Wednesday, 18 March 2026

 Renee HEATH (Eastern Victoria) (11:02): I just quickly want to move an amendment that is in Mr Mulholland’s name. After discussions with the Greens, we are really keen for this to be retrospective, and this amendment clarifies that. We need to get to the bottom of what has happened to the $15 billion that has been lost to corruption. In principle it should not matter how much that money is; any cent that belongs to the Victorian taxpayer should absolutely be accounted for, and the fact that has just gone unnoticed or potentially has been minimised is immoral and unacceptable. Secondly, there are a lot of things that this $15 billion could have paid for. It could have ended homelessness in Victoria. It could have housed every single one of those people. It could have really helped upgrade our hospital infrastructure that is really needed by Victorians. It could have increased the police presence on our roads – as we all are aware in here, we are 2000 short. That is some of the information on the amendment that I am going to move on behalf of Mr Mulholland, and I ask that it be circulated.

 Sarah MANSFIELD (Western Victoria) (11:04): I rise to speak in support of this bill. This bill gives IBAC two of the three critical powers it needs to get to the bottom of the Big Build corruption fiasco. First, this bill gives IBAC follow-the-dollar powers so that IBAC can investigate the alleged corrupt conduct of third-party contractors who are the direct and indirect recipients of public funds. This is critical, so IBAC can follow the trail of how the government lost $15 billion in taxpayers money, all the way through to publicly funded projects and into the private sector and organised crime. Secondly, this bill opens up IBAC’s hearings to the public. There is an old saying that sunlight is the best of disinfectants, and my medical opinion is that this government needs to work on its vitamin D. Victorians have a right to learn what IBAC learns in real time, not shrouded under an unnecessary veil of secrecy currently imposed over IBAC proceedings. But – and this is a big ‘but’ – this bill does not expand IBAC’s jurisdiction so it has the teeth to thoroughly investigate the full extent of the Big Build corruption. Now, two out of three ain’t bad, but the Greens think that this bill can go further, and we will be introducing amendments today to achieve just that. I kindly ask that my amendments be circulated by the clerks.

Currently IBAC can only investigate corrupt conduct involving alleged serious indictable crimes or common-law offending like bribery or misconduct in public office. Unless we expand IBAC’s powers, there is a mountain of allegations of corruption that will never be properly investigated and Victorians will be denied the right to know where the $15 billion of their taxpayer money went. Let me outline briefly a few of the allegations from Geoffrey Watson’s report that IBAC will not be able to investigate, even if armed with follow-the-dollar powers. The CFMEU sold jobs for cash. Individual underground rail loop workers allegedly had to donate $100 in cash to CFMEU officials for a fabricated charitable cause just to be allocated a shift. With up to 100 workers on a single night shift, that is $10,000 extracted from working people every time a roster turned over. The CFMEU filled health and safety roles with alleged and convicted killers, bikies and drug dealers. Health and safety representatives exist to protect workers’ lives in potentially lethal workplaces. The former CFMEU leadership used those positions as rewards, handing them to criminals, alleged and convicted killers and patched members of outlaw motorcycle gangs. These roles paid sometimes $300,000 a year. Most appointees had no qualifications. Many were never onsite, and if they were, they sat in air-conditioned offices watching Foxtel and betting channels.

The enterprise bargaining agreement system became a black market. An EBA is the ticket to work on the Big Build. The CFMEU controlled who got one and who did not. That monopoly power was worth an enormous amount of money, and the former leadership treated it as a personal asset to be sold. A labour hire EBA could cost $500,000. An EBA fixer named Harry Korras was recorded on tape without his knowledge explaining how the system worked. He said:

So there’s a fee to get an EBA. I think the upfront fee is cash. But all you’ve gotta do, I told ya, pay the boys, make sure they’re okay and that’s it. That’s business.

… Everybody gets to eat.

