off by Jeff Kennett and Alan Stockdale – very disappointing at the time.

To give you a visual context of the Port of Portland and how it operates right in the middle of Portland’s central business district is what I want to do now. It is quite wonderful to see piles of cargo woodchip growing and contracting from the main street foreshore area. When cargo ships come in, the entire vista changes. Shoppers and residents of Portland can see when the wide range of maritime customers use the facility, from bulk cargo ships, cruise ships and live export vessels to fishing and recreational vehicles. So you can imagine that safety in ports is a very important issue. This bill introduces a range of changes designed to ensure that this is the case. It provides port managers with clear authority to formally determine that something has been abandoned. Abandoned vessels, goods and equipment are a high risk for collisions and pollution. Unfortunately port managers sometimes have to deal with these matters without the original owner, and that means that there is significant cost. The owner may not be identifiable or the vessel responsible for leaving the goods or equipment may be halfway around the world. This bill sets out a clear process for deciding if something has been abandoned, including a public notice, documentation requirements and the ability to dispose of perishable items without delay. An abandoned vessel can be a danger to port users. It can also do damage to the maritime environment.

On a related issue, the bill also clarifies that those responsible for the pollution, not just shipowners or port masters but others who operate vessels or even third parties, can be held responsible for their actions resulting in pollution. This will allow the state or the port owners to recover the costs of remediation from those who caused the problem. This is simply going to make the operation of ports more environmentally accountable and more environmentally sustainable.

Another important change this bill introduces is to allow a port manager to lawfully assume the role of harbourmaster where a formally appointed harbourmaster is not available. This removes the ambiguity about who can make decisions and take responsibility when the harbourmaster is not there.

The bill also enables local port managers to offer technical advisory and maintenance services. They can do so within and around their port area to organisations like local councils. This will help ensure maritime infrastructure, such as jetties, navigation aids and storage facilities, is well maintained and fit for purpose. These fees can be set to recover costs or reflect commercial rates and can be varied depending on circumstances. This keeps flexibility to allow for emergencies and compassionate grounds. There are all sorts of scenarios that happen at ports, particularly international ports.

The mooring provision: the bill introduces a licensing scheme for mooring services providers, which means that only qualified operators can secure and release vessels. It makes it a clear offence for unlicensed operators to do so. Obviously this is all about safety and knowing the risks of various different activities.

It will also support fairer and more transparent use of public mooring spaces and prevent hoarding of moorings, which is a great irritation particularly for yachties. Importantly, it will help protect sensitive maritime habitats. Poorly installed or abandoned moorings can destroy seagrass beds and damage ecosystems. These reforms are commonsense reforms and bring a suite of changes that bring this act into the modern and fit-for-purpose state that it needs to be in. I commend the bill to the house.

Melina BATH (Eastern Victoria) (17:09): I am pleased to rise this afternoon and make some brief comments on the Roads and Ports Legislation Amendment (Road Safety and Other Matters) Bill 2025. In doing so I want to acknowledge that it crosses over a number of portfolios, indeed the ports and marine safety portfolios and the roads and road safety portfolios, and that safety in our marine habitat for our marine users, our boaters, and also on the roads should be uppermost and paramount in the government’s focus and mind.

This morning I listened most intently while we had the condolence motion for the Honourable Brian Dixon, and we heard about his introduction of seatbelts into Victoria as a world-leading innovation. We look and see how sensible and normal that is, but back in the day – I think it was around the 1970s just prior to those reforms being introduced – they would have had pushback from people who did not think they needed it. But there were – and I have not looked it up – an astronomical number of people who were killed on our roads, and the introduction of that very important road safety initiative saw that figure plummet quite considerably by comparison. Unfortunately, now we see those fatalities on our roads creeping up, so initiatives that improve road safety should certainly be paramount.

This bill amends the Road Safety Act 1986. It alters the Road Management Act 2004. My colleague Mr McCracken spoke to the amendments that the Liberals and Nationals are bringing in in relation to stopping the clock and removing deemed consent, and I will speak to those a little bit in my contribution. This bill also establishes the licensing under the Port Management Act 1995 for mooring services, and it makes various other technical amendments.

In talking about roads, it is something that every good National Party MP and country Liberal as well knows is top. It is of paramount concern to so many of our residents, our constituents in our electorates, and I frequently hear people when I am up the street and talking to people – people write to us – that reducing the speed limit is not a substitute for road safety in terms of improving the quality of driver safety and road quality. It is a measure that this government is introducing and has in recent years, a very poor substitute for actually looking at and improving the road surface. And we have seen my colleague Mr Danny O’Brien, the Shadow Minister for Roads and Road Safety, do a considerable amount of work in the media but also through the Public Accounts and Estimates Committee and the like to point out the fact that whilst the government spruiks high levels of road maintenance funding, the actual surface that the government through contracts is able to deliver has plunged to really an appalling low. So when government considers funding, it also has to consider value for money and facilitating the best quality outcome for – in my case, Eastern Victoria people – regional people about the safety of their roads. I have got a list as long as your arm in terms of roads that are desperate for maintenance, for upgrades, for shoulder improvements and for pothole improvements. I might even, if I have time, look to go into some of those as well.

The provisions in this bill certainly speak to one particular area in relation to the Chief Commissioner of Police having the power to enable unsworn Victoria Police employees to issue camera-detected infringement notices for offences detected by those road safety cameras. I have been very fortunate recently – I do not want to jinx myself, but you are very conscious about setting your speedo so that you are not going to go over the speed limit. But we do need these detection cameras, because they do save lives and, particularly where people understand them, you know that people are slowing down. That ping, that infringement notice, hurts when it comes, and as I say, I have not had one for many, many years because I am focused on driving safely around and getting home at night. But for those people, this bill introduces that unsworn VicPol members can present those notices, freeing up sworn police officers from this administrative task.

