Wednesday, 1 April 2026

 Renee HEATH (Eastern Victoria) (10:41): I move:

That this house –

(1)   notes that according to current crime statistics, crime in Victoria is at an all-time high, in just two years, December 2023 to December 2025, with –

(a) all incidents up 23 per cent;

(b) total aggravated burglaries up 24 per cent;

(c) motor vehicle theft up 56 per cent;

(d) family violence serious assaults up 47 per cent;

(e) youth incidents up 13 per cent;

(f) unsolved crimes up 47 per cent;

(2)   further notes that Labor’s newfound tough-on-crime positioning is just a sham and its –

(a) machete laws are not getting knives off streets;

(b) bail laws are not keeping criminals behind bars;

(c) protest laws are not keeping violent or intimidatory demonstrations under control;

(d) so-called youth justice reforms are a pale imitation of other jurisdictions;

(e) criminal association and industrial relations laws are enabling corruption and costing taxpayers $15 billion;

(f) funding cuts mean more unfilled police shifts and more closed or reduced hours at police stations;

(3)   calls on the government to immediately –

(a) restore move-on laws and introduce a protest registration system;

(b) give police the necessary powers to protect Victorians, including introducing Jack’s law and implementing a ‘break bail, face jail’ policy;

(c) better protect women by implementing a ‘right to ask, right to know’ scheme and criminalising coercive control;

(d) invest in early-intervention initiatives to divert at-risk youths from a life of crime; and

(e) properly fund Victoria Police and keep police stations open.

I rise today to speak about a motion that is something that is extremely important, and that is crime in Victoria. The first job of any government is to keep its citizens safe. I know that it is something that everybody in here takes very seriously, but we also have to acknowledge that something is not working. The latest crime statistics in Victoria show that crime is at an all-time high. In just two years, from December 2023 to December 2025, all incidents went up 23 per cent. Total aggravated burglaries went up 24 per cent, common motor vehicle theft was up 56 per cent, family violence serious assaults were up 47 per cent, youth incidents were up 13 per cent and unsolved crimes were up 47 per cent. Behind every one of these statistics are victims and people who are caught in a life of crime, and that is an absolute tragedy. Every one of those situations has potentially altered a Victorian’s life in a way that the outcomes are much worse.

The second part of this motion is that Labor’s tough-on-crime positioning is just a sham, because the reality is that machete laws are not getting knives off the streets, bail laws are not keeping criminals behind bars, protest laws are not keeping violent and intimidating demonstrations under control and so-called youth justice reforms, which the government said – and I am going to talk a lot about this –were based on those of Queensland, are just not – they are a pale imitation. When you drill down into the specifics, they are just not. Criminal association and industrial relations laws have enabled corruption, costing the taxpayer at least $15 billion. $15 billion could pay to put the 2000 police officers that we are short of in this state back on the street. It could open the more than 50 police stations that have either closed their doors or increased their hours. We will not talk about the hospitals that are needed for people that are victims of crime and just hospitals in general. $15 billion – what it could have done for homelessness. But it is the laws that have enabled that. And funding cuts to police mean that there are more unfilled shifts and more reduced hours in police stations.

The third part of this motion calls on the government to immediately restore move-on laws, something that we have been speaking about for a very long time. We need these move-on laws. The police are up against it, number one, because they are 2000 staff members short. Whenever we have these huge protests in the city, they absorb so many resources, with police officers having to be taken from other areas. We need these move-on laws restored immediately, because police need to actually have the ability to prevent a crisis before it happens.

We also ask that a protest registration system is introduced, like in many other states. We want to see police given the powers they need to protect Victorians, including Jack’s law, which I will speak about shortly, and also the implementation of a ‘break bail, face jail’ policy. We need better protection for women in this state. We are asking that the government implement a right-to-ask and right-to-know scheme, and we ask that they criminalise coercive control. There needs to be more money invested, not less, into early intervention and initiatives that divert young people from a life of crime. The thing that upsets me most when I hear about these horrific stories is the victims and the way that the lives of innocent people are just disrupted. Something else that also deeply distresses me is the fact that young people are getting involved in lives of crime more and more. The other thing we are asking is for police to be properly funded so we can keep police stations open.

Like I said, the first responsibility of any government is to keep its citizens safe. However, in this state every 50 seconds a crime is committed. Every single day there are another 750 victims of crime in this state. With home invasions, statistics show that it is the same 1000 children that are committing four out of five home invasions – kids that are out on bail. Every 16 minutes a car is stolen in this state. Retail crime is on the rise. Despite the fact that PSOs have been taken from train stations and redeployed to shopping centres, retail crime is still on the rise. There have been some absolutely horrific crimes committed at train stations, and I am going to bring up some of those. Crimes committed with banned weapons, such as machetes, are up 10 per cent, despite the machete bins. There is more than one reason why we need to get this under control.

There are a few things I am going to speak about, but first I want to read some stories that have been emailed to my office. I have contacted these victims of crime and asked them if I can share these stories. I want to share a few emails that have been sent to me, because this is exactly why we need to get control of the crime in this state. This is a young girl from Pakenham. She says:

I’m writing because, honestly, I no longer feel safe in the community where we chose to start our family.

…

My partner and I have tried to take every precaution we can. We’ve spent money we don’t really have installing cameras all around our rental property. Unfortunately, they feel almost pointless when it seems like cameras no longer deter people from attempting break ins or causing damage. We’ve even had conversations about rearranging our bedrooms to think about the safest place to hide if a home invasion happened.

That is not how young families should have to live … and it’s not the Pakenham I thought we were moving to when we decided to build our life here in 2023.

…

We’ve had our car egged. Our home has been egged. These might sound like small things compared to other incidents, but they add up and contribute to the feeling that things are becoming less safe.

I found that amazing – I think it is well articulated – but I am going to read more from her email:

I’m writing to ask what is being done to address the growing concerns around safety in Pakenham and how residents like myself can be involved in solutions. Whether that means stronger community programs, better prevention strategies, more visible policing, or forums where residents can discuss these issues and work together, I would welcome the opportunity to be part of that conversation.

…

I want my son to grow up in a community where families feel safe in their homes, where people feel comfortable walking their streets, and where the kindness that used to define our local community is stronger than the fear many of us are beginning to feel.