Organised crime figures were handed EBAs and union-backed contracts. Faruk Orman, an acquitted alleged murderer and close associate of Mick Gatto, with Gatto’s name tattooed on his torso, was gifted multiple EBAs, despite having no skills or experience in any of the relevant trades. In one case his application was approved in three days instead of the usual months. He sold the company for $250,000 days later. Senior CFMEU officials enriched themselves with millions in assets gifted by contractors. Senior organiser John Perkovic allegedly received a new house built by a building contractor and former disgraced cop that Perkovic enriched through conferring EBAs and Big Build contracts. There was no written contract and no disclosed price, and it was financed in ways he could not explain. Perkovic received the neighbouring block of land transferred to his daughter for free, not below market value – free. Not a cent changed hands. His accountants later valued the two properties together at $2.8 million. Perkovic also had four luxury cars in his household, including a Range Rover and a BMW, all from contractors who stood to benefit from the CFMEU’s apparent monopoly of Big Build contracts.

Let me be clear: it is highly unlikely any of these allegations could be investigated by IBAC if this bill became law today, nor could the majority of allegations outlined in the Premier’s 2024 IBAC referral letter. This includes allegations of CFMEU officials advising building companies to hire bikie-controlled subcontractors or to retain underworld standover men, and a person using a state rail upgrade project vehicle to drive to Footscray Hospital when bleeding from a gunshot wound. Our first proposed amendment seeks to expand the definition of ‘corrupt conduct’ so that IBAC is no longer restricted to investigating serious indictable crimes or common-law offences like misconduct in public office, bribery or perverting the course of justice. This would empower IBAC to identify, investigate and expose corrupt conduct of public officers and dodgy third parties that does not constitute a criminal offence but nonetheless still damages citizens’ confidence in public administration.

The bill also makes provision for investigations of conduct occurring before the commencement of the bill as well as allowing IBAC to re-examine matters that it has previously dismissed or referred to another agency. This amendment will align IBAC’s powers with those of most other anti-corruption watchdogs across the nation, including the new National Anti-Corruption Commission.

IBAC has been clear about the powers it needs to investigate corruption on Labor’s Big Build sites. The Greens are the only party who have brought laws to this place to give IBAC real teeth and close the loopholes preventing it from properly investigating corruption. Do not just listen to us; listen to the experts. The Honourable Anthony Whealy KC, chair of the Centre for Public Integrity, stated:

The Centre for Public Integrity fully supports IBAC’s call for urgent reform. The Victorian agency needs the wider powers possessed by ICAC in New South Wales. Presently it can only investigate ‘relevant criminal offences’. It should be able to investigate a wider range of corrupt conduct and breaches of public trust more generally. Secondly it should be able to investigate subcontracting agencies involved in the performance of public functions. Its inability to investigate the CFMEU scandal is a good illustration of its painfully limited jurisdiction. This has to change and change urgently.

Associate Professor Will Partlett at the University of Melbourne, Stephen Charles Fellow at the Centre for Public Integrity, said:

These amendments give the IBAC needed powers to effectively oversee the misuse of power and money by modern government, which increasingly is done at arm’s length by private companies or through grey corruption that might not constitute a crime.

The Big Build scandal has been a wake-up call. So much corruption, which devastates public trust, costs taxpayers billions and poisons the integrity of government, falls outside of what IBAC can currently investigate. What recent events have amply demonstrated is this: whether the corrupt conduct constitutes a criminal offence or not, the scale of the damage caused to our community is the same.

I turn to our second amendment, which provides a clarification of the meaning of ‘corrupt conduct’ and retrospective application of follow-the-money powers. This amendment seeks to do two things. The first is to ensure that IBAC can apply the follow-the-money powers proposed by this bill retrospectively – that is, IBAC can investigate conduct occurring prior to this provision becoming law. In this place I have heard the concern that this would amount to the retrospective application of criminal laws and that this violates the rule of principle that people should only be punished for conduct that was clearly prohibited at the time they acted. To put it bluntly, this argument is nonsense. Section 162(6) of the Independent Broad-based Anti-corruption Commission Act 2011 states that IBAC cannot find that someone is guilty of a criminal or disciplinary offence; IBAC cannot punish alleged criminal offenders.

The second thing this amendment seeks to do is clarify that a finding of corrupt conduct is not a finding of criminal misconduct. As I have just noted, section 162(6) of the IBAC act states that IBAC cannot find that someone is guilty of a criminal or disciplinary offence. IBAC has long adopted a conservative interpretation of the IBAC act to avoid breaching section 162(6), given that the definition of ‘corrupt conduct’ is confined to serious indictable offences or common-law offences. This is precisely why Victoria’s anti-corruption commission has until now stopped short of making formal findings of corrupt conduct. To address this constraint, IBAC put to the Integrity and Oversight Committee that the act could be amended to make clear that any such finding is not a finding of guilt but rather a jurisdictional determination. IBAC’s position is that such a change would allow it to report with greater clarity on corrupt conduct, sharpen its prevention-focused recommendations, avoid prejudicing criminal investigations and prosecutions and help rebuild public trust in our institutions. This amendment exists to give IBAC exactly that power.

