Wednesday, 18 February 2026

 Gaelle BROAD (Northern Victoria) (10:20): I move:

That this house:

(1)   notes:

(a) that the Rotting from the Top report on corruption by Mr Geoffrey Watson SC, tendered to Queensland’s Commission of Inquiry into the CFMEU and Misconduct in the Construction Industry includes redacted sections;

(b) the significant cost of corruption to the Victorian taxpayers outlined in Mr Watson’s report;

(c) that Mr Watson has said that had the Victorian government acted earlier much of this cost could have been avoided;

(2)   in accordance with standing order 10.01, requires the Leader of the Government to table in the Council, within three weeks of the house agreeing to this resolution, the following documents:

(a) warnings or advice from the Department of Transport and Planning, staff in the ministerial office and/or external agencies provided to the Hon. Jacinta Allan MP, now Premier but previously the Minister for Transport Infrastructure, from 1 January 2020;

(b) emails, including attachments, between the then Minister for Transport Infrastructure, her office and the Department of Transport and Planning concerning the CFMEU and corruption from 1 January 2020; and

(c) full briefs including attachments of BMIN-1-23-1378 and BMIN-1-23-3809 concerning CFMEU corruption provided to the then Minister for Transport Infrastructure, the Hon. Jacinta Allan MP.

I am pleased to support this motion, on behalf of the Nationals, put forward by David Davis. It is so important that we have transparency, and that is what this motion is calling for: it is calling for transparency when it comes to the CFMEU issue. This is very significant, what we are seeing happening in this state.

A number of movies come to mind when I consider this matter. The first would be The Godfather, because the types of things that we have been seeing happening on Big Build sites involve over $15 billion going to the hands of criminals. There have been reports of fraudulent shifts, ghost shifts, supervisors giving drugs to workers, top salaries going to criminals, government cars being used and strippers performing shows onsite. This is appalling. I have been contacted by so many people who are furious that this has happened under the government’s watch, under the Premier’s watch.

An article from the Age – and this refers to The Godfather-type theme – talks about Watson and his report and what he said. It says ‘From there the maths is simple’, so he is talking about settling on a rough estimate of 15 per cent, describing it as ‘not unreasonable’ and ‘probably conservative’ – that is talking about the $15 billion:

From there the maths is simple – the leadership of the CFMEU has cost the Victorian taxpayer something like $15 billion. There is another point to this – as will be seen, much of that $15 billion has been poured directly into the hands of criminals and organised crime gangs …

That has been reported in the Age. Another movie that comes to mind, I would have to say, is Dirty Rotten Scoundrels. This is reflected well in an article that Jeff Kennett wrote that was published yesterday:

Labor, under Daniel Andrews, won the Victorian election in 2014.

He immediately, as he had committed to, tore up the East West Link contract, costing Victorians $1.1bn, for which we got nothing.

Money totally lost.

Andrews argued he did so because the project was not justified on a benefit-cost basis. Rubbish.

He was preparing to rip up the AWU/CFMEU protocol and enrich the CFMEU with major government work.

In 2015, Jacinta Allan, as Transport Minister, broke the union agreement and allocated work on the Metro Tunnel to the CFMEU.

Then she allocated the work for the Rail Crossing Removals to the CFMEU.

Jacinta Allan’s husband was a senior officer at the CFMEU at the time.

Since then, all major infrastructure projects have been awarded to the CFMEU.

It goes on to talk about other issues, but I think it is very revealing of what has been happening in this state.

Another movie I thought of when thinking about this issue is Titanic. It makes me think about what happened with the Commonwealth Games. I remember raising concerns with Senator Bridget McKenzie in Bendigo in April prior to the cancellation of the Commonwealth Games, saying, ‘Where is the money coming from? Who’s paying for this and having some accountability?’ At the time –

Ryan Batchelor: On a point of order, President, this is a very narrow documents motion about the matters before us. I am not sure that a reference to the Commonwealth Games is within the scope.

The PRESIDENT: It is a narrow motion. As first speaker Mrs Broad has some latitude, but people that follow with their contributions can respond to the first speaker’s contribution.

Gaelle BROAD: I just am wondering if history is perhaps repeating itself here, because at the time the Premier was like, ‘No. All good, all good,’ and soon after that the Commonwealth Games were cancelled, and now we have the Premier again saying, ‘All good. Nothing to see here. The estimates are not accurate,’ but they are not willing to proceed to an inquiry.