I note that the Police Association of Victoria would prefer that we continue to have sworn officers doing this role, and I note their concerns around that. Really, listening to the Chief Commissioner of Police yesterday on the radio, he has been brought in by the Allan government, after 10 years of having a Labor government, to actually clean out the mire that we find ourselves in in terms of crime in our state and for community safety to be enhanced. He has got a colossal task ahead of him, and I note that the government and he are working closely together. Well, that is great. But the outcomes in our communities are what is vital for this new commissioner. I also note that he said on radio, and I often have too – and probably this is why TPAV is concerned about moving away from sworn officers – that there is a dearth. There is a gap. There are around 1100 vacancies across the state for sworn officers. There are also at any one time somewhere around 700 to 800 vacancies, with people on WorkCover or extended sick leave. That is a concern. He also acknowledged the litmus test that overall more members are wanting to leave the force than is appreciated, and this is because they have been facing the stress and strain of this government for so long. Indeed they are still not forwarding and facilitating enough to replace them. So they are all on the list of the police commissioner.

What I also know – and I raised this issue this morning in terms of crime in our region – is the fact that retail crime is on the rise, and unfortunately Victoria is the retail crime capital in the nation, with somewhere around an 89 per cent increase on the last year. In relation to that I wish the police commissioner good luck, and I wish every officer and non-sworn officer in our state good focus and good outcomes, because certainly we need them. Our communities need improved police safety and community safety.

Looking at the introduction in this bill of a licensing regime for mooring services providers in order to enhance safety and compliance, this is also another really important area. I notice that it is a really vital area. We are, as a member for Western Victoria Region spoke about, girt by sea. We certainly have a long coastline, and my Eastern Victoria Region is part of that. But the important thing is that we do have safety for our boat users. It was good to speak with the Boating Industry Association of Victoria yesterday and to see the good work they do in advocating for safer boating outcomes and safer moorings, and they certainly highlighted some of the issues. Just to put it on record, there are somewhere around 450,000 marine licences, 900,000 boating participants and over 200,000 registered boats. This is a really important area, and safety must be paramount at that. Indeed one thing that they raised – and I think it crosses over into my area – is sometimes there is a shadow area or a grey area with the interaction down at our ports and in coastal communities between port maintenance and port infrastructure and between the Minister for Ports and Freight and the Minister for Environment. Often some of that land is in control of either Parks Victoria or the Department of Energy, Environment and Climate Action. So there are a lot of interactions between different ministers, and there needs to be certainly streamlining of that safety. Again, I could give you a list as long as my arm on some of the improvements that need to happen. Jetties have been closed, and there is a level of frustration, particularly with the people down at Newhaven, around the closing of very important and very well loved and well used infrastructure and jetties.

The topic that I would like to get to of course is in terms of the Road Management Act 2004 and the section that looks at reform for consent for works whereby there can be a hold – a ‘stop the clock’ on this. It sounds good in principle, but we know – and I am not having a go at anyone in particular – that the wheels of VicRoads move very, very slowly and that local councils can be caught up in this and other entities and developments as well. What we are concerned about in relation to the addition of the stop-the-clock mechanism is it could delay and delay and delay further roadworks and approvals, and I thank Mr McCracken for circulating our amendments that will be dealt with in committee of the whole. What we also understand in talking with the stakeholders, from some of the conversation that our shadow ministers, both Danny O’Brien and Roma Britnell, have had, is that there was no substantial stakeholder consultation around this stop-the-clock clause and that there is a frustration about this. We are concerned, and we want to stop the clock on the ‘stop the clock’.

In finishing my comments I just want to put on record again some of the areas which are causing great frustration in relation to developments with either VicRoads or indeed VicTrack. There is a particular spot in Traralgon that I know I campaigned on – I think it was back in 2016 – about Bank Street and Waterloo Road. There is a major intersection at Bank Street that considers the VicTrack railway line and the highway, and we are still waiting. There have been some roadworks done, and we acknowledge that, but we are still waiting for traffic lights to go on there. There have been fatalities there in the past, which is of course – and we heard it before from Mr McCracken – devastating for families who have lost loved ones in these sorts of incidents.

We also note in East Gippsland – a very important space for those wonderful people that live there – the role of both commercial and recreational port activity there for safe and efficient infrastructure. My dear colleague Mr Tim Bull in the other house has been phenomenal in his advocacy post the 2019–20 bushfires. We have still got delays on bridges. We have still got delays on cabins on public land and on public moorings. We are still waiting for those to be developed and re-upgraded post those fires.

Also, the one that is so lamentable – and my colleague Darren Chester, the federal member for Gippsland, has spoken about it on a number of occasions: $10 million was provided by the then Liberal and Nationals government on this particular issue for the upgrade of the Mallacoota-Genoa Road. It was in 2020 that that funding was announced. We are now in 2025. It is a one road in, one road out community, and yet this community is still waiting. The government came out and said the federal government has only now released the funding for stages of that project. The issue is of course that the government may well not have asked for it up until last week. I support this bill in terms of its not-opposed position, and I ask the house to accept our amendments.

David LIMBRICK (South-Eastern Metropolitan) (17:24): I would also like to say a few words on the Roads and Ports Legislation Amendment (Road Safety and Other Matters) Bill 2025. As others have stated, this bill covers a very wide range of areas. It is rather an omnibus bill amending many different acts, and many of the things that this bill does the Libertarian Party does not really have a problem with. However, there is one clause in the bill in particular that I feel if I do not point out and take a stand on then no-one will, and this is clause 70, around the chief investigator for transport safety. This is around powers of entry. Now, we have seen this many times since I have been elected to this place – where the government has given powers of entry to authorised officers and many other different arms of government. There are problems with these – and I will go through some of those in a moment – but powers of entry are always a problem for people who care about individual rights, and although the bill does have some limitations on residential premises, it is not clear to me how this will work if someone is living on a boat, for example, that the chief investigator for transport safety wants to access, and some people do live on boats.

Also I have got concerns about why these documents are being made exempt from freedom of information requests as a default provision. Some sensitive documents might exist in some investigations, but these can already be exempted from FOI on a case-by-case basis. The government claims that this is to encourage people to provide documents in the first place when requested, by protecting those documents from public scrutiny.