That is an incredible email from a young girl that really articulates why we need to do these things. Here is another one that I received from another victim of crime. This one took place in a train station, and that is why I raise the point that, regardless of the fact that a lot of these PSOs have been redeployed from train stations –

Michael Galea interjected.

Renee HEATH: No, they have been redeployed – taken from train stations.

Michael Galea interjected.

Renee HEATH: I want to bring up Aiden Becker soon. I do not want this to be politicised, if that is okay.

The statistics show that people were taken off train stations and put into shopping centres, and retail theft is still up. This is a man that has raised an issue where he was brutally attacked at a train station where there were no PSOs. I normally love engaging in a bit of cross-chamber debate and banter, but I am not going to here. I am going to read his email. He is a veteran, professional engineer and academic. The email states:

I would like to share with you a story that relates to your shadow ministries as it exemplifies the Labor government’s negligence in dealing with crime in general and safety on public transport.

On Tuesday afternoon, I was assaulted at the Highett station by a man who obviously was strung out on drugs (bystanders agreed … He took offence at his dog barking at me so he rushed me and repeatedly punched me in the head with full force, ripping my shirt down the middle as I tried to get out of his grip. I could not run due to a recent surgery, so I was trapped …

I was terrified he was going to kill me, and I have no doubt that I am alive only because three brave bystanders stepped in to save me …

After 40 minutes, I gave up waiting for the promised police to arrive. A couple of PSOs finally came in on a train and chatted but took no details from me and went on their way. Hyperventilating and afraid I might faint, I called my wife to drive me to Chelsea Police Station. By the next morning, the police had identified the assailant from a bystander’s photos. He will likely be arrested next week. The investigating police officer, who has been wonderfully helpful, could not enlist the help of detectives responsible for the train network … as they said it did not meet their ‘threshold’.

That a man could be so brazenly strung out in public on drugs shows how normalised such misbehaviour has become under Labor’s soft-on-drugs attitude.

I want to remind you this was not written by me. This was written by somebody who reached out to me.

That he could feel so entitled to punch me in broad daylight in front of witnesses and cameras suggests he knew he would get away with it, or suffer little consequence, given the government’s indifference to crime. That the police didn’t rush to the station suggests they are under-resourced. This government has … failed to maintain community safety.

The government has re-tasked PSOs to privately-owned shopping centres and has proposed pulling them off some stations. They just don’t get it.

[QUOTE AWAITING VERIFICATION]

This is not the Melbourne we started out in. It is crime ridden. Why would we spend billions of dollars on a new train line if it is unsafe for people like me to use it anymore?

Another person who had a very similar story to this one emailed me and then sent me this follow-up email:

[QUOTE AWAITING VERIFICATION]

I’ve got some new information. Police told me that the attacker will be charged when witnesses’ statements are signed. Wondering why this person felt so free to be out on drugs and whack somebody. Labor has made public intoxication legal. Violent behaviour, then, shouldn’t be unexpected.

Those are not my words, but the words of people who have reached out to me.

There are a couple of things I want to talk about. The first one is that I was, sadly, at Aiden Becker’s memorial after he was murdered. There is no way we can gloss over this. He was violently murdered by somebody he did not know, stabbed to death at the Mernda train station. His family’s lives and his community’s lives have been ripped apart. When I was there I stayed after that memorial – it was one of those days I will never forget – and started talking to a lot of people there that were visibly upset. You could see that they were heartbroken. I went up to one group of young kids and said, ‘Did you know Aidan?’ They said, ‘No. We knew of him,’ like many people there did. We began to talk about it. They were beautiful young boys. One of them grabbed out his phone and showed me a video of himself being chased by somebody with a machete at exactly the same spot as where Aidan had been murdered, and it was two years ago. I said, ‘Hang on, what happened about this? Did you go to the police?’ and he said he did. I am not saying this is right or wrong; this is his perception. I said, ‘Well, what did they do?’ and he said, ‘I felt that because of the way I looked they judged me and thought it would have been my fault.’ I am not saying that is right or wrong, but that is how the victim of this crime felt. I asked him to send me the footage, and he said, ‘I would love to talk to you about it at a later date; at this stage I don’t want to make this about me,’ because we were there grieving the death of beautiful Aidan. The fact that that happened there two years ago and was reported to the police is just unbelievable to me. We need to do something about this. We need to have police that are resourced. We need to have laws that protect people.

I am not going to have time to talk about all of them, but I want to raise the fact that recently adult time for violent crime came into effect in the state of Victoria. The government said that this was based on what has worked in Queensland. However, what has made it work in Queensland is the fact that every off-ramp has been given to children because it has invested $100 million into prevention programs. We have not done this here. The Labor government have taken the slogan and made a law around that but have totally missed out the fact that they have not invested the $100 million to give off-ramps to kids. Not only that, the budget papers show us that $20 million has been cut from crime prevention in the state of Victoria. To me cutting the prevention programs and not investing into what it is that kids need to not get involved in a life of crime, while simultaneously raising the bar for young kids, is immoral.

I do not want to see prisons filled with kids. That to me is a tragedy. These are kids. Imagine your niece or your nephew or your son or your daughter or whoever is connected to you being locked up for a lifetime. Something does need to happen in this state, and there do need to be consequences, but there have to be consequences run in parallel with prevention. We have to be smart on prevention and tough on crime – and that is what we will do. We are going to invest $100 million into prevention programs for kids. We are going to have – the first of its kind in Victoria – a residential program that takes repeat offenders between the ages of 12 and 17. I have nephews that age. If they commit a crime, yes, they absolutely must be responsible, but for kids like them we need to provide a way for them to turn their lives around.

In here I spoke yesterday about the biggest indicator of whether or not a child will become involved in crime being whether or not they can read and write. One of the things we will do is have – the first of its kind – a residential, live-in program that has four pillars. The first one is discipline, so these kids know that they are above what they feel. They might feel like they are hopeless, they might feel like they want to carry out a crime, but we are going to provide them with the discipline to show them they can live above their feelings. The second part is education. I do not have the time, because I have got 2 minutes on the clock, to talk about that, but that one is quite obvious. We want to upskill them so they actually have an opportunity to get away from that life of crime. The third thing is life skills. We want these kids to be able to break the cycle of whatever it is that has got them here in the first place. And the fourth part is therapy, helping them overcome whatever barrier it is that got them there in the first place.

