Wednesday, 27 August 2025

Motions

Crime

David DAVIS (Southern Metropolitan) (15:51): I move:

That this house:

(1) notes:

(a) the recent serious and violent home invasions across metropolitan Melbourne, including home invasions in Kew;

(b) the aggravated retail burglaries in retail outlets, including supermarkets, across Melbourne;

(c) comments of Mr Anthony Heraghty, CEO of the Super Retail Group;

(d) concern regarding community safety in country Victoria;

(e) the lack of police resources available in our suburbs; and

(2) expresses legitimate concern at the failure of the Allan Labor government to control this serious situation putting many Victorians at risk.

This is an important motion because we have a crime wave across our city. We have real threats to individuals and to businesses. In my own suburb in the City of Boroondara, in Kew, there has been a spate of robberies, aggravated burglaries and violent crime committed, and people are genuinely fearful. People are fearful of home invasions. They are fearful of the threats that are there. These are not made-up threats. They are not people being hysterical. These actually relate directly to what is happening and what people see and what they know is happening to their friends. The case in Kew East recently – and I am going to just quote briefly from the Age here.

A Kew East father has been stabbed 11 times, including in the face, while he defended his wife and two toddlers who were trapped in a separate room during a home invasion.

Police said the 39-year-old man had tried to fight off five armed home invaders who smashed a large window to break into his family home in Oxford Street at 4am on Sunday.

I am just using this as one case study to explain what is happening in our suburbs and the reason that people are so concerned. Everyday Victorians, everyday Melburnians, people in the country too, older people, younger people, men, women, children – everyone is fearful of what is happening.

The husband and his wife, 34, confronted the intruders, with the woman herded at knifepoint into a room with their two children, aged two and three, while her husband faced them.

The man’s parents, aged 69 and 70, who were also staying in the home, ran to his aid but were confronted by the group and received minor injuries. The grandfather suffered cuts to his hands, and the grandmother was pushed around, police said.

The invaders, allegedly armed with a machete, garden shears, and a knife, attacked the father, who was later taken to hospital with serious, non-life-threatening injuries …

I think I have said enough. This is a too-typical story in our suburbs. But it is not just the violent home invasions; it is much more than that. It is the serious threats that we are facing in our retail outlets as well. The CEO of Super Retail Group has been very clear about this and about a number of the supermarkets, and I think it is worthwhile putting very clearly what is happening here.

The Super Retail Group has Supercheap Auto, BCF and Rebel Sport, and their chief executive described how Melbourne’s out-of-control crime, targeting his Rebel outlets, has severely drained his company’s profits and also called out Victoria amongst all of the states around Australia as the worst offender. He slammed Victoria as the nation’s crime and theft capital, calling on police to crack down on the ‘industrial-scale theft’. He said:

We think roughly Victoria equates to 40 per cent of the increase in this activity. So that’s disproportionate …

He said:

This is industrial-scale theft. This is not children taking an item and putting it in their school bag, this is gangs of people coming into our stores, taking thousands of dollars, in some cases tens of thousands of dollars in stock …

It’s organised theft –

the CEO said –

… so it is someone coming in and taking thousands of dollars in one move and usually assaulting the team members on the way out. (They are) threatening our team members with weapons, driving 200 Series Land Cruisers through shopping centres, it is out of control.

This is a senior CEO. He has got retail outlets all around Australia. He is singling out Victoria as a particular problem.

The Coles CEO – and we heard a question today to the Treasurer, who did not seem to want to deal with the fact that retail is being impacted by these matters – Ms Weckert said her team were witnessing an increase in crime and threatening behaviour in stores. Organised crime gangs are robbing meat from Coles supermarkets to sell to restaurants for a quick profit, especially in Victoria, where the crime rate spirals out of control and provides lucrative opportunities for targeted theft. She said:

Despite record levels of investment in technology, security guards and safety training, our team continues to experience unacceptable levels of theft, abuse and threatening behaviours – particularly in Victoria, where we see the highest proportion of organised retail crime by individuals who pay no attention to the law.

She said:

And it is definitely the case that in Victoria, retail crime is escalating more than what we are seeing in other states.

A Woolworths spokesperson – lest it be thought it is one major supermarket – said they are seeing increased levels of theft. The Master Grocers – which includes IGA and FoodWorks – chief operating officer, Mikaela McKenzie, said:

Offenders act with little fear of consequence, and they seem to know that once they become aggressive or vocal, staff are instructed not to intervene.

The Master Grocers Australia IGA FoodWorks CEO David Inall said Victoria had become a:

… consequence-free environment.

Enough is enough, our members have had a gutful of the ever-increasing incidence of theft, violence and anti-social behaviour …

The Australian Retail Association chief industry affairs officer Fleur Brown said Victoria was now a ‘hotspot’ for retail crime.

It is very distressing for retail stores to have anything happen like the ram raid, but to have it happen repeatedly is a really traumatic event for those store teams …

she said.

We are deeply concerned about the intensity of these numbers and the increase that we are seeing in retail crime …

We would like to see a response in Victoria with strengthened legislation. We do need to take this problem seriously.

This government has been in power now for almost 11 years, and in those 11 years the situation has deteriorated. The crime situation has deteriorated; the home invasions are up; the severity of the crime, the intensity of the crime and the bloody-minded nature of the interventions by some of these groups has got much, much worse. The attack on retailers and the situation in retailing has become much worse and has now become a very serious matter.

What is going on here is the question. There is a huge increase in crime, as picked up in the government’s own statistics. I am going to stick with many of these from my own electorate, but it is true elsewhere. I might pick some country locations just to show the situations as well, as it is not just the metropolitan area. If you look at Boroondara, the total crime rate from year to year 2023 to 2024 was up 12 per cent; the Monash rate was up 10 per cent; Whitehorse was up 10 per cent; Greater Bendigo was up 15 per cent; Loddon was up 12 per cent; Hume, 20 per cent; Melton, 19 per cent; and Moonee Valley was up 23 per cent. These are very, very significant increases. If you look at aggravated robberies, the numbers have gone up very significantly. In the case of Boroondara it was a 17 per cent increase. In Glen Eira it was an 11 per cent increase and it was 6 per cent in Bentleigh. In Monash there was a 75 per cent increase in the number of aggravated burglaries, up from 60 to 105 over the course of 12 months.

These are very big increases and concerning. Greater Bendigo is 82 per cent up for aggravated burglaries. Melton is 34 per cent up. Even Campaspe has had very significant increases. In Shepparton the numbers have gone up 67 per cent. As I said, in Monash aggravated burglaries are up very significantly, from 60 to 105 – a 75 per cent increase. These are significant and frightening. Some of the theft figures are up significantly. In Kingston, a 33 per cent increase; Boroondara, a 30 per cent increase; Monash, 19 per cent up; a 17 per cent increase in Whitehorse. These are figures that should make people very concerned. These are going terribly in the wrong direction, and Victorians do not feel safe. And they do not feel safe for a reason. They do not feel safe because they are at greater risk now than they were previously, because the crime rate has gone up, the severity of crime has gone up and the deep, threatening nature of it has got much worse as well.