Also, reverse onus liability is very problematic. The government claims that the right is not unfairly limited because information provided may not be admissible as evidence against the person in a criminal proceeding or proceeding for the imposition of a civil penalty, and the government also claims that the limit is not arbitrary because it is to achieve the legitimate aim of marine safety. But this way of thinking ignores the fact that a person has the right to silence, and an investigation of marine safety does not create some sort of exemption to a person’s right to privacy under the charter. The bill does have some warrant provisions, and these search powers should have been included within those powers. I do not accept the government’s justification for these arguments for these new powers. I have seen this many times – where, as I said, authorised officers are given these new powers of entry, powers of seizure – and I think it is time for this Parliament to draw a line under this and say, ‘No more.’ If you want to collect documents or if you want to gain access to something, get a warrant.

John BERGER (Southern Metropolitan) (17:27): I rise to speak on the Roads and Ports Legislation Amendment (Road Safety and Other Matters) Bill 2025, which is currently before the chamber. This bill is about modernisation and improvements across the transport sector, improving safety and efficiency on our roads and improving safety and efficiency at our ports. Road safety is an issue that affects every Victorian. We all use roads in one way or another, and I know in my community of Southern Metro Region that people use the roads in many different ways. At any time of the day you will find motorists, pedestrians, cyclists and public transport users all sharing the roads as they go about their business. I think we can all agree that the issue of road safety is important to everyone and having roads that are safe benefits everyone, so when somebody breaks the road rules and shows disregard for everyone else’s safety as well as their own, it affects everyone. In these situations it is important that police have the ability to hold people to account to enforce our road safety laws.

In this bill we are seeking to address three key issues in road safety enforcement. The first is addressing the 12-month time limit for the police to bring proceedings for summary offences. Hit-and-run offences which lead to death or serious injury are indictable offences and are therefore not affected by the time limit being adjusted in this bill. On the other hand, hit-and-run offences which inflict minor injuries are considered to be summary offences and so are subject to this time limit. There is a good reason for this, and this time limit was implemented with the best of intentions. Victims deserve justice, and they deserve a justice process which is timely and does not drag on for years. However, an adverse effect of this time limit is that in some cases perpetrators can evade justice altogether if investigations go on for longer than a year. By extending the time limit on this particular offence from 12 months to 24, we are seeking to ensure that the police are given the time they need to conduct a thorough investigation.

The second change to road safety enforcement in this bill, which will better enable our police to keep our roads safe, is increasing the number of people authorised to take blood samples in cases related to drink driving and drug driving. Often in situations where a driver suspected of being under the influence of alcohol or drugs is pulled over by the police a blood test will be required. In these situations, the blood samples must be taken within 3 hours of the individual driving the vehicle. Not only this, but the blood sample must be taken by a registered medical practitioner or approved health professional. It is important that we maintain strict and reliable procedures in road safety enforcement so that we can ensure the integrity and accuracy of the system. That is why these requirements exist. But we also do not want a situation where a blood sample cannot be taken because the police are unable to reach a registered health practitioner or approved health professional in time. As such this bill will enable a broader range of qualified health professionals to be approved to assist the police in collecting these samples. This will help ensure that the police can be efficient and accurate when dealing with drink- and drug-driving offences.

The third change is related to improving the enforcement of the road rules and refers to the issuing of infringements for offences detected by speed cameras. As it stands, these infringements can only be issued by a sworn police officer, which can be a drain on police resources, especially given the expansion of the number of offences that can be detected by camera in recent years. Therefore this bill seeks a change which will enable Victoria Police employees who have been given written authorisation by the Chief Commissioner of Police to issue these infringements as well. This will allow for a better allocation of resources within the police force and allow sworn police officers to share a part of their workload with unsworn employees of Victoria Police. With that I commend the bill to the house.

Moira DEEMING (Western Metropolitan) (17:31): I also rise to speak on the Roads and Ports Legislation Amendment (Road Safety and Other Matters) Bill 2025. My colleagues have already covered the positives of the bill, but every piece of legislation carries a philosophy, spoken or unspoken, about what government is for. Labor’s socialist philosophy is all about big corporatised government, about hoarding power and wealth. When they see a problem, their instinct is not to solve it but to invent a new tax or levy so that they can take their cut and grow their control. They market each bill as a fix to a problem to win public support, but the fine print always tells the truth. Just like with this bill, it is more overpaid bureaucrats with more power to take more money indefinitely without ever having to prove that the job was done. Liberals believe that the state should do the opposite: limit itself, publish the numbers and end levies once their purpose is complete. This bill, clause by clause, reflects that fundamental divide.

Let us start with our roads, because nothing reveals a governing philosophy faster than the state of the bitumen, other than perhaps child safeguards of course. Over the past three years road maintenance budgets collapsed from $200 million to $37 million. The total kilometres of roads resurfaced fell by 95 per cent. Our road safety statistics are damning, fatalities and serious injuries increasing every year – real people just trying to get home safely now dead or injured on unsafe, poorly managed roads. Deaths on country and peri-urban roads like those feeding into my own communities rose 23 per cent. The Victorian Farmers Federation now directly links deteriorating road quality to rising fatalities. The government’s response has been to lower the speed limits. And when road maintenance funding is cut to service Victoria’s record $194 billion in debt, the damage shows up fast. When asked for real-world examples to justify these changes, the department could not provide any. The Urban Development Institute of Australia and the Victorian Transport Association, who build homes and move freight, warn this change will choke growth corridors and raise costs in a cost-of-living crisis and a housing crisis. Labor markets this goal as safety, but the real effect is delay, and the real purpose is to bury the accountability for safety. By removing deadlines and default approvals they ensure that no department ever has to explain why the roads still crumble or why the permits still have not moved.

This bill responds to Victorians frustrated with poor road management, but not with accountability, action or funding. This is nothing more than new red tape. The amendment abolishes deemed consent for roadworks and introduces a new stop-the-clock power for complex applications. Deemed consent is the idea that if a government authority does not respond to a road permit or an application within a set time, say 60 or 90 days, the application is automatically approved by default. It is viewed as a safeguard against silent delays. It is meant to ensure that if the government cannot give you an answer in time you can still get on with the job. This bill scraps that protection, but what it does not do is hold the approving authorities liable for failing to respond to a clear service standard. It gives departments the ability to wait as long as they like to respond, with no consequence. Too bad if your small business is trying to do its job and fix roads and road infrastructure and make it safe for fellow Victorians. If the government just does not get around to it, then your permit application will just sit there – and so will your workers and your equipment, and the roads still will not be fixed.