The second thing that we are going to invest in is a youth start program, which is essentially another four pillars. This is for kids that are at risk, kids that are going down a certain path. This will establish regional youth justice hubs that have day programs and cognitive behavioural therapy and reach out to the community. Second, we are going to have targeted mentoring programs for kids that are going down a bad path to help them believe in themselves. The third one is early intervention pathways so these kids can have off-ramps before they get to these issues. And the fourth one is family-based therapy, so we can help these people tackle whatever it is at home to help deal with these issues.

We will bring in Jack’s law, which is going to be preventative and will allow PSOs to essentially take a wand to find out if there are weapons. We are going to go further than in Queensland, where there have to be certain areas that allow this: we are going to allow it everywhere. I have not got time to talk about ‘break bail, face jail’ and the other things in here, but I really hope that you know we are coming in good faith. I commend this motion to the house.

 David LIMBRICK (South-Eastern Metropolitan) (11:01): I would like to speak a bit about this motion about crime. I think we can all agree that crime is a big problem in Victoria. What we are really talking about is not whether crime exists or not, because it certainly does exist, or whether people feel scared at the moment or not, because they certainly do feel scared. I know in the south-east I have spoken to many people who were victims of home invasions, assaults, robberies and all sorts of things, and it is pretty bad out there at the moment. People are worried, people are scared, and rightly so, when crime is out of control like this. Certainly I have spoken many, many times about organised crime as well and the failure of the government and actually the opposition to acknowledge and attack the root causes of this type of crime.

I find it interesting, though, that one of the failures pointed out here is around the machete ban. Now, the opposition is pointing out that this is a failed policy. To remind everyone, this policy was not originally a government policy. They were goaded into it for years by the opposition, and the government foolishly caved in and agreed to do this machete ban. Of course it has turned out to be totally ineffective. In fact it was ridiculed by everyone; it was ridiculed by the opposition themselves when the machete bins came out. I do not know what the opposition thought was going to happen when these machetes were banned, how they were going to be collected. Maybe they thought that police time would be better served by collecting these machetes rather than putting them in bins out the front of the stations. But nevertheless, it was a stupid policy ridiculed by all, even the Liberal Party, even though it was their own policy.

So you would think that there would be some humility before proposing other solutions, such as some of the solutions proposed here. One of these solutions, which I take great issue with, is this idea of a protest registration system. Now, I do not know what sort of Australia the opposition want to live in, but the type of Australia that I envision is one of a free country, a free Western democracy. In free countries, we should not have to go to the police and fill in a form and ask them for permission to protest. That is not how a free country works. The opposition seem to think that if they give the police the power to decide whether or not people are allowed to protest, sacrificing liberty will somehow get them safety, and of course we know it will get them neither. It will get Victorians neither.

This is the other proposal: Jack’s law. For those that are not familiar with this, it is like the opposition went to the airport, saw all the scanners and people being scanned and thought, ‘Well, that’s wonderful, let’s make the whole state like that’ – because that is exactly what they are proposing, to allow police to electronically search anyone at will. They have done this in Queensland, and if the opposition had looked at some of the studies on this – Griffith University came out with some research on the implementation of this – it has had no effect on knife crime whatsoever. Despite them discovering knives, it has had no effect on knife crime whatsoever. Again we have sacrificed liberty for safety and gotten neither. These are proposals that are not evidence based. They do not achieve their stated goal, like the machete ban, which was another failure. In fact I would have a lot of respect for the government if they got up – maybe Mr Galea is going to do it – and said, ‘We made a mistake with the machete ban. It hasn’t actually been effective.’ He probably will not do that. But it would be nice for the government, for once, to say, ‘We tried something and it didn’t work, so we’re going to try something else. We’ve learned from this mistake, that it didn’t work.’ It would be nice, and I think Victorians would have a lot more respect for the government if they said occasionally, ‘We made a mistake.’ I never hear the government say that really, but it was a mistake.

What are some things that could be done to fight crime? We all know, with organised crime – I have spoken many times about it, and I do not blame the state government so much for this but the federal government – we have seen what has happened because of the tobacco excise tax. It has caused an explosion in organised crime. We were getting firebombings of tobacconists, but now we are getting them at ice-cream shops and all sorts of other shops. Make of that what you will. But the firebombings have not ceased. Ironically, the firebombings are more expensive now due to petrol prices. I do not know whether that will have any effect on it.

But there are other things that we can do. I have spoken about it many times. If people feel unsafe, you know what, a lot of people in Victoria would feel safer if they had pepper spray. It is actually ridiculous that we force people to be totally unarmed and unable to defend themselves. I have spoken about it many times. There was a case recently where two women were attacked at a place of business by a violent offender. One of them happened to have pepper spray. She used it. It was caught on video. You can see it on my social media. It was published in the newspapers and on television. She used the pepper spray. It was highly effective. This violent man was attacking two women and succeeded in hurting one of them quite seriously, is my understanding. They used pepper spray. He retreated immediately and went down the street. He was yelling and screaming on the street because his eyes were burning, and he started taking off his clothes because they were covered in pepper spray. It made it very easy for the police to catch him, and he was arrested and charged.

Michael Galea interjected.

David LIMBRICK: He could have had pepper spray, and I am glad Mr Galea has brought that up. He was wondering, ‘What if this offender had pepper spray?’ In fact the Northern Territory had that same concern, when they went through their trial recently, about pepper spray. Their number one concern was the number one concern brought up in this place about pepper spray: what happens if offenders use it? It seems that everyone that brings this up has not actually looked at jurisdictions that have legalised pepper spray, because this rarely happens. In fact after the Northern Territory’s trial they concluded that this concern was totally unfounded, and they went ahead with permanent legalisation of pepper spray in the Northern Territory. That is not a good concern, not a valid concern.