It is also interesting to see what has happened with policing in the same time. I am fortunate to have that rare thing, a time series on police rosters in my own area. When you look at those police rosters, there are significant deteriorations. The total staff working over a fortnight in November, if you look back in 2020, and the most recent ones I have got are 2023 – I am waiting on some new data, I might add – at Camberwell the number of staff has fallen from 287 to 168. That is a 41 per cent fall in the total number of staff working over a fortnight. The same is true in Malvern, with falls there, and in Prahran there are falls.

I should say that in Prahran this week my colleague Rachel Westaway in the Prahran electorate held a forum on Monday night which was incredibly well attended. David Southwick, Tim McCurdy and others were there representing the leadership of the party. But Rachel had done the work to get a large number of people there who had had significant experiences in recent times in that area. Crime is up in that area, but the policing effort is down when we look at the most recent figures that I have available in Prahran. There is a fall of about 14.25 per cent in staff working on weekdays. On weekends it is a 29.75 per cent fall in the number of staff, and the number working night shift has fallen from 125 to 95, down 24 per cent. These are again significant falls. This is indicative of what the figure work that we have shows is happening across local police stations in metropolitan Melbourne.

The effective numbers on the roster for any particular week or fortnight period are falling. When we request a fortnight, we are getting 14 days, so we are getting the weekends and the weekday presence. The names are obviously redacted, but we can see the rank of the different officers, and it is clear that a number of officers have been stripped out and sent to taskforces in the city. Other ones are not there for a range of other reasons, but the number that are available on any particular occasion, whether it is weekend or weekdays, has fallen over the last three to four years in many of these metropolitan stations. That is not good.

The availability to undertake local policing is a concern. It is often that local policing that can provide the preventative work. They are out there, they are visible, they are known to the community. They know the hotspots in a particular community. They know where to go to look and see what is happening. But if you do not have the local police presence available in a timely way, then there is a real concern that a preventative and active police presence and policing cannot take place. This is a very moderate motion because it picks up what is actually happening. There have been these recent home invasions across metropolitan Melbourne. It is not just in my suburb of Kew, it is not just where my office is in South Yarra – it is not just those. It is in Brighton and it is in other areas right across the metropolitan area. We have heard some of the cases in Cranbourne recently.

The retail burglaries are up in supermarkets. I have put those quotes onto the record from a number of the CEOs and senior people in some of the retail outlets that we have got. Rebel Sport, a major store and a major chain, are pointing the finger directly at Victoria and the Victorian government’s failure to act, and they are saying that this is costing Victoria and it is making it more difficult to keep their business effectively running. Then there are those issues with supermarkets. The comments from the Coles CEO are very clear. They leave no room for doubt that there is a serious problem that has developed in Victoria, and it has developed under this Labor government and under Jacinta Allan, who has failed to tackle these points, and she should have tackled these points. It is clear that this has been going on for some time. There is an operation that is working now that is a formalised thing. It is much more than casual crime. These are organised crime operations that are actually putting at risk the safety of our community, and they are putting at risk the viability of many of our retail businesses as well. I know that many of the shops down Chapel Street are afraid to challenge a threatening individual or group that comes into those retail outlets. This, I am sure, is true elsewhere too. Country Victoria is not immune to this.

The lack of police resources is I think closely connected to what is going on. It is not the whole story. It is partly about unclear penalty signals. It is partly about the bail issue, which we discussed last night. There were amendments that we sought to move that the government and others chose not to support. We know that the government culpably weakened the bail laws, and there has been a surge in violent crime since that point. This is in one sense not surprising. If you have got situations where you have got individuals who feel that they are not going to be brought to account for crimes and for violent steps, they may well continue to do that when those signals are not there. We have got to get a better set of things in place. That does not in any way diminish the need for careful preventative policing. I know that is something that many police I have talked to in my area say should be a significant part of the response. That is harder to do if you have got the police stripped out of the local police stations and doing other tasks elsewhere. We have obviously had a lot of demonstrations, but even prior to the demonstrations this issue was a developing issue and a problem. There is no doubt that having less available local police will make it much more difficult to run the preventative steps at a local level that are needed.

The final section of my motion picks up the legitimate concern at the failure of the Allan Labor government to control this serious situation, putting many Victorians at risk. We say it has gone too far; it has got beyond a joke. The violence is serious. The threats and the home invasions are serious. The threats to retail businesses and importantly to retail workers are too much, and people should not have to face those threats. Businesses should not have to face those threats. Something has got to be done, and this motion is a direct call for some sort of action. It is highlighting this issue for the purposes of saying that we have got to act and we have got to move forward.

Sonja TERPSTRA (North-Eastern Metropolitan) (16:09): I rise to make a contribution on this motion standing in Mr Davis’s name in regard to crime and community safety. Despite the characterisation of it by Mr Davis and the casting of this motion, what it does not speak to is the large amount of work that the Allan Labor government is doing in regard to crime. We have to look at what the causes of crime are but then also look at what the consequences are for people who commit serious crimes. Of course what is really front and centre, or the most important point in the government’s approach to crime, is making sure that community safety is really at the centre of our approaches to crime. Community safety is a top priority, and all Victorians have the right to feel safe and be safe in their communities. Nothing that anyone says in this debate should be construed as giving a green light to anyone who commits crime. These are serious problems, and people do have the right to feel safe.

But we also are interested in what drives crime, and sometimes there are many serious drivers of crime. Some of them are preventable, but sometimes there are generational impacts that can cause crime. These are also matters that the Allan Labor government is working incredibly hard on – things like family violence. If you look at some of the drivers of crime – family violence, poverty, drug and alcohol abuse and what is going on inside the family home – all these things can contribute to the reasons for crime, but also the cost of living is particularly high, and we had at least 10 years of wage suppression in this country by former coalition governments.

David Davis interjected.

Sonja TERPSTRA: Through you, Acting President, I will take up Mr Davis’s interjection about how we have been in government for 10 years. The Allan Labor government, the Victorian state government, does not set wage policy in this country. We are not responsible for it. The Commonwealth government is. We had 10 years of wage suppression, and what we have seen is household budgets being absolutely stretched to the max. Whether it is people struggling to pay rent or whether it is people struggling to put food on the table and those sorts of pressures that families or single people are experiencing – whoever they are – they are all feeling the pressure, and there are a range of things that then occur as a consequence. But as I said, trying to look at the causes of crime through a very singular lens is kind of irresponsible, because there are lots of drivers for these sorts of things.