Another movie that comes to mind is Happy Gilmore, because certainly what we have seen in this state is massive debt and huge taxes being put onto people by this government. A massive debt has been racked up – over $190 billion – and new taxes have been introduced to pay for that debt, yet here we have the facts on the table that billions of dollars have gone into the hands of criminals under this government.

So I will think of another movie, The Big Short, because that movie talks about no accountability and concerns being raised, and I think that is what this motion is all about: it is holding the government to account for what has happened in this state. We know that the request for these documents is important, but what is needed is a royal commission, because getting to the bottom of what has happened in this state is so important. To quote from the Australian Financial Review:

To offer a real diagnosis of the conditions that gave rise to this corruption – and what the government should have been doing – will require a royal commission-style inquiry. One with powers to compel witnesses and materials, including from government.

…

Ironically, the need for a transparent inquiry arises precisely because of the denials and the refusal to review the government’s own actions and mistakes.

So there we have it. I think it is very clear this motion is needed and these documents are needed, because right now we see that there has been no transparency and we cannot have this continue. An inquiry is needed to make sure that the facts are put on the table for public transparency, because at the end of the day this is Victorian taxpayer money. The government are elected to manage that money and they do not seem to care, and at the end of the day Victorians are paying the price.

 Ryan BATCHELOR (Southern Metropolitan) (10:26): I am pleased to rise to speak on the motion that was supposed to be moved by Mr Davis but sadly he was not here. It was instead moved by Ms Broad, some of whose contribution to the debate it seems was a recitation of greatest hits from her local Blockbuster in the early 2000s. Nevertheless the matters that are actually being requested here are significant and they are serious. I do not know whether it is just because Mr Davis let her down and was not in the chamber to give the lead speech on this documents motion – I do not know what he was doing – and she was left in the lurch, but I would have thought that the seriousness of allegations of illegal activity on building sites is something that warranted perhaps a slightly more serious contribution in the chamber today, because allegations of illegal behaviour, wherever they occur in Victoria – whether they occur on our streets or whether they occur on worksites – should be referred to Victoria Police. That is exactly what this Labor government, upon receipt of allegations of illegal activities – upon receipt of allegations of the activities of particularly organised crime on our building sites – has done.

Operation Hawk was established by Victoria Police in July of 2024 specifically and proactively to target organised crime linked to the construction industry, with a transition to a taskforce under the same name a bit later. The taskforce is focused on assessing new intelligence and evidence relating to allegations of criminal behaviour connected to the construction industry, a matter that the government takes seriously and Victoria Police is taking it seriously, and the government has provided Victoria Police with the support and resources that it needs to ensure that these investigations can take place. We have had just under 70 charges be laid as a result of the operations of Taskforce Hawk examining behaviour in the construction industry, including for offences like fraud, threats of arson, threats to kill and assaults, and approximately 17 alleged offenders have been charged. I do not want to go into that in any more detail given those matters would be before the courts at some point and we want to make sure that the interests of justice are served, but what it does demonstrate is the seriousness with which the government is taking action in this area.

The government has also, through legislation that has been brought before this Parliament, taken seriously and given new support, resources and powers to deal with criminal organisations. Reforms to the Criminal Organisations Control Amendment Act 2024 have been passed through this place, including things like the changes to the unlawful association scheme, which lowered the threshold for police to issue an unlawful association order to stop criminals associating with each other and to discourage new people from joining. The previous operation of those laws was too high and difficult to enforce. There was also the introduction of serious crime prevention orders to allow police to apply to the courts to impose a range of restrictions on someone who has or is likely to help someone else participate in serious criminal activity, and banning the display of various insignia.

What you have from the government is when allegations of illegal and criminal activity are raised, there are referrals to Victoria Police, and resourcing and support for Victoria Police, with Victoria Police setting up a specific operation and then taskforce to deal with these issues and make arrests. As I said, more than 17 offenders have been identified and nearly 70 charges have been laid as a result of those investigations. On the other side, we have got the government bringing into and passing through this Parliament laws to strengthen controls on criminal organisations, to ensure that Victoria Police have the resources and the laws that they need to deal with serious organised crime, to make sure that unlawful association laws are strengthened and that serious crime prevention orders can be put in place. This government is taking allegations of illegal activity, wherever they may be but including on construction sites, very seriously indeed.