The reason actually is very easy to understand. Criminals already can choose any weapon that they want. They could choose pepper spray if they wanted to. They do not choose pepper spray, because it is a very ineffective weapon for offensive crimes. If you want to rob someone, it is very difficult to rob them when they are covered with pepper spray. You cannot touch them. If you want to physically harm someone, it is very difficult to do it when they are covered with pepper spray. It is not very good for that. Criminals, as we know, prefer knives, machetes and guns. Those are what they choose. They have the entire selection of weapons to choose from, and they are what they choose because they are far more effective for committing offensive crimes. Pepper spray is rarely used in offensive crime, as has been borne out by the trial in the Northern Territory. They were concerned about that, and they concluded that it was a non-issue. They have gone ahead and made it permanent, and Victoria should follow suit. Maybe the government, if they are concerned about it being used in offensive crimes, should have a look at what the Northern Territory government has done. It is very effective, and I know that there are many women in Victoria especially who would love to possess pepper spray.

Back to this case where the woman used pepper spray – very effectively, I might add – many people, including me, were concerned that she was going to get charged with possession of pepper spray, because in Victoria it is a prohibited weapon. You can go to jail for up to two years, and even if you do not go to jail, you can have a criminal record. Keep in mind that the people that continue to support this prohibition on pepper spray believe that this woman, who defended herself from a violent criminal, should go to jail. She should be the one going to jail, because that is the reality of your policy position on this, right? The police disagreed with you. They said it was not in the public interest to press charges. They did not press charges. Even the police thought that there was nothing to be gained by charging this woman with prohibited weapons offences. I commend the police on their good decision here. I would be interested if the government want to continue their prohibition on pepper spray. I would like to hear their justification for why that woman should go to jail, because I do not think she should. I do not think that any Victorian thinks she should. I think that all Victorians would side with her against this offender and not with the government, who wants to put her in jail, because that is the reality of the government’s position. I think that the government urgently needs to look at what Northern Territory are doing and what they have done very successfully, and we need to do it in Victoria as well. I think it would be a massively popular thing for them to do. It would not even be risky for them. I think that would be a very popular thing. It blows my mind why the opposition are not proposing it – I have no idea. I think it would be a hugely popular thing. But nevertheless I will not be supporting this motion, because I do not support restricting people’s liberties for this vain hope that it will somehow curb crime, because it will not.

 Michael GALEA (South-Eastern Metropolitan) (11:11): I am pleased to rise to speak on the motion that has been brought forth today by Dr Heath. I always appreciate the contribution of Mr Limbrick too. It is good to be challenged from outside the box, and Mr Limbrick always does that. This is an important subject. Victorians have a right to feel safe in their homes, going out and about at the shops and in their workplaces. I do want to touch on quite a few things that have been gone into, but I want to, at the outset, acknowledge that this government recognised that more work was required and we are doing that work, and where we need to continue to reassess, look, listen, say what has worked and what has not and do more, we will do so. I am very pleased that we have seen reforms such as adult time for violent crime, County Court uplifts in certain violent crime cases for young offenders, extremely tough penalties for those adults who try to groom children and teenagers into criminal offending and all these many other measures, which I will go into, and indeed, touching on Dr Heath’s comments, many early intervention measures too, because they are critically important.

This motion has come about in light of recent crime statistics, which do show that whilst crime levels are increasing, they are increasing at a slower level than they had been previously. We are starting to see a dent in those crime statistics as a result of these measures and in particular in relation to both the tougher sentences but also those bail reforms, which have progressively come in with the bulk of those reforms – the second tranche of those reforms coming in just in the last couple of months. I am very much looking forward to seeing the next lot of crime statistics once these reforms have been fully set in and to see the impact that they have.

Whilst I am and remain concerned about rising crime rates in my electorate, including in some areas such as Greater Dandenong, Casey and Cardinia, I do note, pleasingly, that in Knox and Kingston we have seen the effects already of those policies, with those crime rates coming down considerably in fact in the case of Knox and stabilising in both Frankston and Monash. There is considerable work that is being done, and I think it is worth commenting on some of it. We know that we need to resource our police to do their jobs as best they can. We are seeing some issues at the moment: despite the fact that we do have the largest standing police force in the country in Victoria Police, we are seeing quite a number of workforce shortages in the police force, in PSOs and in other various sectors as well. This is not for lack or want of trying. There are significant recruitment campaigns underway right now, and the resources and the capacity are there for these police vacancies. This government is committed to working with Victoria Police, with the Police Association Victoria and with others to ensure that we get police on the front lines, where they need to be. It is also not just about the raw numbers. Our role is to provide the investment into Victoria Police. It is not to dictate to them how to go about the operational work that they do. I do note that the Chief Commissioner of Police’s new reforms seek to get police reservists – retired police officers – into police stations to do that sort of back office work as much as possible to free up policing resources for the frontline work, visible policing out in the community where it matters most. There are a number of things I would like to come to, particularly retail crime.

Another point of this motion, which Dr Heath has emphasised, is the role of early interventions. On this I do completely agree – early interventions are absolutely critical. We have brought in the toughest bail laws in the country and tougher sentences for repeat and violent offenders. These are all very important measures. But we cannot just have the consequence; we need to have, for want of a better word, the carrot. You want to have the early interventions in place to support these young people in particular to avoid that life of offending. We have seen the recent announcement of the rollout of early intervention officers in schools across Victoria, including a couple in my electorate, which I welcome as well – that direct feed-in. We have also seen the violence reduction unit, which is already up and running, targeting areas that are peaking, areas of concern that are coming up. I look forward to seeing the work that the VRU will be undertaking in the south-east as well, particularly those spots where we have seen those increases of crime relative to other parts of my electorate. This is all very important.

I take Dr Heath’s remarks that she is coming in good faith at face value, and I am no doubt sure that she is. What I struggle with, though, is not so much her good faith but that of her colleagues. On the very day that the VRU was announced last year we had a member of this place who sits just three seats away from Dr Heath get up and do an adjournment to the Minister for Police. This is a direct quote:

… I call on the government to scrap the costly violence reduction unit announced today by the government.