I am going to go through some of the extensive work that our government are doing in regard to managing crime and also looking at the causes of crime, but with community safety being at the heart and centre of our responses. In terms of Victoria Police we have got a record investment of over $4.5 billion – I will say that again, $4.5 billion – to ensure our police are equipped with the resources and tougher powers they need to keep our community safe. That is a big investment in our police force and our services, and we thank our hardworking police officers for the work that they do in keeping communities safe each and every day. They turn up sometimes in some of the most difficult circumstances. We have just heard recently about a tragedy in and around Bright, where people who chose to serve in our police force have given their lives in service, and that is a tragedy. So I will not talk down Victoria Police. I will not talk down the very important work that they do. I thank them, and I know that members on the government benches also thank the police each and every day for the very important work that they do in keeping our community safe. That is an important thing to get on the record.

We also have more than 3600 new police officers on the beat to keep Victorians safe. Again, there is record investment in our police force, but also we are madly recruiting police officers because we know we need police on the beat. We know that having a police presence in some communities is incredibly important. We have also invested $1 billion to deliver new and upgraded police stations across our state, and our government continues to invest in critical police infrastructure. That is an ongoing process. We know that where police infrastructure needs to be invested in and upgraded we will rise to that request and make sure our police have the best and most appropriate facilities they need to be able to do their job – their job is an important one, and that is keeping Victorians safe – unlike those opposite, who cut $100 million from the Victorian police budget and failed to fund a single additional officer.

I will say that again, because we need to look at the contrast, don’t we, Ms Watt? We need to look at the contrast where our government has invested over a billion dollars versus those opposite who cut $100 million and did not fund a single additional police officer. We know what happens when those opposite get control: they cut, they cut and they cut. As I said, our Victorian police officers are out every day, at all hours, in all weather. It is a very challenging job. But they do it so well, and that is why we back them. We know Victoria Police are making record numbers of arrests – over 75,000 arrests in the last 12 months. Despite what Mr Davis said about crime – he has done a great job in going through and pulling out every single stat that he could look at and cherrypicking various ones – if you look at the long-term average of crime in Victoria, it is stable. There are hotspots, yes, but that is where our police officers are taking action. We continue to support our police officers in doing that very important work.

What people need to know, for any of those people who might be playing along at home this afternoon, is that Victoria by and large is a safe place to live. If you listen to the contribution of Mr Davis, you would think that we have all gone to hell in a handbasket here in Victoria, which is demonstrably untrue. It is demonstrably untrue because if you look at the publicly reported crime statistics – they are available to everyone to see, if you would like to go and look them up yourself, again for those who are playing along at home – if you look at the long-term average and the long-term statistics over time, crime is relatively stable in Victoria.

I have got 2 and a bit minutes on the clock, so I just want to again go through some of the important investments that our government has made. The machete amnesty to address knife crime – a $13 million investment by the government. We have secured the bins for people to be able to surrender those, and that will be coming into effect from 1 September, just a few days away. We have invested in that. Again, that was the advice our police force gave us, that that was what they needed to be able to manage this situation. In terms of bail, some of the signature work we have been doing in this chamber has been around introducing bail laws that are more robust than the previous ones, and these changes have seen remand numbers up by 4 per cent across the system. Again, our bail laws are working despite what Mr Davis would have you believe. We have been clear though that there is more work to do. We never said we are finished. There is more work to do. As part of our second tranche of reforms, which passed the Parliament yesterday, there will be more stringent bail tests, one of the most stringent in the nation, targeting serious offending like aggravated carjacking, armed robbery or home invasion and the like. You can see that we act. We listen to what our police tell us they need to be able to do their job, and we act.

Another area that we are acting on is cracking down on illicit tobacco. We have beefed up Victoria’s police search powers to make it easier for them to raid properties quicker and search and seize illicit products from retailers suspected of having links to organised crime. That is important. The Criminal Organisations Control Amendment Act 2024 gives Victoria Police new powers to target individuals involved in serious and organised crime to deter and disrupt organised crime groups, including outlaw motorcycle gangs. This builds on the powers in the Confiscation Amendment (Unexplained Wealth) Act 2024, which deprives crime bosses of the use and enjoyment of their unexplained wealth, because when somebody all of a sudden has a lot of wealth at their disposal, you might you might think, ‘Well, how did you get that?’ There might be a reason for that. It allows the police to look into that and act accordingly.

There are many areas of note. I think Ms Watt might be speaking on this too. I know Ms Watt will have a lot to say on these sorts of matters as well, but just one of note in the 15 seconds I have left: post-and-boast laws. We are making a new offence for those who publish content bragging about their offences in terms of affray, burglary and robbery, so that can be dealt with as a new offence. Despite what Mr Davis says over there, the government is taking strong action on crime, and we oppose this motion.

David Davis interjected.

The ACTING PRESIDENT (Jeff Bourman): From your spot, Mr Davis.

Renee HEATH (Eastern Victoria) (16:19): I rise to speak in support of Mr Davis’s motion 1055 on the increase in crime. I specifically want to address point (1)(d) around concerns in country Victoria. I am going to use this time to highlight some of the experiences of my constituents across the Eastern Victoria Region. Last week I spoke to multiple shop owners in Hastings, and every single one of them cited crime as their key concern. One shop owner said that the first thing she does every single morning is log onto her computer to look at her CCTV and check if her shop has been vandalised. She says it is literally the first thing she thinks of when she wakes up. She was not the only one. As I went business to business, it was a common theme. Another shop owner spoke about – in main street in Hastings – how there has been a rise in vigilante-type behaviour because people have just lost faith in the justice system. I think that it is extremely worrying when people begin to think that they have to take the law into their own hands. What had happened in this particular situation is there had been a crime committed and there were no police around at the time. The next day, when these shop owners came into work there were posters on every single shop with a picture of the offender. This is very concerning, and it just shows that communities feel as if they are being abandoned, they are not safe, and they are taking matters into their own hands. The community there raised a couple of concerns, and these are the ones that they said would really make a difference in their community: they want more police presence, they want tougher penalties for people that commit crimes and they want CCTV, and these are practical solutions that I absolutely support.

Last week, as you would have seen in the media, an IGA store was held up in Officer by youth with machetes. Officer is a beautiful community. It has got a laid-back feel, but things are changing there. Every week our office receives multiple calls and multiple emails about the fear that community members feel. There is huge frustration and outrage over bail conditions. It was extremely frustrating that, after that machete attack, straight away they heard that one of those offenders had been bailed. The community feels that the rights of the offender are often prioritised above the rights of the victim, and I tend to agree. In Victoria there are often people that are arrested, charged and then bailed within 90 minutes.

