Tuesday, 2 May 2023

Address to Parliament

Governor’s speech

Address-in-reply

Debate resumed on motion of Martha Haylett:

That the following address, in reply to the speech of the Governor to both houses of Parliament, be agreed to by this house.

Governor:

We, the Legislative Assembly of Victoria assembled in Parliament, wish to express our loyalty to our Sovereign and to thank you for the speech which you have made to the Parliament.

And Tim Read’s amendment:

That the following words be added at the end of the motion: ‘but respectfully regret that the speech fails to announce a ban on new coal and gas projects’.

Jacinta ALLAN (Bendigo East – Minister for Transport and Infrastructure, Minister for the Suburban Rail Loop, Minister for Commonwealth Games Delivery) (15:59): I am delighted to make a contribution on behalf of my community of Bendigo East on the address-in-reply, acknowledging that the address-in-reply was presented to the Parliament by the Governor in December of last year. It is always a great opportunity to reflect on the work that is happening in our local communities. I will also touch on some of the work that is going on in my portfolio, because of course the Governor’s speech to the Parliament really does lay out the four-year agenda of the incoming government.

And what an action-packed agenda it is, Speaker, particularly in our community of Bendigo and more broadly in central Victoria. The work that we are doing in central Victoria in and around the communities of Bendigo East and Bendigo West really does build on the foundations that have been built up for the best part of the last two decades in terms of investing in the great regional city that is Bendigo and of course also supporting the smaller country communities that ring the great city of Bendigo. That is why I was particularly pleased to see some commitments that the Andrews Labor government made to the Bendigo East community that supported the work in those smaller communities.

We have made a commitment to the Raywood community to rebuild the Raywood CFA station on its current site, and I want to acknowledge the terrific advocacy of the Raywood community. It was a great day last year – I think it was in August of last year if my memory serves me correctly – when we opened the brand new Raywood train station, bringing train services back to the country community of Raywood after many, many decades of trains running through that town but not stopping in that town. The train services are there; we have seen work on upgrading the road into Raywood, and now we are building on that by investing in a brand new rebuilt CFA station for the hardworking CFA volunteers in that community. Over the journey we have also got works going on for new CFA facilities in the small town of Serpentine in the north of my electorate, in the Loddon shire, and it is all about providing great support for CFA volunteers around the state.

Also, we have made a couple of significant school commitments for the Bendigo East community, and I was just thrilled to be able to make the commitment to the Huntly community of $13.18 million to upgrade the Huntly Primary School. Huntly was not that long ago a small community on the northern outskirts of Bendigo. Today it is a rapidly growing one, but it still retains that great country feel. I was pleased to join the Huntly community on Anzac Day last week. Every year they hold a really special community Anzac Day service where the local kinder and the local school, alongside hundreds and hundreds of people from the local community, come along to commemorate Anzac Day. If I can, on indulgence, Speaker, I will acknowledge the hard work of the Huntly Memorial Hall committee and Keith Kelly and Margaret Pitson, who have told me they are hanging up their boots, in Keith’s case after 28 years of service as president of the Huntly Memorial Hall committee. Over that period of time he has seen great events grow in that local community. I would like to pay tribute to the great work that they have done. As I said, we are supporting the Huntly community with a $13 million investment to make a major upgrade to support the growth of students at the fantastic Huntly Primary School.

We are also, at White Hills – further down the Midland Highway, coming into the suburbs of Bendigo – building on the work that we have done as part of stage 1. We are investing in stage 2 works, which will include a new gymnasium for the White Hills Primary School community. Again, it is a growing school, and that support of $9 million for stage 2 works, which as I said includes a new gymnasium, is going to support both the students but also the terrific staff who work at the school.

I also want to touch on the investment that we are making in the Bendigo regional employment precinct. We committed $6 million to do the important planning and development work. This is, if you like, looking at getting the foundations in place for future industrial activity to happen at this site, which is in the Speaker’s part of the world, in the township of Marong. This is all about jobs. This is all about making sure that we have got the land ready to go to support jobs and development for our growing community.

Another great project that I am also really pleased that we were able to make a commitment to for the Bendigo community was $21 million towards the redevelopment of the Bendigo Art Gallery. It is the best gallery in regional Australia – I am looking at you, Ballarat. It is the best art gallery in regional Australia, and we can say that on an evidence basis.

Members interjecting.