As a Parliament, we have the opportunity today to start providing Victorians with real answers about the full extent and cost of what has been occurring in their name. I urge all members to do the right thing by the people of Victoria now and into the future by supporting this bill and our amendments, and I commend the bill to the house.

 Ryan BATCHELOR (Southern Metropolitan) (11:15): I am very pleased to rise to speak today on Mr Mulholland’s private members bill, the Independent Broad-based Anti-corruption Commission Amendment (Follow the Money) Bill 2026. Obviously, last sitting week we debated a private members bill from the Greens, which the Liberal Party said that they would not support because they wanted to think about it a bit more, clearly so they could debate their bill first. I will not get into the back and forth there. I think it probably speaks to who wants to take their name forward in this way.

The legislation that we are debating today is similar but not identical to the legislation we debated in the last sitting week. It stems from a desire of those in this place to suggest amendments to the legal framework for the Independent Broad-based Anti-corruption Commission, largely, although not wholly, based on recommendations arising out of the report of the Integrity and Oversight Committee, which was tabled in December last year, into the adequacy of IBAC’s legislative framework. I say ‘largely, not wholly’ because there are many things in that report that are not included in the legislative package and the legislative amendments that are brought forward today which I think would help IBAC’s functioning in the state of Victoria. There are things in this legislation that the report of the committee did not recommend and expressly recommended against, which I think is worthy of some consideration. Then there are other matters purporting to implement recommendations of the report, which, I think, as I explained in my contribution the last time we debated this, are complex matters that need to be dealt with as a more comprehensive suite of considerations and package. Taking a couple of amendments here and there to try and do justice to the complexity of the adequacy of IBAC’s legislative framework I think is an approach and a response that is being driven by a political moment, rather than being driven by a desire to achieve workable, long-lasting and effective reform. Certainly I am firmly in the latter camp of being an advocate for substantive, long-lasting and impactful reform rather than cherrypicking certain aspects of these issues, some of which are in conflict with other things which have been said and leaving a range of other serious and important considerations on the cutting room floor. I think what this approach demonstrates is that the motivating factors here are not genuine consideration of IBAC’s legislative framework or the report of the Integrity and Oversight Committee but factors that have been motivated by other means.

I want to just quickly use a bit of this speech to talk about the political context, the allegations of corrupt conduct and what the state of Victoria faces in terms of dealing with these issues. I want to then go into the particular amendments that are proposed in the bill and the subsequent series of amendments that have been circulated by Dr Mansfield and by Dr Heath on behalf of Mr Mulholland. Some of the contribution today will echo the contribution I made in the previous sitting fortnight, largely because the issues remain on the table and have been largely unanswered. I will continue to raise the issues that I have and pose those questions until we get an answer, because as I said last time, I think that the complexity of the legal framework that we are dealing with here and the implications and ramifications of law reform here should be dealt with comprehensively and not cherrypicked like they are today. I think and I hope that we will get to that in the context of the debate.

Obviously there have been very serious allegations of criminal behaviour on construction sites in the state of Victoria which absolutely need to be both investigated and stopped, and that is what the government is seeking to do. I do not know that she intended to make this point, but over the course of Dr Mansfield’s contribution she highlighted the limitations on IBAC’s capacity to bring criminal proceedings and the way that IBAC’s jurisdiction as an investigatory jurisdiction is one that seeks to investigate allegations of improper conduct, not to pursue breaches of the criminal law. If we have allegations before us that there have been and are breaches of the criminal law occurring in the state of Victoria, the appropriate body to deal with them is Victoria Police. The appropriate body to deal with allegations of criminal activity in the state of Victoria is Victoria Police. No other body, whether it be the standing royal commission, in the form of IBAC, that we have in this state or another royal commission-like process, is going to – because of the way that those processes work – or is empowered with the same prosecutorial vehicles to bring criminal charges and to arrest people. I think that if you are serious about stopping criminal behaviour on construction sites, you call the cops, because what the police can do is arrest people and what the police can do is charge people. Since 2024, when Taskforce Hawk was established, more than 70 charges have been brought against people connected with organised crime and criminal behaviour in the construction industry here in Victoria. If you want to target criminals, call the cops. That is what we do.