I have spoken in this place about the prevalence of gangs, particularly around Pakenham, crashing parties, and about windows being kicked in along Lakeside and along Main Street in Pakenham. These things have become commonplace, but we cannot normalise this behaviour. Just because something is common does not mean it is normal, and this sort of behaviour is far from normal.

There have been significant changes that have occurred in Victoria when it comes to law and order. Over the past year, bail has come to this chamber five times, so I do not know how Ms Terpstra can say that bail in Victoria is working when it has been here five times in the past year. If something is working well, you do not have to have a kneejerk reaction to correct it five times. I think that they still have not got it right. There also has been the change to the age of criminal responsibility, something that the Greens are pushing to change even further. They have raised the age from 10 to 12, deeming that children under 12 are incapable of committing a crime. There is no doubt whatsoever that this will improve crime statistics, because an 11-year-old can carry out a crime, but if it is not deemed a crime, it goes into a different category. It does not mean that the communities are safer, it does not mean that houses are not being broken into, it does not mean that less cars are being stolen. What it means is these people are being categorised differently. So rather than a crime, it might be called an incident.

There has been $50 million cut from the police budget, $50 million cut from frontline services, equalling a reduction in manned hours in police stations, fewer patrols and less of a community presence. Under the Allan Labor government more than 1100 Victoria Police (VicPol) positions remain vacant; 43 police stations have either been closed or had their hours reduced since 23 November, and this is due to inadequate staffing resources. We have banned machetes. The Liberal–National parties called for that five times. Five times we called for that and brought legislation, but it was of course rejected by the government and rejected by the government until it was politically a good opportunity for them, and then they backflipped monumentally.

David Davis interjected.

Renee HEATH: That is right, Mr Davis. They were dragged kicking and screaming, and they finally made the change, because machete crimes have become rife in our state. We are in the middle of the three-month amnesty period, where those who have got machetes can give up their weapons, but there has been a lot of concern around how that process is being managed. The Labor government have cut $50 million from VicPol but then they spent $13 million on 40 machete bins across police stations, but we still do not know what sort of change that is going to make.

Here are some crime stats for Victoria. An offence is committed in Victoria every 50 seconds – so by the time that I finish this speech there will have been up to 20 offences committed in Victoria; there is a serious assault that occurs every 29.7 minutes; there is a family violence serious assault happening every 58 minutes; there is an aggravated robbery every 20 hours; and there is a motor vehicle theft every 16 minutes. Youth crime has risen 18 per cent year on year, and that is with the change to the age of criminal responsibility. When crime becomes a culture, which it seems to be becoming in Victoria, it is going to take a multifaceted approach to actually fix it and to root out the issue, because what we see is just the tip of the iceberg.

The research is clear. There is a clear school-to-prison pipeline. Children who do not learn to read properly and who struggle to learn to read cannot flip that and then read to learn. They often end up failing in school and not being at the level that they are meant to be. These kids, according to the research, often find themselves caught in a life of crime. They are far more likely to; it is a huge risk factor. We need to realise that when we fail to educate children properly, we are actually failing that next generation. The reason I bring this up is I believe we have got to be working at both ends. We need to absolutely get out of the flurry that we have been in and look at bail properly. I hope it does not come back a sixth time. We do not even sit that often, so every few times we sit we are bringing in new bail laws. That is just the reality in this place. I believe we have got to get out of that flurry and look at bail properly, once and for all, and stop chasing our tails. We have to figure out a way that we can curb crime from that end, but we also need to look at the risk factors and how our policies affect that in the beginning.

I do not have time to touch on stalking laws, which are in desperate need of reform, I do not have time to talk about emergency management days and how over a thousand days of discounts were given to violent and high-risk offenders across Victorian prisons and I do not have time to talk about how protests are absorbing huge amounts of police resources, so I will just leave it here and say we have an absolutely long way to go. We have got a lot of work to do, and I commend this motion to the house.

Michael GALEA (South-Eastern Metropolitan) (16:29): I also rise to speak on motion 1055, which has been put forward by Mr Davis today. I appreciate the opportunity to speak on what is an important part of government policy and an important community concern, and that is: keeping Victorians safe. At the outset it would be remiss of me not to reflect and take a moment to acknowledge that yesterday was a very dark day in our state. It was a very dark day, and it always is on any day that police officers doing their job to keep us safe are lost in the line of duty. I want to briefly acknowledge their sacrifice, the sacrifice they should not have had to make, in the interests of keeping us all safe. Many in this chamber, in fact probably all, are wearing the blue ribbons today. It is a potent and very sad reminder of what our police face.

Our police do very important work, and I always appreciate the chance to have conversations with them in and around my region about their work, about their priorities, about what is working and what needs more attention. It is one of the reasons in fact, as I discussed yesterday, that I was so pleased to attend a Casey policing forum last week organised by Victoria Police with representatives there from federal, state and local government. It was a very interesting conversation, but most importantly it had input from residents and business owners as well. I noticed Mrs Hermans was interjecting yesterday. She was complaining about not having received an invite. I am not sure what she felt she needed – a handwritten invitation? It was a publicly advertised event, and as a local MP I certainly was happy to take the opportunity. I did not need to be specifically invited.

But I really wanted to take that opportunity to go and hear firsthand from our police and hear firsthand from the community as well. It was a very valuable crime forum and not one of those ridiculous sorts of sham forums that the Leader of the Opposition and some of his Liberal colleagues have been running around and hosting. It was an actual forum with police – the unvarnished truth, the good, the bad, the ugly, what is going well, what is not going well and what more needs to be done. It was very useful. In fact I think I took about half a notebook of notes out of it. I am still working through them and looking at things that we can be doing in that local area in particular to better support our police.

As I touched on yesterday, they covered some very large topics, big topics, starting with family violence. We know that that is still a major driver of crime in the south-east, as it is across the state and well beyond this state’s borders as well. We know the influence that has on then connecting to further offending, with victims of that type of offending then becoming offenders in other ways down the track. It is still a very significant issue. Indeed there are pockets of my electorate that have some of the highest instances of family violence in the state. It is something that I know my colleagues, including in particular the member for Cranbourne, have been very invested in and very focused on. This has included, amongst other things, securing the new Orange Door in Cranbourne to provide that support for people when they need it most. As the police rightly said at the crime forum, it is not just a societal issue, it is a crime issue, and it is a community safety issue that we should all be taking very seriously.

A number of other topics were also raised, including youth offending and including various government reforms, such as the first tranche of the bail reforms which were passed through this year. It certainly seems the impact of these reforms is already starting to make a difference. I know many police officers were very much looking forward to this place passing the bail laws, which we did at around about midnight last night. It was a very good thing for us to be able to do that. They are laws that will make the community safer and will make a difference in terms of both deterrence and keeping people off the street at that highest level of offending.