Then comes the second change, the stop-the-clock power, which means that even if a deadline does exist, they can pause the countdown whenever they declare that an application is complex. A 60-day time limit can suddenly stretch to 90 or 120 or more. It is a way of appearing to have deadlines whilst avoiding them altogether. Instead of clear timelines and accountability via default approvals, we will now have open-ended silence and ever more bureaucratic loopholes. This is the white-collar road-worker equivalent of standing around leaning on shovels, but this time the government can do it via officers in Spring Street. Every politician loves to open a shiny new road. We do not open the repair of a pothole. There are no ribbons to be cut, no media, no cameras and no votes for just doing those basics well. How about the Allan Labor government does its job properly and assesses permits in a reasonable time and actually manages the road network properly.

Now onto our ports. Ports are trade arteries, but in Victoria they have also become cash machines for Labor’s addiction to debt. With $29 million a day now being spent on interest payments alone, this bill empowers port managers to impose their new prescribed fees for mooring and other services. A prescribed fee is a government-authorised charge set by regulation, not negotiation, for using public infrastructure or services. In this bill these fees come with no cap, no expiry date and no legal requirement to prove the results. This means that port users can be charged more and more without any link to performance and without any end in sight. In 2023 Station Pier fees rose 15 per cent, supposedly for maintenance. Cruise operators fled and Victoria lost over 100 ship visits and $28 million in tourism income. Fewer ships mean more trucks and more diesel fumes for families in the western suburbs, but the fees remain. It is one of more than 60 new taxes and levies Labor has introduced over the last decade.

Meanwhile, solutions promised by these charges have stalled. The port rail shuttle, touted as the answer to truck traffic, is now delayed to 2029, and the western intermodal freight terminal was shelved, even after $400 million was spent. Let us not kid ourselves that this is going to be some noble user-pays reinvestment scheme – with Labor, it never is. Just look at the so-called commercial passenger vehicle levy that was meant to compensate former taxi licence owners. It was supposed to end in 2026, but it is still there, pulling in tens of millions every year, while the ex-owners of the taxi licences have had their lives ruined and remain in debt. Or the emergency services property levy – that was marketed as a way to fund the CFA and is now used like a second land tax on regional families and volunteers. Labor does not tax to fix. They tax to fund themselves, and they never, ever stop.

This bill also deepens the quiet centralisation of authority in our ports system. Where once local harbourmasters guided decisions, we now have a rebranded authority with no marine credentials. Community-designed redevelopment plans were junked so that consultants could rewrite them from scratch. This bill rolls investigative powers into a single act while removing parts of the freedom of information coverage. The scope expands, but scrutiny retreats. And the result? Heritage sheds vanish, fishing berths dry up and consultants pocket another million dollars for a fresh lens. The bill is not about safety or efficiency; it is about power and money. In the fine print, they quietly centralise authority, remove accountability and give themselves more power to tax forever, without ever proving delivery. It is not governance, it is exploitation by regulation, and I urge the house to accept our amendments.

Rachel PAYNE (South-Eastern Metropolitan) (17:39): I rise to make a brief contribution to the Roads and Ports Legislation Amendment (Road Safety and Other Matters) Bill 2025 on behalf of Legalise Cannabis Victoria. This bill makes several amendments across a number of pieces of legislation. Among other things, it establishes a licensing framework for the provision of mooring services at specified commercial ports, improves their operation and extends the time Victoria Police must bring proceedings for certain hit-and-run offences. My contribution today focuses specifically on the changes this bill makes to the Road Safety Act 1986. This bill seeks to expand the classes of people who can take blood and urine samples to detect drink and drug driving offences. While we do not necessarily have a problem with this amendment, if resourcing is the issue, we would like to offer an alternate solution, one that we have been calling for ever since we have been elected. On that note, I will be moving amendments on this bill, and I ask that they now be circulated.

Amendments circulated pursuant to standing orders.

Rachel PAYNE: Since day one we at Legalise Cannabis have advocated for medicinal cannabis patients to be treated like any other person on legally prescribed medication who is not impaired when driving. It is deeply regrettable that when Victoria first legalised medicinal cannabis in 2016, no forethought was given to the need to reconsider our driving laws. Almost 10 years later it continues to be an offence to drive with cannabis in your system, regardless of whether it is medicinal cannabis taken as prescribed and not causing impairment. Other lawful prescription medication is not treated this way. There are far more impairing drugs that we do not test for, things like opioids and benzodiazepines. Some people are taking these instead of medicinal cannabis because they know that if they get pulled over at a roadside drug test, it will not come up on that test. For others who decide to go without entirely, they are left managing the symptoms of their condition. Instead of having an unimpaired medicinal cannabis patient on our roads, you get someone struggling with crippling insomnia. Now, that is hardly a safer alternative.

We understand the Victorian government recognises this issue and has dedicated both time and money to addressing it through its controlled, closed-circuit driving trial to assess the effects on driver performance. It is expected that this will conclude sometime next year, meaning any potential change to legislation is realistically not going to happen until the next term of Parliament. In the interim we commend the government on passing an amendment to the Road Safety Act to provide magistrates with discretionary powers not to cancel a medicinal cannabis patient’s licence if they are driving while not impaired. However, while we wait, there are thousands of medicinal cannabis patients in Victoria who risk being criminalised every time they drive. This driving trial will only tell us what we already know from similar studies: medicinal cannabis patients can and do drive safely. Tasmania’s laws have allowed medicinal cannabis patients to drive if unimpaired for many years now, and the sky has not fallen in. This amendment would provide that prescription medicinal cannabis that does not impair driving is to be treated in the same manner as other prescription drugs. It is just common sense, and there is no need to continue to wait.