The other element which is important here is getting the regulatory framework with the powers and resources to ensure that firms that are not fit to work on these construction sites are off the job. That is what our Labour Hire Licensing Authority has done. That is what the additional powers that we gave the Labour Hire Authority to investigate and remove the licensing arrangements from subcontractors in the construction industry have done – laws, a framework, an agency, a Labour Hire Authority to regulate the labour hire industry here in Victoria, initiated by this Labor government and opposed by the Liberal Party. In 2018 the Liberal Party voted against the laws to regulate labour hire in this state. If it was up to them, there would be no rules in place to regulate labour hire on construction sites in the state of Victoria, because they voted against the authority. Since then, with that authority and with the additional powers granted by this Parliament at the initiation of the government last year, we have seen 170-odd licences revoked from labour hire authorities here in the state of Victoria. Zero of those licences would have been revoked by the Liberals because they did not want to have the authority in the first place. They voted against the Labour Hire Authority, which is out there on construction sites right now, taking licences away from those who are not fit to hold them.

Nick McGowan interjected.

The ACTING PRESIDENT (Michael Galea): Mr McGowan, please cease interjecting.

Ryan BATCHELOR: The last point I will make is just to sound a note of caution against the gross exaggeration of some of the figures that we are seeing in the course of this debate and the attribution of figures in their entirety to corrupt and criminal conduct, because the cost escalation is built into the figures that Mr Watson put into that report, figures which he himself said were obviously rough and crude – ‘rough’ and ‘crude’ is how Mr Watson –

Nick McGowan interjected.

Gayle Tierney: On a point of order, Acting President, I ask that the house be called to order. You asked Mr McGowan to desist from interjecting, and he has continued to do so.

The ACTING PRESIDENT (Michael Galea): I uphold the point of order, and I ask Mr McGowan to cease interjecting. Mr Batchelor to continue without assistance.

Ryan BATCHELOR: There are others who suggest he query the underlying assumptions of those calculations. Some of them are as a result of the increased wages and conditions that have been paid to construction workers in the state of Victoria. So when the Liberals and the Greens get up and say that all of that money is going into the hands of corrupt people, I think what they are actually doing is saying that all of the people who work in the construction industry in the state of Victoria are corrupt.

Nick McGowan interjected.

The ACTING PRESIDENT (Michael Galea): Mr McGowan, the President is due back in 3 minutes. Please do not make me get him earlier.

Renee Heath: On a point of order, Acting President, Mr Batchelor is being extremely provocative. I think that he is asking for a response from the opposition. I just want to make sure that he is being truthful.

The ACTING PRESIDENT (Michael Galea): Mr McGowan will have the opportunity to respond in his contribution.

Ryan BATCHELOR: I am not sure why the Liberal Party feel that they need to try and silence a critique of their own words, which say that every worker involved in the construction industry is corrupt. That is what the Liberal Party are saying by dint of their own words because of the way that they have characterised those statements and, frankly, some of the contributions from the Greens have said exactly the same thing.

What I will do instead, following that, is get on to the substantive issues that have been proposed in the amendments being brought forward today both through the bill and in the amendments that have been proposed by Dr Heath on behalf of Mr Mulholland and by Dr Mansfield. The substantive amendments in the bill seek to grant IBAC powers to effectively follow the dollar. What they seek to do is to respond to a recommendation in the Integrity and Oversight Committee’s report – I think this is the important part – to clarify and streamline the definitions of ‘public officer’ and ‘public body’ under section 6 of the Independent Broad-based Anti-Corruption Commission Act 2011.