 David DAVIS (Southern Metropolitan) (10:32): This is a narrow documents motion that seeks certain documents concerning the now Premier, but particularly in the time period when the Honourable Jacinta Allan was Minister for Transport Infrastructure. It seeks warnings or advice from the Department of Transport and Planning and staff in the ministerial office or external agencies provided from 1 January 2020. It also seeks emails and attachments between the then Minister for Transport Infrastructure, her office and the Department of Transport and Planning concerning the CFMEU and corruption from the same date. It seeks a couple of specific briefings that we know exist, and we know they exist through freedom-of-information requests. We know that they relate to two documents that were sent to the Minister for Transport Infrastructure in her official capacity by email. We know that the two documents have been refused an FOI, because they are said to contain personal information. The two documents total 27 pages in length, they concern corruption and the CFMEU and they are official documents sent to the Minister for Transport Infrastructure at the time about corruption and the CFMEU. The question is: what did those documents advise? Why will the government not provide those documents? Why should the community not see those documents and see the advice or the warnings or the information that was provided to the then Minister for Transport Infrastructure in official briefings from the department to her, containing as attachments the two documents, the 27 secret pages of advice or material presented to the Minister for Transport Infrastructure in her official capacity as Minister for Transport Infrastructure, concerning corruption and the CFMEU.

These, as I say, are very basic steps to seek the information to understand what steps were advised, or indeed if there was not advice – that is telling too. If there was advice, what was the nature of that advice? Was it heeded by the then Minister for Transport Infrastructure or was it ignored or otherwise rejected?

These are legitimate questions. Given what has come out in recent days – the Watson report and the material at the Queensland royal commission – the question of a royal commission is a very legitimate one. We will debate that later in the day, and that is obviously a conclusion that many, including Robert Redlich, have come to. But that is for later in the day. This is really a very simple motion about those documents that went to the Honourable Jacinta Allan, as Minister for Transport Infrastructure, in the period after 2020. I think the chamber and the community have every right to see these documents, to understand the decision-making around the documents and to understand whether Jacinta Allan in her capacity at the time made the appropriate decisions to resource IBAC, to strengthen IBAC and to refer in certain ways. All of these are questions that I think will be elucidated by these documents.

As I said, if one conclusion is that there is a whole tranche of documents that do not exist because there was no advice, that is an issue in and of itself, and I think that is something that the community would want to know and understand. I think it is very much in the public interest for these documents to be made public and for the Leader of the Government to provide these documents to the chamber. As the report from Mr Watson SC makes very clear, the cost to Victorians is enormous. The cost to Victorian taxpayers is enormous. Every step we can take to root out this corruption, to expose it and to get transparency is in the state’s interest.

 Tom McINTOSH (Eastern Victoria) (10:37): The government have zero tolerance for any sort of illegal behaviour, and we support the independent administrator’s comments that any allegation should be referred to the AFP, Victoria Police, the Fair Work Commission or any other relevant enforcement agencies and regulators for investigation. As is convention with short doc motions, the government will not be opposing the motion. Already we have seen, through Taskforce Hawk, the results of 70 charges laid against 15 alleged offenders. The government has responded swiftly off the back of the Wilson review to the allegations of criminal and intimidatory activity. Already the Wage Theft Amendment Bill 2025 has been legislated, with our commitment to create a new complaints referral service within the Workforce Inspectorate Victoria. This complaints service is up and running and provides a safe and effective forum for anyone to raise complaints or concerns about corruption on government sites. It also enables complaints to be made confidentially, investigated and referred to relevant enforcement bodies where appropriate.

We have also passed amendments through the Labour Hire Legislation Amendment (Licensing) Bill 2025 to help target criminal and unlawful conduct in the construction sector, particularly those that operate using labour hire. In Victoria, labour hire businesses must be licensed, and host businesses must only use licensed providers. There are significant penalties for using or providing unlicensed labour hire services, with penalties in excess of $630,000 for a corporation and $150,000 for an individual. Our labour hire reforms will strengthen the powers of Victoria’s Labour Hire Authority to prevent those with links to criminal organisations from operating labour hire businesses.

In addition to those legislated reforms, the government have also acted to implement recommendations 2 and 7 of the Wilson review. This includes recommendation 2, which sought to establish an alliance involving state and federal law enforcement and regulators and other relevant entities with a role in addressing allegations of criminal or unlawful conduct on Victorian government construction sites. This alliance is up and running and is collaborating on how agencies can best share information, coordinate action and inform government on emerging issues on sites. The alliance is chaired by Victoria Police, with members across a range of organisations and agencies. The Wilson review also recommended that construction policies and contracts include clauses that require principal contractors on government-funded construction sites to report criminal or unlawful conduct. We have updated a suite of standard form contracts and developed model construction contract clauses and other materials to support agencies to implement this recommendation as a requirement on public construction projects. I am out of time.

Motion agreed to.