Without going too much into my contribution from yesterday’s bill, I will make the point that we know that, especially with young offenders, the most effective way to make the community safer is by providing those better pathways for them, providing those detours off the path to crime as early as possible. We know that for the majority of them it works, whether it is the programs that I talked about yesterday that are run by Victoria Police, whether it is the youth crime prevention program, whether it is any of those measures run by official authorities or whether it is run by community groups on the ground. Nas Recovery Centre is an outstanding one in the Cranbourne area as well that does incredible work in building that community strength, in building that community power, so people who are at risk of falling into a life of crime do not do so and are able to build their lives better.

These are the positive stories that are worth mentioning as well. But as we do so we also acknowledge that there is that smaller contingent of offenders who will not take up the very many opportunities that are given to them. And for those offenders it is appropriate that we have bail laws in place which appropriately reflect the community’s expectations. The community has a right to feel safe. They have a right to feel safe at their home. They have a right to feel safe going out to the shops. They have a right to feel safe at work as well. It is an important thing, and that bail reform that we passed through yesterday is going to help to achieve that. It is a very significant piece of legislation and it does complement the other. As Dr Heath said, or was maybe complaining about, the very many bits of legislation that we have put through in the past year in particular focused on community safety.

I will come back to some further legislation that will be coming as well, but I do want to pick up on, firstly, something that Dr Heath made mention of in her contribution: this apparent $50 million cut which was affecting police resourcing. I do not know if this is intentional or she is just unfamiliar with the facts, but it may interest Dr Heath to know that the $50 million she refers to was a temporary time-limited measure as part of an enterprise bargaining agreement called the patients in bargaining allowance. It was always due to come to an end. It came in and it came to an end at the time it was scheduled to do so. It had nothing to do with police resourcing. So to infer that the government is proactively making these cuts to police resourcing is actually blatantly false and could actually not be any further from the truth.

We are continuing to invest in that resourcing for the police. But we do know that, as with other jurisdictions around Australia and around the Western world, police forces are struggling to recruit. I do take this opportunity as well to echo the sentiments at the Casey crime forum that the police finished on to say that it can be a very rewarding career, and I very much encourage anyone who wishes to put their hand up to help make Victoria a safer place to consider a career in the police force, with the very many different opportunities. They do from time to time of course run recruitment campaigns, and I became aware that apparently the Queensland police force was also helping us down here when they accidentally ran a recruitment campaign on Melbourne trams. So it was very good to see, and thank you to QPol for helping to boost police numbers in Victoria.

Another thing that I was quite surprised to hear last night in the chamber was Ms Lovell doing an adjournment on a local policing matter and raising a police station issue in I believe Epping on this very matter and on this issue of resourcing, saying that we are struggling to fill these police roles and making some wild assertions, firstly, predicting the station may be closing altogether or may be reducing its hours, and then saying that that would mean that people would have police not able to respond to them as quickly. I think it just goes to the very point that for a party that claim to be all about law and order, they apparently have no idea how the police actually operate. It is not like the old days of the 1950s where police officers are sitting around in the station waiting for something to do. They are out on the road every day. They are in their units, they are going around doing patrols, whether they are within 500 metres of a station or 50 kilometres of it. They are out there, and that is the operational model which they use. And for members such as Ms Lovell to apparently not be aware of that is quite surprising.

David Davis interjected.

Michael GALEA: I am curious as to why, as you come in here to proclaim yourselves as the party of law and order, you would be so unaware of how the police in this state actually operate. It is an important issue. And as I say, it is really important for anyone who does have that interest and the skill set to seriously consider a career in Victoria Police. We know there are challenges and certainly we know that there are dangers, but it is for many a very rewarding career. I would like to particularly thank the officers that came out to the Casey forum last week. It was a really interesting session, and I would like to thank the residents as well. I do have much more to say but my time is up, so I will leave my remarks there.

Georgie CROZIER (Southern Metropolitan) (16:39): I rise to speak to motion 1055:

That this house:

(1) notes:

(a) the recent serious and violent home invasions across metropolitan Melbourne, including home invasions in Kew;

(b) the aggravated retail burglaries in retail outlets, including supermarkets, across Melbourne;

(c) comments of Mr Anthony Heraghty, CEO of the Super Retail Group;

(d) concern regarding community safety in country Victoria;

(e) the lack of police resources available in our suburbs; and

(2) expresses legitimate concern at the failure of the Allan Labor government to control this serious situation putting many Victorians at risk.

I think that last line is particularly pertinent, because there are many people who do not feel safe. They do not feel safe in their homes, they do not feel safe in their communities, they do not feel safe at work and they do not feel safe in their streets. That is the reality of how we are living in Victoria. That is the reality of what has happened to this state under the Allan Labor government – a decline in community safety and in the perception of the government looking after us. I say that because they have failed. They will talk up a big game, but they have failed, because every day, every night we see in our news stories about home invasions, carjackings, firebombs. These are crimes that were never as prevalent as they are now, and I am shocked at the extent of the crimes and the prevalence of the crimes. That is why this motion goes to some of the very deep and serious issues that need to be debated in this place.

The violent home invasions across metropolitan Melbourne, including home invasions in Kew – and it does not matter if it is Tarneit, Toorak, Kew, Cardinia, wherever it is, Brighton, Broadmeadows – are across this city and are hugely concerning. But I think the Kew home invasion that this really is referring to is that terrible situation where just a couple of days ago, and I am reading from a report here from the ABC from Monday 18 August:

A man and two teenagers have been charged with breaking into a family home in Melbourne’s east and repeatedly stabbing a father multiple times after forcing his wife into a bedroom with her children.

That is what I am talking about. The severity of these crimes – they are horrific. Many of you have heard me speak before of that terrifying moment when you are in your home and an aggravated burglary is occurring because I have experienced that – I experienced that last year.

On Saturday I was at a lunch supporting women in football, actually, speaking at that. I spoke to someone who was a great supporter of this club. That very night he had six young people in his property roaming around, on camera and so brazen; they did not care a hoot. He told me that last Sunday he was so terrified and his wife was absolutely petrified. The police were brilliant. They came very quickly – like they did for me as well, I have got to say. They were fantastic; I cannot fault them. While I am on the police I want to extend my thoughts – like all in this chamber, I am sure – to them with the very difficult time that our police force is experiencing at the moment and recognise the extraordinary work that they do day in, day out. When you need them, like I needed them and like this friend needed them in the early hours of Sunday morning – the frustration of the police when they are talking about trying to deal with this and magistrates just let these people out.