Renee HEATH (Eastern Victoria) (17:43): I rise to speak today on the Roads and Ports Legislation Amendment (Road Safety and Other Matters) Bill 2025. The Roman Empire understood something that this government does not seem to understand, and that is that roads and ports build civilisation itself.

Harriet Shing interjected.

Renee HEATH: I just want to say I love it when Minister Shing is in here, because it really does spice things up. Roman engineers did not build roads to nowhere; they built them to move armies, goods, people and ideas and to do it efficiently. Their ports were not just revenue-gathering exercises, they were gateways to building communities and prosperity. When the former Prime Minister Robert Menzies championed regional road development, he understood that same truth: regional roads are not just strips of bitumen, they are lifelines. We understood this when Mallacoota was engulfed in flames recently and there was one road in and one road out. So many people were, sadly, stranded there and had to be rescued by the navy. Roads are not just bitumen. They carry produce from farm to table, they are keeping food affordable for families, they ensure fire trucks reach burning homes and communities on time, they get ambulances to victims that need life-saving assistance and they connect isolated communities.

Before I address the chaos on Victoria’s roads and in its ports, I would like to highlight a couple of clauses in this bill. This bill proposes that police infringement notices would be handled by Victoria Police employees. This clause is a clear admission that police numbers are insufficient, and instead of addressing the issues, the government is merely shifting the responsibilities to police employees. The second one I want to highlight is the extension of the investigative powers for hit-and-run. This provision seems also to stem from low police numbers and lack of resources. We know that many cases remain unsolved and uninvestigated due to inadequate resources. These are temporary solutions that really are not going to address the underlying causes.

There are a few things specific to my area of Eastern Victoria Region that I just want to put on record. The statistics are absolutely shocking. Let me give the house some facts that this government would prefer to hide. Road maintenance funding has declined by 45 per cent in the last four years. The truth is the condition of our roads are the worst that I have seen them. They are apparently the worst that a lot of my constituents have seen them. This is not political. It is a fact that is echoed by a lot of people that I talk to. The government’s own performance data reveals the truth. Resurfacing spending has collapsed from $200 million to $37.5 million. Only 422,000 square metres of regional roads were rehabilitated in 2023–24 compared to the 9 million square metres in the previous year. Year after year Labor ministers announce a regional road blitz, yet their own department data shows that the works are absolutely plummeting. The RACV survey, a community survey, highlighted some real issues. The most recent RACV survey reveals the scale of community concern. Sixty-four per cent of respondents identified poor road quality and potholes as their main safety concern, up from 46 per cent in 2021. The worst affected roads included Bass Highway from Jam Jerrup to Leongatha, the Great Alpine Road between Bairnsdale and Wangaratta, the Princes Highway between Stratford and Bairnsdale and of course Phillip Island Road. These are arteries of eastern Victoria, and they are failing.

I just want to quickly touch on Pakenham’s infrastructure crisis. It is one that I have spoken about quite a few times here. Pakenham has experienced explosive growth, population growth at an unprecedented rate, but the infrastructure investment has not kept up. Federal coalition funding for crucial road upgrades remains incomplete. Roadworks create traffic chaos from Monash Freeway while potholes erupt across Healesville-Koo Wee Rup Road. McGregor Road suffers severe congestion. Residents struggle with intersections like Henty Road and Rogers Street, desperately calling for traffic lights and roundabouts. The Department of Transport and Planning have stated that there are no plans for upgrades at the Toomuc Valley Road and Princes Highway intersection, the main entrances for Beaconhills College, despite repeated petitioning by locals to have that problem solved.

Another one that has been a huge issue and one that has been raised many times in this place is the Lang Lang bypass. A lot of locals say they feel that it is trucks versus children, and it remains unresolved. The minister recently met with some with some locals there. Unfortunately, the meeting had to be delayed because there was a person travelling to the meeting that got killed on the road. It is absolutely devastating. There are significant risks there that need to be dealt with and need to be addressed, and I hope they will be dealt with and addressed. Our roads connect and strengthen communities, and I think we need to remember that. This government sometimes builds projects that are vanity projects that are putting all of their eggs in one basket and that the whole state is paying for but the whole state does not benefit from. I believe that this government needs to build for purpose, not just for politics, and this bill fails that test comprehensively. It provides legislation that will mask problems and ignore the real crisis facing regional Victoria.

Harriet SHING (Eastern Victoria – Minister for the Suburban Rail Loop, Minister for Housing and Building, Minister for Development Victoria and Precincts) (17:50): Today has been a pretty wideranging debate for a wideranging bill. I want to just sum up with some of the observations that have been made by speakers today around the primary purpose of the bill – namely to strengthen safety across the road and port networks and improve the way in which we manage our transport infrastructure and enforcement. There are a number of acts which are amended by this bill, including through road safety enforcement, management of works on public roads, regulation of high risk mooring services at commercial ports, assistance for local port managers to better maintain and operate key infrastructure, clarification on marine pollution response and updated liability caps, and support for a no-blame transport safety investigations function with clearer powers. So at first blush it does appear to be an omnibus miscellany of transport reforms, but the truth is it is actually part of ongoing reforms to assist with continuing and tireless efforts to make smart and safe legislative changes that benefit all Victorians.

I might just start where previous speakers finished off in relation to a number of comments that have been made about the safety of our roads. Nobody cavils with the important position that safety is of primary importance, and again, when we committed $976 million to roads in this year’s budget, it delivered another record year of funding to fix potholes and upgrade road surfaces in every corner of the state. There have been comparisons to the Roman Empire. I cannot quite believe that we have ended up here again. I suspect a Hansard search might yield some pretty wideranging contexts in which this epoch has been referenced.

Ryan Batchelor interjected.

Harriet SHING: As Mr Batchelor just said, all roads do lead there. Also, it is important to note that road traffic and vehicle movements were not even vaguely comparable to what we are seeing now. Millions and millions of movements across our road networks have required a record investment into making sure that they are upgraded, maintained, resurfaced and repaired in a way that reflects need and also commits to long term improvement. This is where we are again making sure that we have got a $6.6 billion 10-year strategy to plan long term and make sure that we have got an equipped strategy to cater to our rapid growth and increasing freight task. Again, the Romans never dealt with B-doubles or large volumes of materials and commodities heading to market. That intermodal connectivity was never part of the challenge faced by the Roman Empire.