That is appalling. Mrs Hermans may not support the early intervention work that this government is doing, but I can only presume that she is speaking for the Liberal leadership. The Liberal leadership certainly supported her and endorsed her preselection, so I can only assume that when Mrs Hermans comes into this place and says that she wants early interventions such as the violence reduction unit scrapped, that is Liberal Party policy. I hope that from today Dr Heath’s remarks might lead us down a different direction, but we just do not know. Whilst I take her remarks in good faith, I do not think we can take the Liberal Party’s stance on this in good faith when you have members of the Liberal Party coming into this place and saying, ‘Remove the early interventions.’ That is frankly atrocious. It would only make the problem worse if we were to do that. I would appreciate some clarity from Dr Heath in her closing remarks – whether she does stand behind Mrs Hermans’s outrageous statements and whether those statements of Mrs Hermans do reflect the position of the Liberal Party, or whether they are going to distance themselves from them, which they absolutely should. We should get an unequivocal message from the Leader of the Opposition. Does she stand by Mrs Hermans’s comments, or does she support early interventions such as through the violence reduction unit? That is the very least that we can expect from any party that wants to pretend to Victorian voters that it is worthy of government.

I do have some remarks in terms of retail crime. I am anxious that the clock is now working against me, but I do want to turn to this very important topic. I will just talk through a few of the key things. Obviously the bail and sentencing reforms and the early interventions are all very critical to this space. We know there is a scale of offending. We saw just before Christmas last year several hundred young people run amok in a supermarket in my electorate. With the local member Tim Richardson, the member for Mordialloc, we really appreciated the chance to go and meet with the staff who were affected by it. One silver lining out of the visit was whilst we were there one of the parents dragged their daughter in to apologise to the staff, which was very appropriate and very nice to see. But there are continuing concerns around retail crime, and we legislated just last year tougher penalties for those who do seek to violently abuse or assault retail workers, as is appropriate that we did. We will very soon be bringing into the Parliament new laws for workplace protection orders, which will serve to keep retail and other essential service workers safe where there is a particularly violent and repeat offender who is likely to return to a store or other workplace. These will allow for court-enabled mechanisms to keep those people out of those workplaces and to keep workers safe. We have seen early indications from other jurisdictions around Australia of the success of similar initiatives.

We do also have Operation Pulse, which is seeing extra police resources and PSOs deployed to select shopping centres across Melbourne, initially as a summer trial, which has now been extended. I make the point that the PSO hours on Operation Pulse are extra hours as overtime and there are no shifts being taken off railway stations to meet the shopping centre operation. We have already seen dramatically good results from that program, which has now been extended to the end of the year. I have certainly heard from workers in Fountain Gate in my area, and shoppers as well, of the difference that is making, and we have seen the huge stats coming out, which I do not have time to go through, but I will at another opportunity if I can.

 Trung LUU (Western Metropolitan) (11:21): I rise today to speak on this motion put forward by Dr Heath regarding the all-time high crime statistics in Victoria. This motion highlights just a fraction of the consequences of the crime crisis Victorians are facing. The latest figures from the Crime Statistics Agency tell the story that every Victorian already knows, has experienced and has endured under this Labor government. Victoria is in the grip of an unprecedented surge in crime, and it did not happen overnight. Time and time again I have raised questions and concerns over the past years about the rise in crime, the rise in youth offending, the increase in violent crime and how young offenders transition from minor offences to serious crime – from summary offences to indictable offences and then to serious indictable offences – with very little hesitation. This is the result of the Allan Labor government going soft on youth crime, watering down bail laws and weakening sentencing legislation, among many other progressive policies.

In this motion my colleague Dr Heath has outlined the consequences of inaction and the failures that come from poorly designed government policies such as the so-called machete bin initiative. I recall standing in this very place calling on the government to support the reclassification of the machete as a prohibited weapon. Those of us on this side recognised the alarming trend: its increasing misuse, its easy accessibility and its devastating potential. I made it quite clear at the time that regardless of what age the offender was, the person swinging a machete can split a skull open and sever a limb. Yet those opposite dismissed the warning and insisted it was just a knife and only a knife. We all know what followed: a sharp rise in machete-related attacks, an escalation in serious injuries and the weapon becoming a common choice among young offenders involved in aggravated burglaries, home invasions, carjackings – and it goes on. If we fail to act now, Victorians will once again bear the cost of inaction.

In my electorate in Melbourne’s west motor vehicle theft has become one of the fastest escalating threats to the community in Victoria. The problem is most visible in Wyndham, where over 1700 vehicles have been reported stolen. This places Wyndam amongst the highest risk areas in this state. Offenders are becoming more modernised and innovative in their efforts. In Tarneit and Truganina police have intercepted individuals misusing onboard diagnostic devices to bypass vehicle security systems and clone keys. Residents are increasingly finding their cars stolen overnight, even while the keys are still inside their homes. This demonstrates a shift from opportunistic theft to organised, targeted activities.

The Victorian government must ensure that police are properly resourced and equipped with the tools that they need to dismantle organised crime networks and protect our citizens. Aggravated burglaries have surged 45 per cent, and the impact on Victorians is profound. These home invasions are not merely property crimes, they are acts of terror committed in the very places where people should feel safest. It is no surprise that many Victorians no longer feel safe in their homes. Households have endured forced entries carried out by offenders armed with weapons, ransacking properties and violently confronting victims. Communities are left grappling with psychological trauma from repeated violent incursions, and the sense of safety that they once their homes has been taken and shaken.

Our dedicated men and women in blue have always performed strongly to protect Victorians from these incidents. I know because I worked among them for many years. However, they cannot continue this standard or even try to do better if the Allan Labor government deprives them of proper funding, proper resources and the manpower to look after the growing population.

Some have attempted to suggest that young offenders cannot distinguish between right and wrong. Certain voices in this chamber have promoted an ideology that 14-year-olds who damage properties, commit robberies and assault other people somehow lack understanding of their actions. This narrative does not help Victorians. It does not help the surge in crime. It makes it worse. Let me be clear: young people are not foolish. They are bright, capable and resourceful. Their backgrounds, whether they come from disadvantage, limited education or a challenging home, do not take away their ability to understand the consequences. If they have an obstacle in front of them, they will find a way around it. So when a 13- or 14-year-old youth with no physical or cognitive impairment strikes someone with a weapon in order to steal their belongings, they know exactly what they are doing. They know the force they use will hurt someone. They know it will cause pain. They know that the pain makes the victim submit so they can take away what they want. Young offenders who commit violent crimes are not acting in ignorance, they are making choices. Victorians deserve a justice system that acknowledges this reality and protects our community.