A few years ago when we raised the issue about youth gangs it was Labor who said, ‘Youth gangs are non-existent. They’re just groups of affiliated young people.’ Look where we are now. These are youth gangs that are rampaging through shopping centres, terrifying shoppers, terrifying those people that work in those retail outlets. If you look at the numbers, the crime statistics, that have just escalated so incredibly high across the state, there is no denying that we have a crime crisis in this state and people do not feel safe – they do not feel safe. The first priority of any government is for their community to feel safe. This government has failed on that fundamental element of government. They do not feel safe because of what is occurring, as I said, in our streets, in our homes, in our communities. This motion goes in large part to that which is reflected by comments made from those that are also concerned, those people that are looking after their people. I am referring to part (c) of the motion:

comments of Mr Anthony Heraghty, CEO of the Super Retail Group …

They are talking about the disproportionate increase in Victoria around these crimes that are occurring in their stores. I think they refer to the Rebel stores where clothes are constantly being targeted and where these youth gangs come in with knives and machetes. While I am on machetes, we have got the machete bins that are out there. They are covered with barbecue covers – you know, $13 million for a few machete bins at $370,000-odd each. These figures are extraordinary, and that is just so symbolic of this government. They have got no clue how to manage taxpayers money. They are just appalling in their disregard for how taxpayers money should be spent. It should be spent wisely.

Ryan Batchelor interjected.

Georgie CROZIER: Well, Mr Batchelor, you interject; it is your government that has failed every single Victorian. $13 million on a few bins – I am talking about the cost of the bins.

Michael Galea: On a point of order, Acting President, we know that the Liberals are not very good at maths, but Ms Crozier is ignoring the fact that the majority of that funding is going to community resourcing, police resourcing and community education. To say that is the unit cost per bin is grossly inaccurate.

The ACTING PRESIDENT (Jeff Bourman): Mr Galea, that is not a point of order. The point of order is overruled. Ms Crozier to continue unassisted.

Georgie CROZIER: Labor are very testy about this because they know that their communities are suffering. Mr Batchelor’s area is my area. You should stand up for your constituents a bit more in Brighton, Toorak, Malvern, Kew, Caulfield and Albert Park. Everywhere it is out of control. Oakleigh, Bentleigh – firebombings, carjackings and home invasions are rife.

Members interjecting.

Georgie CROZIER: Mr McIntosh! Labor are very testy. They come in. They do not even speak from their places. These people have lost control of crime in this state and our community safety. This is no laughing matter; this is really serious. This is a really serious issue. This is a responsibility of government, and these backbenchers are laughing about this very serious issue. There are people that cannot live in their homes who feel terrified. There are women who do not feel safe in their homes.

Michael Galea: On a point of order, Acting President, I am quite obviously not laughing about that. Ms Crozier, the bizarre comment where you were equating Mr McIntosh interjecting from outside of his seat with our attitude to crime was outrageous.

The ACTING PRESIDENT (Jeff Bourman): That is not a point of order, but it is a good time to remind everybody that it would be good for Ms Crozier to be heard unassisted and that interjections are unruly.

Georgie CROZIER: As I said, this government has failed every single Victorian. The community deserve to feel safe, whether they are in metropolitan Melbourne or whether they are in regional Victoria. Right across this state there is a crime crisis. It is spiralling further out of control. We are known as the crime capital of this country. We are known as the protest capital of this country. They are not enviable labels that anyone should be proud of, they are appalling. It is a disgrace how far we have sunk because of this government’s failure, and these unenviable labels that we have are just appalling, to say the least. I stand by those people who are speaking out about the concerns about where we sit in this country with these disgraceful circumstances that we find ourselves in. I would say that this motion, where it expresses legitimate concern –

The ACTING PRESIDENT (Jeff Bourman): Ms Crozier, your time has expired.

Ryan BATCHELOR (Southern Metropolitan) (16:49): I am pleased to rise to speak on the motion today about crime and community safety. I think it is worth reflecting that it is disappointing that Ms Crozier in her contribution seemed to have not listened to the quite significant debate that we had in this chamber yesterday debating some very serious legislation to improve community safety through our second tranche of the bail bills. I made a contribution at length yesterday and I made a contribution in the last sitting week about community safety and the important ways in which the Allan Labor government is both listening to the concerns of the community about crime in our communities, particularly about high-harm crime, serious crime, in people’s homes – things like aggravated burglaries, home invasions and carjacking – and acting. It is not just about listening to the victims, as important as that is; it is about doing something with it, not just making spurious allegations across the chamber about matters and not taking these issues seriously. This government, the Labor government, takes these issues seriously. To suggest, as Ms Crozier did in her contribution just now, that government members are not out talking to the community and listening to our constituents is, frankly, offensive. I understand that she legitimately feels very strongly about these issues for some very personal reasons, and we understand and respect that. But I think it is taking a complete step too far to suggest that members on this side of the chamber are not listening to our communities and are not talking to our communities on a regular and consistent basis about the legitimate concerns that they have, because we are.

I made the remarks about what I have been doing in the region that Ms Crozier and I jointly represent – over I would have said recent months, but it has been longer than that – in talking with residents who have been the victims of serious high-harm crime. I spend time regularly talking with the excellent people at the Bayside Neighbourhood Watch, who are an excellent conduit for feedback from members of the community to me, as a representative of the governing party in the Southern Metropolitan Region. We take that feedback and we use that feedback. The response that we have had from the community and the concerns of the community, that the government has listened to, I would have said were acted upon as recently as last night, but it was the early hours of this morning, when this chamber passed the second tranche of our bail reforms. It was not even yesterday that we did that; it was earlier today.

If the opposition wants to downplay the work that the government is doing, that is on them. But we are taking this issue seriously. We are making sure that our police have the resources that they need to tackle the crime in our community. We have invested significantly in supporting our police force, providing them with the resources that they need. We have been providing them with the powers that they are needing, and we have been making sure that in the laws that surround things like bail, in the issues that bail decision-makers need to take into consideration in making determinations about whether alleged offenders should get bail before their court dates, community safety is an overarching priority – a principle for bail decision-makers. We have ensured that with high-harm crimes there are tougher tests to get bail and that in the serious cases there are presumptions in different ways.

We had some peculiar contributions from Ms Crozier, who seems to be critical of the government’s actions in banning machetes. She seems to be critical of the measures that the government is taking, with the installation of receptacles at police stations to allow individuals to safely take their machetes off the streets, through the bin and amnesty program that it is running. I do not know why the Liberal Party is so critical of action to get machetes off our streets. They might think it is a joke; we think it is pretty serious. The Minister for Consumer Affairs is exercising special powers, and the Minister for Police is working with Victoria Police to make sure that we have got the facilities that we need so that Victorians can safely surrender their machetes from 1 September, the date that was in the legislation that this chamber passed to ban these dangerous items several months ago.