One of the issues that the Integrity and Oversight Committee has grappled with for many years in various reports is that the way that the IBAC act was drafted in 2012 was quite extensive and convoluted in the application of what constitutes a public body and a public officer for the purposes of corrupt conduct here in the state of Victoria. I should say at the outset that the act itself and the jurisdiction and powers of IBAC do cover instances where someone in the construction industry seeks to improperly influence the decision-making of a public official or a public body. I think that gets lost sometimes in the debate. That somehow IBAC does not have powers to deal with some of the issues that might arise in the course of the way construction projects are operated in the state is simply not true overall, because anybody who seeks to improperly influence the exercise of a public official or a public body’s duties is captured by the definitions of ‘public body’ and ‘public officer’ and the definitions of ‘corrupt conduct’ in sections 4 and 6 of the IBAC act. I think we just need to put that in a little bit of context. IBAC has powers here with respect to people seeking to influence the decision-making of public bodies and the decision-making of public officers. One of the challenges that exists is obviously with the complex web of subcontracting arrangements that exist in many areas of government endeavour, not only in the construction industry but also, quite frankly, more broadly across a range of different services. The recommendation of the Integrity and Oversight Committee was:

That the government seek input and advice from the Commonwealth Government and other stakeholders to clarify and streamline the definitions of ‘public officer’ and ‘public body’ under section 6 of the IBAC Act 2011 (Vic).

The concern I have with the amendments being moved in the substantive bill today is that they do nothing to clarify and streamline. I think the effect of the amendments that we see before us will be to increase the complexity of these definitions. I would like to see a simpler set of definitions of ‘public officer’ and ‘public body’ in the act, which then gets to some of the conduct that the amendments purport to seek to get to.

The other thing that we need to do, which is detailed in recommendation 5, in my opinion, is understand where there is a substantial connection between alleged corrupt conduct and government funding. The concern that I have with the particular amendments that Mr Mulholland has brought forward here is that they are not only a bit unwieldy but seek to borrow from concepts that have been used and acquitted in audit legislation for the purposes of conducting performance audits and import definitions into a set of definitions about ‘corrupt conduct’, ‘public officer’ and ‘public entities’ to deal with a different set of issues. I think what we need here is an actual, proper consideration of all of these definitions as the IOC has recommended. What we have on the face of it in terms of the follow-the-dollar powers I do not think delivers on the recommendations of the Integrity and Oversight Committee and I think will add more complexity into this law. Frankly, I think the operation of IBAC and its investigations could deal with less legislative complexity rather than more.

The other things I want to do in dealing with the substantive act is deal with the questions of the proposal to repeal section 117(1)(a) of the principal act, which deals with public examinations only being held in ‘exceptional circumstances’. It is a little bit difficult to understand from the contributions that the opposition has made on this bill what they mean by this particular amendment. It was largely absent from Mr Mulholland’s second-reading speech, the justification for this amendment. He barely mentioned this amendment in his second-reading speech, so we as a chamber are not informed as to why the Liberal Party thinks that this is the correct approach. We do not know what the Liberal Party thinks is the right approach. What we do have is some commentary from the Integrity and Oversight Committee on the question of the use of IBAC’s coercive powers and the significant coercive powers that IBAC has and whether this exceptional circumstances test for public examination should be repealed. The IOC in its report on the adequacy of IBAC’s legislative framework said that:

Section 143 of the IBAC Act 2011 (Vic) provides that any secrecy obligations required of public officers, other than Cabinet confidentiality, are overridden by requirements to comply with a witness summons during IBAC examinations. Section 144 of the IBAC Act 2011 (Vic) provides that a person summoned to provide evidence to IBAC cannot claim privilege against self-incrimination to not provide the evidence.

The committee report goes on to say:

… it also increases the risk of reputational damage for witnesses, creates complication in balancing the needs for confidentiality and public transparency, and provides less protection for witnesses in comparison to providing evidence in a court of law.

IBAC’s examination process is notably different than the court process for giving evidence. Aside from the abrogation of privilege discussed above, submissions have also highlighted that while witnesses in IBAC examinations are able to have a lawyer present, their lawyer is not able to speak, and there is no opportunity for cross-examination to enable a right of reply. It has also been stated that ‘[e]xhibits used by IBAC lawyers in examinations are not provided to witnesses or their lawyers prior to the commencement of the examination, which is distinctive from court processes.

This is technical but serious, because what it attempts to do is to demonstrate that IBAC public examinations are different to court proceedings in a court of law, which are held in public. Because IBAC’s examination processes are necessarily inquisitorial, they necessarily are not determinative of guilt or innocence. But to use those inquisitorial powers the Parliament has granted IBAC exceptional powers to erode the human rights of its witnesses. There is no privilege against self-incrimination in IBAC proceedings. Lawyers cannot speak in the course of public examination. Witnesses are not provided with any material before they are asked questions. They are exceptional sets of powers, which have been recognised as being in conflict with the charter of human rights but a necessary conflict because there are protections in the IBAC act against having a person’s reputation unlawfully attacked, which is one of the rights protected under section 13 of the Charter of Human Rights and Responsibilities Act 2006.

