Tuesday, 17 March 2026

 David DAVIS (Southern Metropolitan) (21:25): (2402) My matter for the adjournment tonight is for the attention of the Minister for Police, and it concerns Sunhill Road in Glen Iris in part of my electorate. I met on Friday with 12 residents who live in Sunhill Road in Glen Iris. Ten months ago they got the street’s first break-in where a youth offender held a knife to someone and stole a car, only to come back several days later to harass the owner. Since then, in the last week in particular, there have been three break-ins and another break-in a few days after that. They are concerned that the street is turning very violent. They have received very little information about whether the offenders have been caught. The street is now looking at options with council. Indeed they are looking at putting security of their own on the street. The street is now very worried. They have a WhatsApp group to try and control what is happening in the street. There have been nine incidents in the past few months, and this has now become something that is out of control. People are very concerned. Reported crime in the City of Boroondara, I might add, is up 21.8 per cent per cent in the last 12 months. The number of police officers in the City of Boroondara has fallen by 5.34 in the last year. So there has been a fall in policing and a rise in crime, and we now have streets like Sunhill Road that are facing real threats and intense numbers of break-ins, carjackings and other clearly violent crime.

It is time that people made a real stand on this. It is time that we actually saw some action. What I want from the police minister is that he look at this matter and potentially come down and visit Sunhill Road in Glen Iris with me so that he understands what is occurring. This is completely and utterly unacceptable, and it is time that there was action on it. I just want to be clear: Labor has closed the nearby Ashburton police station. It is shameful, and there are less police consequently in the nearby area. Overall police numbers have fallen in Boroondara, crime is up almost 21 per cent and now we have a spate of crime, a flurry of crime, in this one street, and people are sick of it. The minister should come and learn what is going on under his watch.