The SPEAKER: Order! The Speaker agrees with the Deputy Premier.

Jacinta ALLAN: Speaker, I will acknowledge I may have been more than a little provocative; however, I am making an evidence-based argument through you to the Parliament that validates the claim I can make for Bendigo to have the best regional art gallery in Australia.

Steve Dimopoulos: Only the Minister for Creative Industries can make that judgement.

Jacinta ALLAN: Well, it is a fact, whether you look at the existing collection or whether you look at the exhibitions that have been curated and displayed at the art gallery, with wonderful support from our creative industries. We won a national tourism award most recently. I really do want to pay tribute to art director Jessica Bridgfoot and her team and also the City of Greater Bendigo, who have worked really hard on planning for an expansion of the gallery. The reason why we are having to expand the best gallery in regional Australia is not only so that we can continue to put on those big blockbuster exhibitions like Elvis – and I know the Assistant Treasurer remembers fondly his visit to Bendigo to open the Elvis exhibition, when we had the opportunity to hang out with Priscilla backstage as part of that exhibition. It is also an opportunity for our region to build in a really important dedicated space to showcase not just the Indigenous community’s art but also culture and offer an education experience to the local community – education facilities to provide for children’s programming. So that is a great commitment that I am really proud of. I know, Speaker, we worked very hard to secure that commitment and we are looking to work with the city as we look at that investment being realised through the redevelopment of the gallery.

Of course, if you look at the areas I have touched on – investment in education, investment in the art gallery, which speaks to the support for the creative industries, which also supports our tourism and hospitality sector and our investment in the regional employment precinct – these go to the fundamental pillars of where jobs and economic activity are occurring around central Victoria. We have an agenda that supports that activity but also builds on those other investments. For example, we recently opened the magnificent new Bendigo Law Courts. Not only is that an impressive facility in itself, but the services that are being delivered are making a difference for our community. And there is also the soon to open GovHub, which is in a similar vein. It is a magnificent piece of infrastructure, but it is also about bringing together state and local government services that are more easily accessible for our local community. This is all part of the build-up of Bendigo. Bendigo will be on the international stage, alongside Ballarat and Geelong and the Latrobe Valley and Shepparton, as we host the 2026 Commonwealth Games. There is also the ongoing work, and I thank our local community and our council for the work they are doing with us to support the activities around the Commonwealth Games.

There are just a couple of other areas I want to touch on, broader statewide areas, that are really important signals about how the Andrews Labor government supports regional communities. I particularly want to talk to the cheaper public transport fares for regional Victoria. This is going gangbusters in our regional communities, bringing fare equity between regional train travellers and those in Melbourne – that is $9.20 or, for the 40 per cent of V/Line users who hold a concession of some sort, $4.60 for those travellers to travel anywhere in the state for the entire day. This presents a real and massive saving for regional passengers. For families thinking about bundling the kids in the car and going to Melbourne to watch the footy, or indeed for Melbourne people who want to come up and visit our fabulous regional art gallery, the $60, $70 return fare just made catching the train really not an option for some families. The Andrews Labor government has addressed this quite directly by bringing fare equity into our public transport system – the same fares for Melbourne and regional Victoria – and also making it easier for families to get around.

This has been supported by a massive investment in additional regional services. You can only make this announcement and provide this fare equity support if you have built up the foundations of our rail network, which successive Labor governments have done. Those upgrades to the train lines and the upgrades to new train stations have added hundreds and hundreds of extra services across the state, and those extra services are well and truly being put to great use with the great demand we are now seeing on our network from people who are taking up the opportunity to leave the car at home and get around the state by train. I should also point out that these fares also apply to our V/Line coach network as well. This was something that we worked very quickly on – and I want to acknowledge my colleague the Minister for Public Transport – to make sure that this policy was implemented very, very quickly. The fairer fares rolled out at the end of March so that we could move very quickly in bringing that cost-of-living relief as well as making our public transport network so much more accessible for public transport users.

Time will perhaps not permit me to run through the significant investments we have made across my portfolio areas that the Governor’s address-in-reply speech outlined to the Parliament, but the theme of that was continuing on with the investment in a pipeline of projects to provide that certainty for the construction industry. If you are a young person wanting to consider a trade, you can see that there is not only the opportunity to get your start on these projects but indeed build a career on these projects. Then of course for local communities they can see that we are continuing that investment. I am a little sad that the member for Bayswater is not here. I was going to give the Boronia station – oh, there you are! I am not sad anymore; the member for Bayswater is here. One of the big commitments we have made is of course a new Boronia station. It is a big commitment that has been made.

