Thursday, 24 September 2026

 David DAVIS (Southern Metropolitan) (18:23): (2856) My adjournment tonight is to the Minister for Local Government. It is about the ongoing issue of the conflict of interest of Mr Hockley in Kingston and Cr Hockley in Bayside. Mr Hockley is listed as advocacy lead in the Kingston area, and he is elected as Cr Hockley in the Bayside area as well. What is significant here is that Mr Hockley voted against a motion on 25 April 2025 that opposed the Suburban Rail Loop project in its entirety. It required writing to the relevant ministers, the Premier and so forth, seeking an immediate stop to the program.

Georgie Crozier interjected.

David DAVIS: Yes, Mr Staikos is right up to his neck in it.

At the same time I am aware of figures that show Mr Hockley’s area at council level has a significant number of people and properties impacted. In the Ivison ward there are 806 individual lots affected by the draft structure plan and 1766 individual lots within the declared planning area. Within the Highett suburb boundary there are a total of 648 individual lots in the draft structure plan area and 1652 individual lots in the declared planning area – thousands of properties impacted in that area. Equally, when one looks at the areas involved in Bayside, they are very significant, as well as the Kingston scope. The Kingston information says there are 11,880 properties that fall within the SRL Clayton and SRL Cheltenham declared areas within Kingston. For Clayton we have 3356 properties within the declared area and 1919 properties within the structure plan boundary. For Cheltenham there are 8524 properties within the declared area and 3305 properties within the structure plan area. Mr Hockley over here in Kingston and Cr Hockley there – one side is fighting for the Suburban Rail Loop and the other is conflicted by his representation of a council ward that is not in favour of the Suburban Rail Loop. He is so conflicted. It is true that the member for Bentleigh is up to his neck in this as well. I have got to say there are real problems here and something needs to be done to deal with this conflict of interest. Hockley is up to his neck in it – Hockley not properly making declarations, Hockley voting, Hockley acting as a paid advocate over here in direct conflict with his council responsibilities in the neighbouring council. He needs to be dealt with – (Time expired)