Too often, young offenders who are given opportunities through intervention programs and outreach initiatives abuse these opportunities. Many come to see these programs as little more than a get-out-of-jail card. And when young offenders fail to attend these sessions, what happens then? In most cases, they are simply given another chance, referred to another program, and the cycle continues right up until their next arrest. It becomes a revolving door, as most policemen would say, just like what we see in the bail system: bail, reoffend, arrest, rebail, offend, arrest and rebail again. This pattern sends entirely the wrong message. It tells young offenders consequences are minimal, that accountability is optional and that the system will always give them another chance, no matter how many victims they create. There must be clear consequences, real consequences. Without them, we are setting young people up to fail and leaving the community vulnerable to continued harm.

Police need more resources, as I mentioned, on the front line and staff resources to respond to incidents quickly and effectively. Anyone familiar with the system knows the extraordinary amount of paperwork, referrals, follow-up obligations and court involvement for even a single family violence incident. So when I say Victoria Police need better resources, more manpower, and less administrative burden, it is an understatement. To help police prevent family violence–related assault from occurring in the first place, Victoria needs stronger tools, proactive tools, to stop harm before it happens. This includes initiatives such as the ‘right to ask, right to know’ scheme, as is mentioned in this motion, which will allow people to request information about partners’ violence history, and the criminalisation of coercive control. The government must act to protect victims before the harms occur, not only after. Our community deserve nothing less.

I will keep it short; I am close to the last minute. Under this government, the number of criminal incidents in Victoria has risen to 29 per cent over the past two years. This is the highest number of events in two decades. The government has cut police resources, allowed police stations to close and failed to introduce laws that deter criminals from committing serious offences. Safety is not a privilege – it is a fundamental expectation of the community. Victorians have every right to feel safe in their homes, on the street and in their communities, and they deserve a system that delivers exactly that. In the last 30 seconds, this motion gives an overarching lesson in what happens when a government fails to acknowledge a crisis, act properly and have proper policies to attack and deter crime. I will leave it there.

 Jeff BOURMAN (Eastern Victoria) (11:31): I stand to make a contribution in support of this motion. The facts are the facts – all incidents are up: aggravated burglaries, which are home invasions, up by 24 per cent; motor vehicle theft, up by 56 per cent. And given how hard it is to steal a car the old-fashioned way, by hot-wiring it and all that, that can only mean one of two things: either an aggravated burglary or a burglary. Someone has got to get the keys; it is just not that easy. There are other ways, I suppose. The one that really perturbs me is that family violence serious assaults are up. There is a lot of work that has gone into the family violence arena over the years I have been here, but it does not appear to be reaping results, and I wonder if it is time for a fundamental shift in the approach and how it is going. Family violence is one of the things that really affected me whilst I was in the police force; when going to these situations, it became apparent then that it was not as easy as I had thought. And maybe the so-called fixes we have seen over the years are not as easy as they thought. But we cannot just rest on our laurels. As a society we need we need to do better.

But getting to the reasons why I feel that this is happening, why the data is going up, on police numbers for starters there are 1500 or so positions vacant every single day, plus around another thousand sick every single day. Now, being a police officer exposes you to trauma, both mental and physical, and also, as I found out the hard way, you get diseases from people, and it is no fun at all. So the number of people sick is something that probably cannot be dealt with as far as – you have got to look after those with mental health issues, but the trauma and the other stuff are medical issues. The support given to officers in mental distress is anecdotally not very good. Also, I have got to say, as coppers you are encouraged to suck it up somewhat and move on, and as everyone finds out, everyone’s piece of string for dealing with those matters is different to the others.

But why would people not want to join the police force now? It was a big thing in my time there that people did want to. But we saw COVID, and I can assure you that no-one joined the police force and went through all the stuff you go through in the academy to kick kids off playground equipment. We saw people like the traffic management guy that was going lights and bells to an event, and he was charged by the department. It made it to the first hearing where basically the magistrate threw it out. Slightly off our beaten track, Zach Rolfe in the Northern Territory. The treatment of police by the government – and I am not pointing at this government – of their own people, is getting next level. I would not recommend it to anyone at the moment. Things go wrong. Police need to be held to account, absolutely, but it has to be reasonable. You are putting normal people in situations that the average person might go through once in their lifetime, but they are doing it two or three times a day, and sooner or later something is going to come up where people are forced to make a split-second decision, on which everyone has weeks to figure out what should have gone on and blah, blah, blah.

I feel a societal shift or even a governmental shift towards the protection of the officers on the beat. Doing things in good faith and within policy should never end up in a court – never, ever, ever. The machete laws – I heard Mr Limbrick go on about them. Basically, only law-abiding people obey laws. It apparently has not changed a thing. Ironically, I believe the massive number of machetes they got off the street were from the dealers, so none actually got off the street.

One of the things I have had an issue with is the move-on laws. When it came out that they were going to be moved on there was a big furore about it, and a lot of it was to do with industrial relations problems. I figure that the police need a move-on law or power – call it what you will – but they need to work with the unions so that legitimate industrial action is not affected. I am sure, with the power of the government and all the resources it has, it could work out something.

But I am going to move on – and it is only going to be a fairly short contribution – to investing in early intervention initiatives to divert at-risk youths from a life of crime. The other day we had Blue Light Victoria in here. Blue Light Victoria has over 50 years experience in delivering the early intervention programs. I think most of us remember Blue Light discos, which I did not go to – discos are not my thing. But it works with a lot of community organisations as well as emergency services, and particularly the police, to reduce youth offending but also normalise contact with police. A lot of people that go off the rails have only ever had a negative experience, and they see police as someone that comes and bustles them up, puts them in a van and goes off and deals with them; they do not realise that they can be helpful as well. It depends on your perspective, I guess. They do mentoring for at-risk young people. There are a lot of restorative justice practices, where you do not just lock them up and throw away the keys; there is time to work with kids, because when kids are at the beginning of their life and not towards the end of their life there is still hope for them. They do school- and community-based intervention programs. They can also help with training and apprenticeship pathways. There are a whole lot of things they can help with, but they need help. The Blue Light disco program is always after funding. It should be something, I figured, that was funded in full by every government, but moving on, it has been around since 2012. There is a lot of evidence that it does work. It is the only youth organisation embedded with the Australian Federal Police, Victoria Police and emergency services across all the programs.