Members interjecting.

Jacinta ALLAN: Hang on, we are going to have to do some cheerios, aren’t we? The Thompsons Road and Berwick–Cranbourne Road intersection – that gets some people excited over there. Ballan Road, Point Cook Road, the Barwon Heads Road stage 2. You can only do stage 2 of course if you have delivered stage 1, which is what we are doing at the moment. I am sure if the member for Yan Yean and the member for Kalkallo were here, they would be pleased to hear us reference the Watson Street ramps that are part of making it easier for motorists to access the Hume Freeway, and of course there is the ongoing work to get rid of dangerous and congested level crossings, marking 110 level crossings to be removed by 2030. I am really pleased to report that at the start of last week we clocked over number 68 in terms of level crossings that have been removed in just on eight years.

So it is an action-packed agenda that the Andrews Labor government is delivering. Whether it is in our regional communities, like the one we are proud to represent in Bendigo, or indeed across the state, we are continuing to deliver on each and every one of our election commitments, and we also continue to work on the policy and project priorities that are important to the Victorian community.

In the time available I also want to acknowledge that the Governor’s term comes to an end in the coming months, and I want to use this as an opportunity to acknowledge the tremendous service that the Governor and her husband Tony Howard have provided to the state of Victoria over the Governor’s time in office. She has worked tirelessly. She has travelled the state, travelled the world being a proud civic representative of our state, and we thank her for that work and the way she has engaged compassionately and considerately with the local community.

Members applauded.

Danny PEARSON (Essendon – Minister for Government Services, Assistant Treasurer, Minister for WorkSafe and the TAC, Minister for Consumer Affairs) (16:15): I too rise to join the debate on the address-in-reply. From my perspective it is a wonderful opportunity to think about what has gone on and to gaze forward to the future with a degree of hope and optimism.

I had a fantastic campaign last year. I was so grateful and so pleased that my campaign manager for my last three elections, Darren Arthur, was once again campaign manager with the support of his wife Jayne. Darren is a Qantas pilot, and he is just everything you could possibly want in a campaign manager. He is steady, he is reliable, he is unflappable. He has got great judgement. This was our third campaign together, and to be together for this campaign was incredibly special to me.

I also want to use this opportunity to give a shout-out to my ministerial staff and my office. I have had the great privilege of being a minister for coming up to three years – it will be three years next month – and I have built a great team around me. I want to start with my chief of staff Naomi Nugraweni. Naomi is an incredible woman. She is so driven and focused. She is so intelligent. She has been a terrific chief to have in my office, and we complement each other well.

I want to acknowledge my former deputy chief of staff Jo Swift. Jo came on board when I was allocated the housing portfolio. Jo had previously been the CEO for Kids Under Cover. To have somebody who really understands the housing sector incredibly well as my deputy for those few months was incredibly valuable, so I really want to place on the record my appreciation for the important work she did over a short period of time.

Julia Donovan is my government services adviser and is all things digital in my office. Julia is very young, but God, the head on her shoulders. She is a really incredible woman. Being able to work with younger people and provide that mentoring for them in the same way that those who came before me mentored me is something I am incredibly proud of. In terms of the work that we are doing with Service Victoria, trying to turn the Westminster model on its head so that we have got more efficient, more consistent services being offered through those digital platforms is something I am really passionate about and I am really excited about. Having Julia doing a lot of that work with me is great.

Claudia Subocz, my current deputy chief of staff, is just a powerhouse and a dynamo. She is incredibly driven and focused. We have worked together for a very long period of time, and it is always great in these roles to surround yourself with people who will challenge you, who think differently to you, who will take you in directions you might not normally go in and who round you out and fill you out. Claudia has just been amazing.

John Hondros – Hondo – does a lot of that reg reform work and has got a real energy and drive about him. He and Julia are both younger people, but they have got a big future in front of them, a huge trajectory. To work with people for that period of time when they are at the start of their careers really is a great privilege, because you have got the opportunity to see people who you know are going to make a great contribution in whatever field of endeavour they embark upon. To be afforded that opportunity is truly wonderful.