Again, we can have an exercise of relativity here, but let us make it a meaningful one. On the point of comparison, let us have a little a little exercise in facts, just for the sake of Hansard and for clarity. The average spend under our period in government has been around $740 million in yearly funding toward maintaining our roads. To compare and contrast that with those opposite on an annualised basis, that number is $493 million. That is averaged out. The opposition spent on average in their last term in government per annum $493 million, and for our period in office on average there has been $740 million in yearly funding. Again, this is work that needs to continue irrespective of who is in office, and again, that $6.6 billion 10-year strategy is part of making sure that we are putting road safety and a better capacity-building process across our road network front and centre.

We want to make sure also that our transport system keeps up with rapid growth and make sure that we have also got the central planks of safety, efficiency and resilience built in, because we know that incomplete, unregulated or poorly planned works manifestly put lives and safety at risk and they also present significant risks to infrastructure. Ports and roads are part of the lifeblood of our economies and our communities. They deserve strong oversight and also smart regulation, and because every Victorian has the right to feel safe, whether they are walking or using our roads or adjacent to our roads or working in and around our ports, safety is of primary importance.

The bill, on that point, gives Victoria Police more tools to hold unsafe drivers to account, including more time to investigate hit-and-run offences and broader access to health professionals for drug-driving testing. This is where again I note the comments made by Ms Payne in respect of the amendments being proposed and also the commentary and contributions being made by a number of speakers around this chamber around the impact of road fatalities and collisions on our communities. Nobody has been untouched by the road toll, and it is absolutely essential that road safety transcend party politics. It must be the case, and again, some of the contributions here today give me a measure of hope that indeed that can be the case. Reducing the risk of unplanned or unsafe works proceeding through deemed consent and introducing a stop-the-clock mechanism so that all roadwork applications have the proper information are a really significant part of this bill. There is a little bit of misinformation or misapprehension that I do want to correct in the course of the committee stage in addressing the coalition’s amendments here. We also want to make sure that we are freeing up police for frontline duties by allowing authorised employees to issue camera-detected infringements.

Moving on from road to sea, the bill protects port workers with a new licensing scheme for mooring services. As Ms Ermacora referred to in her contribution, western Victoria is significantly dependent upon port functions, as are a number of areas around the state, so I am grateful for the contributions she has made in focusing her attention port functions. Making sure that port managers can act quickly on abandoned vessels and charge fair fees for vital maintenance services is important as well – again, something which Ms Bath touched on. Modernising marine spill liability is also important. This is something which has featured in public discussion around policy settings intermittently, but we all know that when and as there is any issue around marine spill, it is something which activates people to call for responsibility resting with polluters and not taxpayers as that relates to clean-up.

There are two amendments that have been proposed today. The government will not be supporting either of the amendments. I just want to touch on them quickly before perhaps we go into committee. I might start with Ms Payne’s amendment. Thank you for the conversations and discussions that we have had. It is always a really important process for us to have conversations with you, not just about the substance of the amendments and the positions that you take but also about the form in which they might appear or otherwise be addressed in the course of committee stages or engagement with ministerial offices, departments and the Legalise Cannabis Victoria party. THC remains a banned drug because it is known to impair driving. There is strong evidence that THC, which is the active component in many medicinal cannabis products, almost doubles the risk of a crash compared to a drug-free driver. Having said that, Victoria is leading the way. As people well know, no other state is doing more to understand how medicinal cannabis affects driving. Again, this is the distinction between presence and impairment, which has occupied the minds and challenged the skill and the expertise and the common sense in policymakers’ minds for many, many years. We funded the world-first $5 million driving trial to get some really significant and baseline comparative evidence before making further changes, and that trial is currently underway. Ms Payne and Mr Ettershank I understand actually visited the trial track with the Minister for Roads and Road Safety –

Rachel Payne interjected.

Harriet SHING: There we are. Ms Payne has indicated that she passed with flying colours. I am not sure whether I should congratulate you, Ms Payne, or just stand here in silent admiration. Not having been silent before in my life, I will go with the former. I do just want to make sure that we do finish the trial before we rewrite any laws. We do not want to jump the gun, because doing that would undermine the science. We do need to follow through to a state of completion on this particular trial.

The amendment being put by Legalise Cannabis Victoria relies on assumptions that we just cannot verify at this particular point in time at the roadside. So again, this is a question of technology and it is a question of sequencing, particularly as that relates to the trial. Currently there is no reliable test to determine impairment rather than presence or to show if someone used cannabis legally and as prescribed. The basis upon which the cannabis THC has been consumed is not something that a test can determine at this point. These are the sorts of things that matter when it comes to understanding the challenges around presence, impairment and the purpose or rationale for the consumption of that product in the first instance, noting that there is a lot of self-medicating that occurs and a lot of other use of THC and cannabis products. In a study of medicinal cannabis users we did see that 44 per cent of respondents with a valid prescription reported that they had topped up with other cannabis products. Again, this is part of the ongoing discussions that we have been having with LCV and also Ms Patten in this place. I was part of a taskforce and the work in relation to medicinal cannabis use and its impact on road use a number of years ago. It is long term, difficult, tricky and challenging work that for a long time has confounded the minds of policymakers, and if it were easy it would have been done by now. The work does go on there, but we do need the facts before we make any changes.

The opposition has circulated an amendment which we will not be supporting, and I am very happy to provide some further detail on that. This is actually about safety and not delays. If someone lodges an incomplete application, which may have public safety risks, the very things that opposition members raised in the course of many contributions this afternoon, the clock should actually stop until they provide the full picture so only dodgy or rushed applications get held up. If you submit everything required, the clock keeps ticking, and we can get on with the works and we can continue that work apace. The opposition’s plan to remove the mechanism would force road authorities to reject incomplete applications just to avoid deemed consent. That is really clunky and it is actually less efficient, and rejecting an application restarts the process and causes even more delay. Stopping the clock actually streamlines that process. Right now there is no set list of what must be submitted. The bill allows us to prescribe that in regulations, which will give everyone more clarity, certainty and consistency. If the clock cannot stop, bad applications might actually slip through, and that is the sort of situation that could and indeed may well put lives and infrastructure at risk – the very thing that we are all, based on the contributions made this afternoon, intending to address and prevent.