Investment is essential for the purposes of taking the pressure off the other systems. I do not have forever, but I could go on about the justice system and all that. But one way of reducing the pressure on the justice system is keeping the kids diverted from there. If they do something wrong, they get punished. But we as a society should be doing our best to try and keep them out of the system, and this is a way. It may not be the way; it will not work for everyone of course, but it will help. The current funding is set to cease this year, and our budget is coming up, so I would like to hope that the government has seen the light and will do this. It is established. It is already there. There is nothing to build; it has just to continue. But if government – federal and state governments – do not invest, then it stops, and what good it does do just evaporates. I feel that this is an opportunity for what is a fairly modest investment by a government that should not be passed by. It is something that has proven itself. It is something that will deliver results. For at least every kid it keeps out of the system or diverts away from the system, it is helping the bottom line. It is helping by the fact that the justice system does not have to deal with them. Their families do not have to deal with them in a negative way, and in the end, a problem avoided is far better than a problem dealt with. I will leave my contribution there.

 Ryan BATCHELOR (Southern Metropolitan) (11:40): I am pleased to rise to speak on Dr Heath’s motion about crime and police. It is a wideranging motion covering a range of issues. These are significant and serious issues and ones that we have obviously dealt with on a number of occasions over the last couple of years, responding to legitimate and real community concerns that have existed about the rise in criminal activity in the community and responding to the needs and desires of all Victorians to feel safe, particularly in their own homes. Fundamentally every Victorian has a right to feel safe in their home and safe in the community where they live and work and play. This government have been listening to the community about what they want to see, and we have been acting to make sure that the laws are in place to deal with the changing nature of criminal offending, that the police have the resources and the powers that they need to effectively deal with crime and that the Parliament makes it clear to the courts what our expectations are with things like bail and sentencing matters. I think it has been very clear that the fundamental point that Victorians have a right to feel safe in their homes and in their communities is something that this Labor government absolutely believes in and absolutely supports, and we have been acting in a range of areas to make sure that the laws are in place that are needed and the resources are in place that are needed to deal with rates of criminal offending in our community.

We do know that there has been in recent years an increase in rates of violent youth offending across the community. You do not need to just read statistics to understand that; you can go and talk to the community. I have certainly had many conversations with members of the community across the Southern Metropolitan Region about crime matters, and I have spoken with local police in various parts of Southern Metro, whether from the Boroondara area, whether from the Bayside area or whether from Moorabbin or Port Phillip. There has been a range of conversations that we have had over the last couple of years about the way that the police report to us, the different and changing nature of the crimes that they are facing and certainly the concerns that members of the community have about criminal activity and the impact it is having on their lives.

I have spent quite a lot of time in particular talking with the very good people at Neighbourhood Watch Bayside, who have done a really excellent job in engaging with their community about ways that every household can take steps to improve and increase their own safety. That has really been a community-led response to keep individuals and households safe. There are little things that we all can do to make ourselves safer in our homes and in our communities – locking cars and doors is just one example. Neighbourhood Watch Bayside in particular, who I have spent a lot of time talking with, have been really great at getting out and having those conversations with the community. They have also been forthright and forthcoming in talking with me as an elected member in the area about the sorts of changes that they want to see made to the criminal law and to bail and sentencing provisions. As a representative of that community I have been bringing those concerns back to government, and government has been listening. You can see that through things like the suite of changes we have made – for example, the adult time for violent crime reforms, ensuring that young offenders who commit certain violent, serious crimes face serious consequences by the uplifting of more trials and sentencing from the Children’s Court to the County Court; increasing the maximum penalty for recruiting a child to engage in violent offences to 15 years across the board; and introducing a new life sentence for youth gang recruiters who recruit children into serious and violent offending.

Importantly, the government has also backed the new Chief Commissioner of Victoria Police Mike Bush’s reforms to get more police out from behind a desk and onto the streets, because fundamentally we know that the community feels safer and is safer when we have got more of our uniformed officers out on the streets either deterring or investigating crime, and the work that the chief commissioner is doing to try and get people out from behind the desk and onto the streets has been something that has significant support from the government.

The other thing that we have done, in addition to strengthening and toughening the consequences for those who commit crimes, is actually put work into trying to prevent some of that criminal behaviour from occurring in the first place. It has been really significant, I think, the work that the government has done to establish the new world-leading violence reduction unit in Victoria, which is seeking to reduce violent youth crime through early intervention, and to make sure that we are investing to prevent crimes from occurring before they do whilst strengthening the laws to provide real and necessary consequences for those who choose to break the law. We have also invested in and recently made further announcements about the location of early intervention officers in schools to intervene earlier in the lives of children who are starting to go down the wrong path. It is important to invest in prevention as well as tough consequences and more resources for police.

We know that not every member of the Liberal Party agrees with some of the measures we are taking to prevent crime. We know that there has been criticism from members of this chamber, members of the Liberal Party in this chamber, who have called for the violence reduction unit to be scrapped. I cannot fathom why any member of this place who is concerned about their community and concerned about community safety would get up and decide they want to scrap the violence reduction unit. It is a really important part of the suite of measures that we are taking as a government to deal with violent crime in our community, to deal with increased rates of youth offending. You need tough consequences, you need more resources in police, you need resources going into prevention and you need to be preventing that crime from starting. For Liberal Party members to get up and say they want to scrap the violence reduction unit I think is astounding and confounding, and I think it demonstrates just how out of touch they are with what is necessary to deal with youth offending in the community.

There have been obviously a range of laws and a range of actions that we have taken over the last couple of years to deal with increased rates of youth offending and to deal with increased rates of crime in the community. I think what we have seen is that there is progress being made on these issues. The latest sets of crime statistics do demonstrate that there are early signs of promising results from the suite of measures that I have talked about. Record refusals of bail and bail revocations are helping to keep high-harm young offenders off our streets. Victoria Police are holding more offenders to account, with more being remanded for serious offences like home invasion, aggravated burglary, assault and theft. Overall, crime rates do remain unacceptably high, but our measures are working.