What we have not heard at all from the opposition is why it is necessary to change this element when the coercive powers of IBAC and the rights of witnesses are different to those that they would expect in a court of law – no privilege against self-incrimination, no access to a lawyer during proceedings and no provision of information to witnesses before questions. The opposition should, if they are proposing to take away significant rights from citizens, at least have the courage to explain why, and they have been silent in the second-reading debate so far. I think we deserve answers as to why they think removing this test is compatible with the legal framework – the charter here in Victoria – and necessary, because we know that, for example, the operation of the National Anti-Corruption Commission has this protection and has adopted Victoria’s protections in terms of public examination. Certainly, after detailed consideration on this particular point, the Integrity and Oversight Committee did not recommend that section 117(1)(a) be repealed. To quote from the committee’s report:

While the Committee acknowledges that the exceptional circumstances test in section 117 of the IBAC Act 2011 (Vic) provides a high threshold for holding an examination in public, the Committee considers that this is appropriate when considering the risks associated with IBAC’s public examinations, including reputational damage.

We did so in the context of several years of the Integrity and Oversight Committee, particularly in the last Parliament, being concerned about witness welfare in IBAC proceedings – being concerned about the way that those proceedings have affected individuals who are, in some instances, taken off the streets and put into a car and driven away and told they cannot tell anybody about what is happening to them. We know that there have been exceptionally serious consequences from the way that these coercive powers, significant coercive powers, have been used and that certainly there has been at least one tragic incident of someone taking their own life as a result of their involvement in IBAC proceedings. They are serious issues. We should take them seriously. I think that the Parliament deserves to hear a little bit more from the Liberal Party as to why they think that removing section 117(1)(a) is appropriate and necessary, because I just do not think that they have so far.

The last points I want to cover deal with the proposed amendments by Dr Mansfield and the Greens, which largely mirror some of the amendments to their bill that were moved last sitting week, particularly, and this came out in that discussion, including changes to the definition of ‘corrupt conduct’ by removing a requirement that the conduct constitute a relevant criminal offence in the state of Victoria and in IBAC’s jurisdiction. It is something that the IOC talked about. Certainly in her contribution on that bill and even in her contribution today Dr Mansfield talked about why this is necessary to eliminate grey corruption. I think here again it is important to look at that, particularly when we are dealing with laws and particularly when this is the kind of conduct that Dr Mansfield and the Greens are seeking to deal with here, and they have expressly said that these amendments are designed to deal with grey corruption. To quote again from the IOC’s report:

Some scholars have noted that including acts of ‘grey corruption’ may be difficult to define legally. For example, Professor Tim Prenzler notes that ‘[t]he term “grey corruption” appears to have utility in political discourse in describing areas of minor corruption and/or unethical but legally ambiguous practice’.

Then the discussion goes on. The committee went on to say:

The Committee recognises the difficulty in settling on a workable legal test for a definition of serious corrupt conduct in the political context that falls short of a criminal offence, and notes the lack of substantive definition, and even consistent definition between witnesses, on what would constitute ‘grey corruption’. The Committee does not consider that the term ‘grey corruption’ is helpful in guiding reforms to the IBAC’s legislation.

The report then goes on to have a more fulsome discussion about some of these issues and also looks at what amendments might be required and necessary to common-law offences of misconduct in public office to more clearly define the elements of that offence that constitute corrupt conduct under the IBAC act. I again hope that we might get some sense of what it means and what kinds of conduct and behaviour are sought to be dealt with by this amendment, which is, to use the words of those who propose it, to deal with grey corruption, when we have considerable evidence from experts and scholars that this is a very difficult definition to make and one that is probably not appropriate in the context of dealing with the legislative framework for our integrity agencies. I think it would be good in the course of the debate to deal with those here.

There have also been amendments moved on retrospectivity. I think we have to be particularly careful as a Parliament in proposing measures which would include a retrospective element, least of all retrospectivity which would date back to the commencement of the IBAC act itself in 2013. I think we need to think very carefully about whether the particular provisions that have been proposed here are appropriate in that context.