Jackie Parry is my executive assistant. I often say about Jackie that Jackie has worked with everybody, is related to everybody or knows everybody – the number of people that know Jackie Parry from Navarre up in the Wimmera, I think the Clerk will correct me if I have got that wrong. Jac has been fantastic and just a great EA.

Tony Zhang has come on board doing a lot of that detailed policy and research work. Again, like with Jules and Hondo, he is on a huge trajectory. To Jabulani Bulle, who did a lot of the Assistant Treasurer work, I want to place on the record my thanks for his work over that period of time. I also was incredibly grateful that my former government services adviser Brent Carney took leave and worked after-hours to be able to come back and assist me with my re-election campaign.

As all members know, you need to have very strong electorate office staff around you to really support you when you need to get things done locally. It is particularly important when you are a minister, because you always have to dance with the one who brought you, and it is always important that, although you get dragged off to ministerial responsibilities, you make sure that at the time when you are in your electorate you are well served. So a big shout-out goes to Frank Dinoto. Frank has been with me all the way. He is incredibly steady, solid and reliable, one of the most patient people you will meet. When you are dealing with housing-related matters or people who have got really challenging, complex needs, it is really great having someone at the front who can navigate and deal with that.

To Rod Gurry – Rod has been around forever and a day and knows Essendon inside out and back-to-front and has made a terrific contribution in my office. To Jenni Chappell – Jenni has been terrific in terms of doing a lot of that office management work and making sure that things are well run and well organised in the office, and that is great. To Kara Thompson – Kara is at uni but she has been helping out in the office now for a few months. Again, she is a really, really bright, smart young woman and a joy to work with. I think Kara has got a huge future in front of her. I am not sure where she will go, but I know that someone like Kara, whatever she turns her hand to, will be successful. To Jono Oppenheim – Jono has been with me and has been terrific in terms of doing a lot of correspondence and that work. In the digital age, with so much that is being produced in the written form, making sure that you have got people who can write clearly and cogently, people who have got really good digital skills, really is essential in relation to the smooth running of an electorate office.

Over in Essendon I am incredibly fortunate. We have got a great branch structure and a great branch network. We have got people who have joined the Labor Party for the very best of reasons and who are committed and focused on wanting a progressive community, and they work so incredibly hard. On election night it was really special. We got together at the Maribyrnong Park bowls club. You can brag about the result, but I am not doing that here. What I want to focus on is that I had a room full of local activists from my community who had made such a huge contribution to the party – they are just the best people to hang out with – and I thought, ‘Well look, we can do something a bit different this time around.’ So I went down to New Somali Kitchen on Racecourse Road. It is probably fair to say that the membership of most political parties tends to be whiter and older. We got New Somali Kitchen to cater for the election night function and people got to experience Somali food who had never experienced it before, and it was just really nice. You are having a few drinks and you are working the room and you are talking to people about how they have gone on the booths that day and what they did – and, ‘Oh, this food’s really good. I haven’t had this before.’ It is knowing that you are able in a very practical way to support a small business, a successful small businessman in Abdul – giving him that opportunity and expanding people’s horizons. You know, life should be about moving forward and lifting your gaze, raising your horizon and having that opportunity to have a broader perspective – to try to push the envelope and do things differently. We did that on election night and it was really, really lovely.

So again to all the volunteers who helped me – because all of us know in this place we are only here for two reasons: by the good grace of the support that we receive from our communities, but also invariably off the labour and endeavours of hardworking volunteers – I want to thank those who helped in so many ways, be it phone banking or pre-polling, the election day booths, the erection and hosting of garden signs, the letterboxing, the street stalls and the stations. Many of the volunteers put in big hours at pre-poll before work and after work, and I just simply cannot thank them enough.