We want to make sure, again, that road users and their safety and our safety are front of mind. We want to make sure that common sense is front of mind, and this is where, again, we are looking to make sure that through the wide range of matters set out in this bill we can continue to achieve exactly that. It is consistent with the reforms that we have foreshadowed. It is consistent with our commitment to road safety and to better, smarter regulation, and on that basis I would commend the bill and move it to committee.

Motion agreed to.

Read second time.

Instruction to committee

The ACTING PRESIDENT (John Berger) (18:03): I have considered the amendments circulated by Ms Payne, and in my view these amendments are not within the scope of the bill. Therefore an instruction motion pursuant to standing order 14.11 is required. I remind the house that an instruction to the committee is a procedural motion.

Rachel PAYNE (South-Eastern Metropolitan) (18:03): I move:

That it be an instruction to the committee that they have the power to consider an amendment and a new clause to amend the Road Safety Act 1986 to provide that medicinal cannabis that does not impair driving must be treated in the same manner as other prescription drugs.

Motion agreed to.

Committed.

Committee

Clause 1 (18:05)

Rachel PAYNE: I move:

1. Clause 1, page 2, after line 3 insert –

“(ia) to provide that medicinal cannabis that does not impair driving must be treated in the same manner as other prescription drugs; and”.

2. Insert the following New Clause to follow clause 5 –

‘5A Offences involving alcohol or other drugs

After section 49(3C) of the Road Safety Act 1986 insert –

“(3D) Subsection (1)(bb), (bc), (h), (i) and (j) do not apply to a person whose blood or oral fluid contains delta-9-tetrahydrocannabinol from a legal cannabis product –

(a) which is a prescription drug; and

(b) for which the person has a prescription or other authority to obtain, possess and use that product; and

(c) which has been used in accordance with that prescription or authority.

(3E) For the avoidance of doubt, subsection (3D) does not operate to exempt a person from the application of subsection (1)(bb), (bc), (h), (i) and (j) in relation to any other prescribed illicit drug which may be present in the person’s blood or oral fluid.”.’.

I just want to acknowledge Minister Shing’s commentary in respect to the closed-circuit driving trial that is currently underway and that we are in a predicament here where we have had medicinal cannabis legal for nearly 10 years and are trying to find a balance there. Obviously Legalise Cannabis Victoria have advocated for medicinal cannabis patients to be treated like any other patient on prescription medication. We are talking about prescription medication, and I do take issue with claims that medicinal cannabis patients then top up with recreational cannabis. I could point to the fact that someone that may be prescribed a medication such as valium or benzodiazepine may also find themselves topping up their medication. So I think that looking at those distinctions might not be as relevant anymore when we are talking about looking at that distinction of prescription medication and patients’ rights.

Harriet SHING: I just want to again, perhaps for avoidance of doubt, indicate I was not suggesting in the course of my sum-up that this might well be a top-up with recreational cannabis; it might well be a level that exceeds a prescribed dose. Again, we just do not know, and so without knowing it is then very difficult to understand what the nature or the extent of impairment might be in any situation where medicinal cannabis has perhaps been prescribed to a certain amount. A top-up may occur because of a recreational volume but may actually occur because of a prescribed volume that is brought forward in dose, for example. I would hate for you to conclude that in fact I was suggesting that prescription cannabis was only ever sitting alongside, in that 44 per cent, the use of something other than prescribed volumes or amounts of cannabis as prescribed.

David LIMBRICK: The Libertarian Party will be supporting this amendment. I note some of the minister’s comments earlier about the science of this and testing for impairment. I would like to make the point that the whole reason for roadside testing is meant to be to test for impairment, because what everyone cares about is whether or not someone is impaired, not whether they have some substance in their body; they care whether they are a danger to other drivers on the road. It is very unfortunate that in the case of THC it stays in the body for a long period of time and is detectable well after someone is impaired.

I would say that if we are looking for the gap in the science, the gap in the science was when roadside drug testing was introduced in the first place, when they introduced a testing mechanism which did not test for impairment and which continues to not test for impairment. Many people are very unjustly being penalised, having their licences taken away and being put through all sorts of trauma, and they pose no risk to other drivers on the road because they are not impaired – but we do not know that because they never actually test, or rarely test, for impairment. I have been told in the last term in Parliament that the reason that they do not test for impairment – even though we have an impairment test, which is rarely used – is because it is very onerous on the police force and takes a long time. There is a lot of paperwork and a lot of stuff involved; they do not like doing it. The roadside drug test is a lot easier when you can just test someone and you do not need to actually prove that they are impaired. This is an injustice that should never have come about. It should never have happened. I do not actually care whether it is prescription medication or not, or indeed some illegal drug; what actually matters for road safety is whether or not someone is impaired. That is the only thing that we should be testing for, and that is not happening in Victoria at the moment.

I acknowledge that the government is doing these tests at the moment to try and come up with some sort of test for impairment, but in the meantime we have very large numbers of people who use cannabis for medicinal purposes. I have met many of these people. There are people who have lost their licences and people who could benefit from medicine who are choosing not to take that medicine. They are taking more dangerous medicines, such as opiates, which they do not test for and which do cause impairment, but for some unknown reason – well, actually, I know the reason. The reason that the government does not insist that we test for opiates and benzos as well as cannabis is because there is a social stigma on cannabis, and there does not seem to be a social stigma on opiates and benzos.

The company that produces the roadside drug tests that they use at the moment also produces another one for a very similar cost that tests for opiates and benzodiazepines. The government has not instructed the police to use this. They do not use it because they could be pulling half the drivers off the road; that is why. They are not going to introduce that because there will be an absolute uproar, but as the number of medical cannabis patients increases, the noise from these patients that are suffering this injustice will increase over time. It will get to the point – and I think even the government acknowledges this; that is why they have agreed to this roadside testing stuff that they are talking about – where it is unbearable, and the government will have to face the fact that what is happening is an injustice.