There is a lot more that I could say about some of the particular amendments, because it is a particularly complex piece of public administration and law, and I know that in the debate last sitting week people took issue with the seriousness with which I take these matters and the consideration and thought that I give them. But they do matter, because this body has exceptional powers and it abrogates the rights of individuals in a fairly significant way, as I have outlined. That is necessary to eliminate corrupt conduct, but we do need to treat the particular amendments that we are proposing seriously and give them thought. I would much prefer to see a legislative reform package that responds to the Integrity and Oversight Committee report as a whole after proper consideration and after proper and due analysis of the range of issues that the IOC dealt with and also posed as questions to the government to consider. I do not think that the amendments moved by the opposition and by the Greens satisfy that rigour in today’s context.

The PRESIDENT: Before I call the next contribution, can I acknowledge in the gallery the Deputy Premier of Queensland the Honourable Jarrod Bleijie.

 Bev McARTHUR (Western Victoria) (11:45): I know we are no longer hosting the Commonwealth Games here, but if we were, Mr Batchelor, my opponent on the other side there, would have received a participation medal – not gold – for deflection. That is as good as it goes, Mr Batchelor.

I would like to make a brief contribution on Mr Mulholland’s excellent bill, not a blow-by-blow retelling of shocking allegations – and there are plenty of shocking allegations. We have heard them all in recent weeks, and every day brings a new story of a new outrage. Instead I want to reflect briefly on something more fundamental: the quiet contract between a government and the people it serves and what happens when that contract is broken. Most people are not particularly interested in politics. They want to get on with their lives. Somewhere in the back of their minds they accept that the whole circus is necessary, but they would rather not look too closely at it. They expect the silly political games, the stunts, the initiatives that come and go. They understand there will be disagreements in politics, and they are generally content to let us get on with it. That is the contract: we get on with the business of government and we do not trouble them unduly with it. They put up with elections every few years. They do not necessarily enjoy them – maybe a sausage sizzle here and there. Many of them might even think we are a bit frivolous. Others consider us a necessary evil. But in general the public is content to let the political circus and class carry on as long as we do not cause them direct problems in their daily lives. In fact we are a whole lot less relevant to most people than we might think ourselves. Rightly or wrongly, many of them do not know what is going on in politics. Sometimes they do not even know who we are, much to our surprise.

But that contract can be broken, not by poor policy or even by mistaken decisions – those are expected and to some extent forgiven. The contract breaks when government conduct spills over into something the public cannot look away from – open and undeniable corruption. That is what is going on here. When the cost of major infrastructure projects inflates by billions of dollars, people want to know why. At first they might want to put it down to inflation. Over on the other side there it is always a war or COVID that causes the problem or inefficiency – the usual culprits. But when the scale is so vast they begin to realise something else is going on, and that something is not inefficiency, it is illegality. It is corruption on worksites. It is abuse of the law. It is intimidation in criminal conduct operating in broad daylight. Let me say it plainly and slowly: billions of dollars lost, not to inflation and not to inefficiency but simply to corruption.

We have to thank the Queensland government for actually exposing this extraordinary corruption, and long may it continue, hopefully till November this year. Thank you, Queensland. Thank you to the LNP government in Queensland. What a lot of heroes they are. Yet even then the public is remarkably forgiving. They can be generous with the benefit of the doubt, sometimes more generous than those of us closer to the action believe is warranted. They reason that crime and corruption do happen, and when it is isolated it is not necessarily a deal breaker for their support of a government. But even that benefit of the doubt has been utterly exhausted by this Labor government – for two reasons. First, it is not isolated. The findings of Geoffrey Watson make that abundantly clear. Federal court decisions confirm it. We see it across field after field of this government’s operations. We see it in the politicisation of the public service, where advice is no longer fearless or impartial but politically compliant. The public service has become an extension of the Labor Party. We see it in the awarding of contracts to mates, the appointment of former ministers and MPs to plum positions, the entire nexus of what might be called soft corruption, which has become this government’s speciality. And then of course there is the hard corruption, the kind that Geoffrey Watson documented in devastating detail: organised crime on worksites, drug distribution, bikie infiltration, billions in taxpayers funds siphoned away through a system designed to reward Labor’s friends, to say nothing of the strippers that were provided for onsite CFMEU workers as well.