The investment that we are making – contrary to the position that Ms Crozier has put in her contribution – is not just for those disposal bins themselves. It is also, as the ban and the amnesty kick in, going to include a public awareness campaign, funding to support retailer education, the manufacturing and installation of the safe disposal bins for the machetes, mechanisms in place so that we can securely collect the machetes out of those bins and dispose of them properly, and the cataloguing and safe destruction of the items that are handed in. If Ms Crozier and the Liberal Party do not support that, then they cannot be taken seriously on issues of community safety. They cannot be taken seriously when they come to the chamber and make those sorts of outlandish claims, because the safety of the community is something that this government takes incredibly seriously.

As I said, in the early hours of this morning we were passing the second tranche of our tough new bail laws. In March we did the first round, and they are working. The number of inmates who are on remand awaiting their date in court is up since those changes were made, particularly for high-harm crime and associated areas. The second tranche of the reforms, which passed the Parliament in the early hours of this morning, will deliver the toughest bail test in the nation, targeting serious offending like aggravated carjacking, armed robbery or home invasion, and the laws will make sure that the bail decision-makers put community safety first.

As I said, we have made significant investments to support the actions of Victoria Police – a $4.5 billion record investment into Victoria Police to ensure that they are equipped with the resources and the powers that they need. We have added resources so there can be more than 3600 new police officers on the street to keep Victorians safe. In addition to that, we have invested almost a billion dollars to deliver new and upgraded police stations across the state and to support the investment in critical police infrastructure.

We are engaging with members of the community to make sure that crimes that are of significant harm are being targeted. We know that both the on-the-ground frontline policing activity but also the intelligence work that is going in to try and disrupt the criminal networks are underway and yielding results. We support and thank members of Victoria Police, I should say particularly those who are continuing to be on the front line in what has been a very, very difficult 24 hours for Victoria Police. We do take community safety very seriously and we will continue to do so.

Melina BATH (Eastern Victoria) (16:59): I rise to endorse the motion moved by my colleague Mr David Davis, motion 1055. It is a very serious issue and serious topic that we are debating today in relation to violent home invasions in metropolitan Melbourne, and I certainly know that is not limited to metropolitan Melbourne. It highlights an example in Kew and aggravated retail burglaries in retail outlets, including supermarkets, and also the increased comments in relation to retail crime. A concern that we have on this side is in relation to community safety in country Victoria and a lack of police resources in our suburbs. We want to see an improvement in this situation. Before I do that I want to just put on record my sincere condolences to our Victorian police members and the families of those dear and beloved service personnel who lost their lives yesterday morning. The devastation that this is causing is not only in the region of Porepunkah but reverberating right across the state. We acknowledge the pain of people who lose loved ones in such an extreme and violent circumstance. We wish with all our heart that there can be healing in the knowledge that Victoria stands side by side with our members in blue.

I would like to start to correct the record. It certainly sounds like there has been a little bit of communications tennis in this house today, because we have heard various statements refuted and then I may well refute them back. Speaking to knife crime, indeed in my region I am seeing it more. Australian retailers have recorded a 66 per cent year-on-year increase in retail crime compared to last year. Unfortunately, Victoria is tracking in all the wrong metrics. This data is collected by Auror. It is a global institute, a global agency. It is used not only across Australia and New Zealand but in North America and the United Kingdom, so it is to be believed. The category that Victoria is doing so poorly in is, compared to last year, Victoria is leading the states in terms of threatening events – and this is in the Australian retailers. Victoria is up 52 per cent. That translates to a lot of fear, a lot of concern, a lot of aggravation and a lot of people feeling less and less safe. Serious events in Victoria are up 38 per cent, and these include the use of knives, blades – in the retail environment – hammers, scissors and box cutters. Used in a violent fashion, they can create all sorts of lasting trauma not only in the victims, the retailers, but the centre in which that is occurring and the community in which that is occurring. I put on record again my concern for those people.

If we look at that, we have seen in my own region, in my own electorate, alleged stabbings this year in Morwell and Warragul. We have seen our small business owners frustrated and concerned by this. I did a walk only a month or so ago down the main street of Morwell with my colleague Martin Cameron, and Martin Cameron and I spoke with shop owners and business owners very concerned about this knife crime and antisocial behaviour. There are layers upon layers of this, but it is happening in our regions.

Part of this motion goes to community concern in regional Victoria. Let us look at some of those crime stats for June – so the most recent. There will be more coming out. We now have a criminal offence occurring every 50.3 seconds in this state. We see youth crime, motor vehicles being stolen – I can give you examples that are happening in towns close to my home as well – aggravated burglary and the like. On the percentages in the rise of crime, Bass Coast is up 13 per cent, Baw Baw19 per cent, East Gippsland 9 per cent, Latrobe 12 per cent, South Gippsland 11 per cent, Wellington 18 per cent and Cardinia 32 per cent – in that fantastic area in my electorate.

If I have time, I will continue this litany of crime increases happening right across the electorate. Just finishing off on that, Bass Coast has a 61 per cent increase in supermarket crime and a 53 per cent increase in other retail settings. Cardinia, an 84 per cent increase in petrol crime. I am sure my colleague Dr Heath and I have both been speaking with those fantastic people in the town of Lang Lang in relation to the fact that their fantastic little police station, right in the heart of town, is open only a few hours a week. This lack of oversight, this lack of presence in these smaller towns is a concern. Those officers are being asked to backfill in our metropolitan stations where there is a dearth. We know that there are around 1100 vacancies and around 700 long-term sick leaves in our police force. This again are concerning. The reality of this is that people do not feel safe in their homes, they do not feel as safe as they did 10 years ago, and it is quite frightening.

In relation to machetes and in terms of refuting the comments from the other side, the Liberals and Nationals in early May this year introduced a private members bill to outlaw machetes on our streets. We introduced that and, hey presto, the Allan government knocked it back and said, ‘No, there’s nothing happening here. It’s a bit of a problem.’ A few months later it introduced its own bill, but we still have a delay in that machetes will not be banned until September. If Labor had been on the front foot, they could have been banned much, much earlier. I will just make some comments about machetes because we see the costings. I heard from the speaker before me about the whole rationale and that $13 million for 40 steel bins equates to over $300,000 a bin. I take a very sensible person, the member for Narracan –

A member interjected.

Melina BATH: It has hit a nerve, I might say; it has hit a great, big nerve. My colleague Mr Wayne Farnham, the member for Narracan, has gone out and sourced what it would take, in a professional capacity, to produce a properly fabricated steel bin that could be used – all of the rest; he did that work – and it was around that $10,000 mark. So we see –

John Berger: He would be the last bloke I’d get a quote from for 10 grand.

Melina BATH: I will take up that interjection. It is quite unparliamentary to start bagging people out when they are not in the house, so I suggest that you do not do it.