Katherine COPSEY: The Greens will be supporting this amendment. We thank Ms Payne for her continued advocacy on this matter and the reminder to the chamber and to the government of its importance. We hope to see it successful in its intent in the very near future, before the end of this term.

The DEPUTY PRESIDENT: The question is that Ms Payne’s amendment 1, which tests her amendment 2, be agreed to.

Council divided on amendment:

Ayes (7): Katherine Copsey, Anasina Gray-Barberio, David Limbrick, Sarah Mansfield, Rachel Payne, Aiv Puglielli, Georgie Purcell

Noes (28): Ryan Batchelor, Melina Bath, John Berger, Lizzie Blandthorn, Gaelle Broad, Georgie Crozier, David Davis, Moira Deeming, Enver Erdogan, Jacinta Ermacora, Michael Galea, Renee Heath, Ann-Marie Hermans, Shaun Leane, Wendy Lovell, Trung Luu, Bev McArthur, Joe McCracken, Nick McGowan, Tom McIntosh, Harriet Shing, Ingrid Stitt, Lee Tarlamis, Sonja Terpstra, Gayle Tierney, Rikkie-Lee Tyrrell, Sheena Watt, Richard Welch

Amendment negatived.

The DEPUTY PRESIDENT: Mr McCracken, I invite you to move your amendments 1 and 2, which test your remaining amendments.

Joe McCRACKEN: Short and sweet: basically we do not think the stop-the-clock provisions are helpful and we think they might actually elongate the process of trying to get road-related infrastructure in place. The amendments have been circulated. I move:

1. Clause 1, page 2, line 20, omit “2004 –” and insert “2004 to enable responsible road authorities to be prescribed for certain road infrastructure; and”.

2. Clause 1, page 2, lines 21 to 25, omit all words and expressions on these lines.

Harriet SHING: The government will not be supporting the amendment. The changes do not impact upon the ability of road authorities, including councils, to maintain the roads for which they are responsible. Providing coordinating road authorities with a stop-the-clock mechanism on incomplete applications for consent for works will ensure that the authority can obtain the information required to be confident that the works will be carried out in a safe and appropriate way.

The changes to the consent-for-works application process will not impact upon councils’ ability to maintain their roads. A consent for work is not required for a council to perform roadworks on any road for which the council is the coordinating road authority, and timeframes to identify and respond to hazards on the road network are not impacted by the amendments in this bill. Response times for addressing hazards on roads are set out by road authorities in their road management plans, and road authorities responding to hazards on the road network do not need to apply for a consent for works.

There is no set list of information that applicants must provide; nor is there a stop-the-clock mechanism if a road authority receives an application that does contain all the information the authority needs to make an informed decision. After the changes in the bill we will have the ability to prescribe in regulations a list of information that must be provided with an application for consent for works. If an application is made without all this information, then it is incomplete and the clock does not start. The clock is effectively stopped when the road authority does an initial assessment of the application as received, concludes the application is incomplete and advises the applicant. If an application is made with all the prescribed information, then the road authority will not have the ability to stop the clock.

David LIMBRICK: Whilst I am sympathetic to the amendments moved by Mr McCracken, I do have some concerns about the incentive here that would be set up, as was pointed out by the minister – the incentive to actually decline the application to avoid deemed consent. I am not certain whether that is a real thing or not, but I am concerned enough that without further evidence I am not prepared to support this amendment.

Katherine COPSEY: Similarly, whilst we understand the concern that has been put forward by the opposition, we appreciate the minister’s efficiently, as usual, delivered explanation and will not be supporting the amendment.

Council divided on amendments:

Ayes (13): Melina Bath, Gaelle Broad, Georgie Crozier, David Davis, Moira Deeming, Renee Heath, Ann-Marie Hermans, Wendy Lovell, Trung Luu, Bev McArthur, Joe McCracken, Nick McGowan, Richard Welch

Noes (22): Ryan Batchelor, John Berger, Lizzie Blandthorn, Katherine Copsey, Enver Erdogan, Jacinta Ermacora, Michael Galea, Anasina Gray-Barberio, Shaun Leane, David Limbrick, Sarah Mansfield, Tom McIntosh, Rachel Payne, Aiv Puglielli, Georgie Purcell, Harriet Shing, Ingrid Stitt, Lee Tarlamis, Sonja Terpstra, Gayle Tierney, Rikkie-Lee Tyrrell, Sheena Watt

Amendments negatived.

Clause agreed to; clauses 2 to 107 agreed to; schedule 1 agreed to.

Reported to house without amendment.

Harriet SHING (Eastern Victoria – Minister for the Suburban Rail Loop, Minister for Housing and Building, Minister for Development Victoria and Precincts) (18:24): I move:

That the report be now adopted.

Motion agreed to.

Report adopted.

Third reading

Harriet SHING (Eastern Victoria – Minister for the Suburban Rail Loop, Minister for Housing and Building, Minister for Development Victoria and Precincts) (18:25): I move:

That the bill be now read a third time and do pass.

Council divided on motion:

Ayes (34): Ryan Batchelor, Melina Bath, John Berger, Lizzie Blandthorn, Gaelle Broad, Katherine Copsey, Georgie Crozier, David Davis, Moira Deeming, Enver Erdogan, Jacinta Ermacora, Michael Galea, Anasina Gray-Barberio, Renee Heath, Ann-Marie Hermans, Shaun Leane, Wendy Lovell, Trung Luu, Sarah Mansfield, Bev McArthur, Joe McCracken, Nick McGowan, Tom McIntosh, Rachel Payne, Aiv Puglielli, Georgie Purcell, Harriet Shing, Ingrid Stitt, Lee Tarlamis, Sonja Terpstra, Gayle Tierney, Rikkie-Lee Tyrrell, Sheena Watt, Richard Welch

Noes (1): David Limbrick

Motion agreed to.

Read third time.

The PRESIDENT: Pursuant to standing order 14.28, the bill will be returned to the Assembly with a message informing them that the Legislative Council has agreed to the bill without amendment.