I had a look just recently at some of the latest crime statistics, and I was talking with some members of Victoria Police who cover parts of the Southern Metro area. We are seeing some promising signs. In the Bayside area, the latest crime stats show a slight decrease in the offence rate and a slightly larger decrease in the offence rate in Glen Eira and in Kingston. Much of that is being driven by reductions in the number of burglaries and break and enters, which are down by 6.2 per cent in Bayside, around 13 per cent in Glen Eira and around 24 per cent in the City of Kingston. There is a lot more that needs to be done, and we need to remain absolutely vigilant to ensure that the laws we are changing are having an effect, that the extra resources we are providing are going to police to get them out from behind the desk to the front line and that we are working to prevent crime before it occurs.

 Sonja TERPSTRA (North-Eastern Metropolitan) (11:50): I also rise to make a contribution on this motion in Dr Heath’s name in regard to crime statistics. I just want to say at the outset that my thoughts are always with anybody who is a victim of crime. It is something that I know Mr Batchelor remarked on and other speakers have remarked on: every Victorian has the right to feel safe. Whether it be in their own home or whether they are walking on the street or shopping or in whatever setting that they wish to participate in in life, everybody has the right to feel safe. Unfortunately we do see a lot of reporting on crime when it happens and on victims of crime. It is always an unnerving situation, whether you are seeing it on the news, whether you are hearing about it from friends or whether you have been personally affected. It is something that, again, is never a good thing. As I said, my thoughts and sympathies are always with people who have experienced crime and any trauma associated with being a victim of crime.

The statistics are one thing, but it is also important to focus on the stories about what is behind crime and also on the investment that our government is putting into addressing crime. It is sad that, unfortunately, there are many drivers of crime. We can talk about statistics, but unfortunately the drivers of crime are known, and they often eventuate from things like family violence affecting young children in the home or from abuse or neglect – a whole range of things. That is something that is very difficult and challenging, but also something that our government understands only too well is that early intervention is a very key part of helping to not only drive down crime but stop it before it starts. What we know is that early intervention is far more effective as a tool or as a mechanism to address the reasons for crime.

Once somebody becomes incarcerated as a consequence of committing a crime, oftentimes that individual for the first time in their lives might be getting some kind of intervention that might actually assist them to turn their lives around. It is a sad factor that once somebody becomes incarcerated they may end up going through a revolving door of incarceration, whether it is in juvenile justice, for example, in the first instance or perhaps then as they become older and become an inmate in an adult prison setting. Those things are always regrettable because that person is still a person. Our job as government is to try and assist that person to rehabilitate so that they do not go on to commit more crime. It is always challenging. Some people, once they come into a custodial setting, will for the first time in their lives have access to medical treatment or psychological treatment. They may have an underlying disorder that has not been previously diagnosed, and that is a very sad fact. Sometimes these are things that can go into part of the reasons why people commit crime. But again, that is very cold comfort to anybody who has been the victim of a crime.

Before I do talk about the investment our government is making, I just again want to thank Victoria Police and every police officer on the beat, whether they be on the beat or in a police station, for the very important work that they do. I know that police officers, whilst they are on the front line and attending to crimes and addressing these matters in the community, often make important linkages with communities as well. We know that community policing type of role is critically important so that young people from various groups or backgrounds can see police officers in their own community and understand the important work that they do. There is a vital role for our police officers, who obviously are at the end of trying to catch people who have committed violent crimes, and then we have those people that get put before the courts to receive sentencing. It is a very important role that the police do and a difficult and challenging role, so I thank them for all of that.

I am going to talk a little bit about statistics, but statistics do not tell the entire story. Contrary to what those opposite might be saying, our reforms are delivering results. We have had record bail refusals and revocations, which is keeping more offenders off our streets. If they are breaking their bail conditions, their bail is being revoked and they are being put back into custody. There are more people who are being remanded for serious offences like home invasion, aggravated burglary, assault and theft. Whilst the crime rate remains unacceptable, these results show that our approach is working. As I said, we are backing Victoria Police with record investment and the Chief Commissioner of Police’s plan to get more officers out from behind desks and onto the front line. We know that Victoria Police, for example, are making record numbers of arrests. They have arrested over 78,000 people in the last 12 months alone. Our hardworking and dedicated police officers are absolutely out there on the job doing very important work. As I said earlier, I thank them for that. It is a difficult job. You can see from the statistics that I have just highlighted that our hardworking police officers are working harder than ever and are achieving real results.

In terms of knife crime, we know that too many people have had access to knives, but we have made some initiatives on that. We had our machete bin program, but also we have introduced a range of laws to disrupt and prevent knife crime. We have expanded Victoria Police’s stop-and-search powers and our machete bin program, as I touched on earlier. We are investing a million dollars in funding to procure over 840 additional handheld metal detectors, and that will support Victoria Police in conducting searches for dangerous edged weapons. Our machete bin program saw over 12,000 dangerous weapons handed in by members of the community over that amnesty period, and our expanded stop-and-search powers helped to seize another 17,400 dangerous knives, which were taken off our streets. Those things are a testament to the success of that program, and it is having results. I know those opposite might say that it is not enough, but there is tangible work and tangible results that are in fact being achieved.

This approach of trying to drive down crime is not a one-size-fits-all approach. We need to be responsive to the challenges that are being presented. I do remark on some of the remarks that our Premier made in regard to this when the police were talking about the types of crime that they were seeing, and some of these things were new and they had never seen them before. When we have new sorts of presentations of these things, obviously new responses are required. That is why we are working with Victoria Police and listening to them about the sorts of things that they need.

Just on the early intervention front, we have established our world-leading violence reduction unit in Victoria, which will reduce violent youth crime through early intervention. As I said earlier, that is critically important. It includes a $7.7 million investment for youth mentors to connect kids with reformed offenders, so people who have that lived experience can connect with offenders and talk to them about getting them back on the right path. There is a further $5.6 million for early intervention officers in our schools to intervene early in the lives of children who are heading down the wrong path. We know it is critically important. We know that early intervention works. We have backed that with real investment: as I said, $7.7 million for youth mentors to connect kids with reformed offenders but then a further $5.6 million for early intervention officers in our schools.

I have talked about this with a lot of my friends. It often takes a village to raise a child, and this is a village approach. We have so many people working from so many angles, coming together with a shared objective of driving down crime. As I said earlier, my thoughts are with victims of crime, but it is always a sad thing to see young people getting tangled up in lives of crime so young and so early, and that is why our early intervention approach is so critically important.

Business interrupted pursuant to sessional orders.