The Allan government refuses to take responsibility for that crisis it has created. We have seen the government water down our 2013 bail reform. We saw them water it down in 2016. They then watered it down again in 2023, and now they are looking at, as I said yesterday, the twostep dance on this. People’s lives, property, homes and wellbeing are at stake here. I think this is a reasonable motion; it does not go too extreme. It is just calling out the truth and calling on the government to take the situation seriously and reduce that risk to our Victorian population so that they can feel safe sleeping in their beds at night.

Tom McINTOSH (Eastern Victoria) (17:09): Throughout these contributions we have heard what you would expect from the Liberals: negativity and naysaying and I think some misquoting as well. But community safety is the Allan Labor government’s top priority. All Victorians have a right to be safe and feel safe in their communities. We are backing Victoria Police with our record investment of over $4.5 billion to ensure our police are equipped with the resources and tougher powers they need to keep our community safe. We have more than 3600 new police officers on the beat to keep Victorians safe, and we have invested almost $1 billion to deliver new and upgraded police stations across our state. Our government continues to invest in critical police infrastructure. There have been no cuts to Victoria’s police budget. The government works with Victoria Police, not against them. We deliver the tools and resources they need to keep all Victorians safe, unlike those opposite, who cut $100 million from the VicPol budget and failed to fund a single additional officer. We know they did not do much in their last four years, but not only did they not act, they took the state backwards. We are backing Victoria Police to keep Victorians safe. It is Victoria’s police who are out every day at all hours in all weather patrolling our community and keeping Victorians safe.

We know Victoria Police are making record numbers of arrests – over 75,000 in the last 12 months alone – and our government is committed to supporting Victoria Police in their efforts by ensuring they have the resources and the laws they need. Particularly today, as many of us have indeed, I want to acknowledge Victoria’s police and their families. It is an incredible commitment they make to us day in, day out, but in recent days with lives lost we have seen the commitment they make to our state and the work they do so that all of us can have a quality, safe life in our state. We give our condolences for those that have lost their lives.

Regarding the machete amnesty and knife crime, we are calling on Victorians to do the right thing and hand in their machetes during the amnesty. The amnesty is just one part of our plan to end knife crime in Victoria. From 1 September machetes will be banned in Victoria. Anyone caught with a machete without a valid exemption or approval after will face up to two years in jail or a fine of over $47,000. Every week VicPol are using their strengthened stop-and-search powers to seize knives off criminals. Our retail ban has choked the supply of machetes across the state, with over 98 per cent of retailers doing the right thing. We are also partnering with major retailers who want to get rid of their excess stock.

Regarding bail, the Allan Labor government is listening to the community and taking action to deliver the toughest bail laws in the country to prevent reoffending and keep our community safe. In March we passed the first round of our new bail laws, ensuring community safety was the overarching consideration in all bail decisions, and these changes are working. Remand numbers are up by 4 per cent across the system. But we have been clear there is more work to do, and that is why we introduced a second tranche of legislation to deliver on our commitment to Victorians. As part of the second tranche of reforms which passed Parliament early this morning, we will deliver the toughest bail test in the nation, targeting serious offending like aggravated carjacking, armed robbery or home invasion and ensuring that our bail laws meet community expectations and put their safety first. Only the Allan Labor government can be trusted to keep Victoria safe. Our government has taken strong action to crack down on illegal behaviour and has given Victoria Police the power that it has asked for.

When it comes to getting knives off Victorian streets, the Terrorism (Community Protection) and Control of Weapons Amendment Act 2025 allows police to search and seize weapons without a warrant, with less notice and for longer periods of time. We have changed the law to allow the Chief Commissioner of Police to declare a location a designated search area for up to six months instead of 12 hours. This allows police to act on intelligence about potential violence and weapons for much longer.

The Criminal Organisations Control Amendment Act 2024 gives Victoria Police new powers to target individuals in serious and organised crime and deter and disrupt organised crime groups, including outlaw motorcycle gangs. We have powers for improving oversight of the private security industry under the Private Security and County Court Amendment Act 2024. We have given the Chief Commissioner of Police the power to issue a code of conduct for private security employers and workers. We are making sure that the industry is safe for workers, because we know the vital role private security plays in the places where we meet, learn and play.

With regard to post and boast, criminals who share their disturbing crimes on social media will face extra jail time under our new laws. The new offence targets those who publish content bragging about their involvement in serious crimes such as affray, burglary, robbery, car theft, carjacking, home invasions and violent disorder. This includes anyone encouraging or facilitating these crimes. There is no room to hide behind the ringleader. These laws respond to the dangerous trend among young people chasing clout on TikTok and Snapchat about their heinous crimes, which encourages copycat offending, retraumatises victims and deeply disturbs the community.

The Allan Labor government has taken the next step to drive down youth crime and keep Victorians safe, handing courts an extra tool to ensure those who are granted bail get back on the right path or face tough consequences. Through the $34.4 million electronic monitoring trial the Children’s Court and the Supreme Court now have the power to impose electronic monitoring and intensive supervised bail for young people in the metropolitan area as a part of their bail conditions. The trial builds on the government’s tough new bail laws, which put the community, as I have discussed, at the centre of all bail decisions and make remand for younger people no longer an option of last resort. As I am running out of time, I will leave my remarks there.

David DAVIS (Southern Metropolitan) (17:16): This motion is a very thoughtful and modest motion. It points to what is a developing and serious problem – a problem that has beset so many Melbourne suburbs now, so many parts of the country and so many of our retail and other outlets. Supermarkets are being hit. This is a serious, serious problem. At its roots this is certainly partially at least due to the lack of police resources, but it is broader than that. Nonetheless we ask for the expression of legitimate concern at the failure of the Allan Labor government to control this serious situation, putting many Victorians at risk.

Nobody can deny that the crime rate has gone up. Nobody can deny that the seriousness of the crimes has got worse, the home invasions have got more serious and the retail issues have got worse and worse. This is a very serious situation we find ourselves in, and we need to take it seriously. It is time the Allan Labor government did.

Council divided on motion:

Ayes (13): Melina Bath, Jeff Bourman, Gaelle Broad, Georgie Crozier, David Davis, Moira Deeming, Renee Heath, Ann-Marie Hermans, David Limbrick, Wendy Lovell, Joe McCracken, Nick McGowan, Rikkie-Lee Tyrrell

Noes (17): Ryan Batchelor, John Berger, Lizzie Blandthorn, Katherine Copsey, Enver Erdogan, David Ettershank, Anasina Gray-Barberio, Shaun Leane, Sarah Mansfield, Tom McIntosh, Rachel Payne, Aiv Puglielli, Harriet Shing, Ingrid Stitt, Lee Tarlamis, Sonja Terpstra, Gayle Tierney

Motion negatived.