The second reason the public’s patience is exhausted is the government’s response, or rather its total failure to respond with any semblance of integrity. If a government reacts to corruption by condemning it, investigating it without fear or favour, rooting it out and perhaps even apologising, the public may accept that. Mistakes happen. Corruption can infiltrate any system. What matters is how you respond, and that is everything this Labor government has not done. They ignored the warnings for years, they buried what they could, they deflected and denied and they attacked the messenger, launching extraordinary personal attacks on Geoffrey Watson SC and former IBAC Commissioner Robert Redlich, amongst others, people of the highest standing and integrity who dared to shine a light on what was happening. They hamstrung the very bodies that could have investigated. They restricted IBAC’s funding. They denied it the powers it asked for, which is precisely what this bill is about. And they have certainly never apologised.

Michael Galea interjected.

The PRESIDENT: Order! Mr Galea, please.

Bev McARTHUR: May I continue in silence, without interjection from over there. The truth is that Labor are too deeply entwined in this to extricate themselves.

Members interjecting.

Renee Heath: On a point of order, President, Mr McIntosh just offended the standing orders by interjecting when he was not in his place. He is a bit further into the backbench there, so I just wanted to bring that up.

The PRESIDENT: I uphold the point of order. Members, interjections are unruly anyway, but if people really need to, they should be doing it from their place.

Bev McARTHUR: Of course Mr McIntosh does not know where he lives, either in this chamber or in his electorate, because he does not live in his electorate. Perhaps he needs to go back to his electorate. The truth is that Labor is too deeply entwined in this to extricate itself. It is entwined with the unions, entwined with the contractors. That is the real reason we had the massive splurge on the Big Build: everything all at once to generate enormous contracts and work for the union allies of the Labor Party, work for your union allies, all funded by the public purse. The poor taxpayers of Victoria are picking up the bill for your political actions. And that is why they cannot get out of it now. They are in bed with these people. It is part of their DNA. It is part of your DNA over there.

They are a government that has been there far too long, so we are taking matters into our own hands. My colleague Mr Mulholland’s private members bill would give IBAC the follow-the-dollar powers it has been requesting since 2017, powers to trace public money beyond government agencies and into the hands of private contractors, subcontractors and third parties, where taxpayer funds ultimately end up. IBAC’s own commissioner has told this Parliament directly that the current laws are too weak. IBAC’s own commissioner – your appointed commissioner – has told this Parliament that the current laws are too weak. They are too weak because you do not want the corruption that you are responsible for exposed. You are a disgrace on that other side, a total disgrace. You have abused the taxpayers of Victoria. $15 billion worth of abuse – that is what you have done. But this bill is the first step toward restoring the accountability that Victorians deserve. This is the first step. We are just beginning. Look out over there. You are in real trouble. $15 billion has gone down the gurgler courtesy of your corruption, your association with the CFMEU, your abuse of the process and your hatred for the taxpayers of Victoria. You do not care about them. You do not even care about the real workers in this state. You certainly do not care about the people of this state. And you need to be held accountable; you absolutely need to be held accountable in every way we possibly can.

I congratulate the crossbench for getting involved and for making sure that this corruption is exposed and the taxpayers of Victoria have their money properly spent on the infrastructure that is required, not on lining the pockets of criminals. That is what you have done. You have been totally associated with lining the pockets of criminals in this state, and you should hang your heads in shame. You should endorse this bill. We are trying to make your life better. We are trying to help you out by exposing the corruption that has been involved.

Evan Mulholland interjected.

Bev McARTHUR: Yes, the backbenchers should absolutely get behind it, Mr Mulholland. Well, they might not be there much longer, Mr Mulholland, some of those backbenchers. They will be struggling to hold their places. We have got to make sure Mr McIntosh gets the number one position. Poor old Ms Shing might get rolled. But anyway –

Members interjecting.

Bev McARTHUR: Enver will get number one. But here on the opposite side we are interested in the taxpayers of Victoria. We are going to make sure the taxpayers of Victoria get value for their money and make sure that this corruption is exposed, that your abuse of process is exposed and that the $15 billion is found. Thanks again to the Queensland government for making sure this is happening. What a great government they have got in Queensland. We look forward to joining them after 26 November in Victoria.

Business interrupted pursuant to sessional orders.