I do want to give a shout-out to a few people. I want to thank Glenice Thomas. Glenice has worked with me for three campaigns now. We turned her whole house into the campaign headquarters, which was great. It was wonderful for Glenice. Glenice is now I think probably about 81, so I do not think her house had ever seen so much traffic and movement before. It was just great being based at Glenice’s place. To Marg Healy, who did the booth rosters. To Jane and Ivan Bertoncello who did phone banking and pre-poll scrutineering. Jan Chantry again did multiple pre-poll sessions with me. Luke Mitchell did phone banking and worked tirelessly on election day. To Paul Miles and Martin Scheirich. Marlene and Roy Burrows again did a lot of time at pre-poll with me. To David Hutchison – David is one of those guys who just gets things done. He goes out there with his ute and with his hammer and gets garden signs erected. Stephen Fodrocy was a phone banking coordinator. Ian Lang was a coordinator for communications. To Robert Johnson and Helene McNamara who did the phone banking and pre-poll on election day. Rose Scott did a power of work in terms of doing the local fundraising. Derick Melder turned up to pre-poll every single day at Moonee Ponds, and he was there from dusk till dawn. He was a machine, Derick. To Kate Crossin, again, who opened every shift at pre-poll; and to Daniel Scheirich, again, who made a significant contribution. I want to thank Christine Blandthorn and India Pinkney as well for their work. To all the booth captains, the scrutineers, the letterboxers, the phone bankers, everyone who handed out how-to-vote cards, everyone who had a sign on their fence – it was just such a great campaign.

Locally, I was really pleased. My ministerial office did a power of work in the housing portfolio really trying to make life better for public housing tenants. If the house will indulge me, I told a story years ago about how a little five-year-old boy was in his walk-up at Flemington – it was in the height of summer and I had just got elected – and he put his hand on the windowsill and the window dropped. He nearly had the top of his finger severed; it was reattached. I remember thinking, ‘This is no way for people to live. We have to do better.’ I made some comments at the time that got picked up. I was probably a bit intemperate in some of my comments; I did not think they were going to be picked up and recorded, but they were. But anyhow, it led me on a journey to start to say, ‘How we can do something in a practical way to change the trajectory of public housing tenants? How can we give a meaningful, dignified experience for public housing tenants?’ One of the things I really pushed for incredibly hard was to say, ‘Let’s get air conditioning in towers.’ I remember when I was first elected, you would see Adam Bandt wandering around Flemington with his thermometer in the height of summer saying ‘Woe is me!’ and ‘Isn’t this bad?’, and he would never do anything about it. Now they are actively trying to stop a $10 billion housing fund. Anyhow, I thought, ‘Rather than just talk about it, why don’t we do something about it? Why don’t we actually try and fix it? Why can’t we make it better for housing public housing tenants?’

I have always viewed housing through that prism of opportunity. It starts with housing, and it is about making sure that the schools are well funded and there are pathways to employment. When I was elected we had these walk-ups – they are gone; we have knocked 198 of those down. The first tranche will be commissioned later this year, and those families are coming back. The school no-one wanted to send their kids to and was a pretty poorly performing school – we have invested $26 million in that school. The new block will be officially opened in a few weeks time, I am told, but kids are going there now. I remember speaking with the architect, and he described how he wanted to make sure that the top level of the main building would look out over the city – stunning views. For him it was about saying, ‘I want to lift the gaze of public housing students to see their future in the city, that that’s where they can go.’ The old community centre – basically the floor was falling into the foundations. We have provided $5 million worth of funding for that, and that is going to be opened this year as well. You are here for a very narrow period of time, and you are here to get things done while you are here. For me the trajectory that Flemington is on now – if you had gone overseas at the start of 2014 and if you were to come back at the start of 2024, the place would be unrecognisable, and that is a really good thing, because I think it is about making sure that we can transform the precinct and we can give opportunities to people who need it most.

Locally, we have provided $1.5 million to the Ascot Vale Panthers. I want to give a shout-out to the former president Aileen Cox. Aileen, a woman from Glasgow, did not know anything about footy before she arrived, but boy, what an incredible organiser. She is a change agent. She gets things done. She is just incredible, and she has just been delightful to work with. Belinda Nelson, her successor, is going to make a huge contribution and really drive things along as well.

I am really pleased that we are going to provide $2.6 million to provide a new playground for Essendon Primary School. This is what the school has been calling out for. I want to recognise the fact that we will be providing $1.5 million to St Monica’s, and I want to give a shout-out to the principal there, Peter Moore. Peter is one of the best principals you will ever come across in the state district of Essendon. He is just sensational.

We have provided $100,000 to the Moonee Valley Legal Service – again, what a great service locally – $300,000 to the Fanny Street Reserve bike track and $400,000 to a dog park in Flemington. And finally, we are going to have a neighbourhood battery in Moonee Valley.

Government is a gift and government is a joy. You never, ever know how long you have got in this place. You never, ever know how long you are going to have in government. But you do not want to die wondering; you do not want to be one of these people, one of these grey men or grey women of politics that never had an original idea, never took a chance and never risked it. For me this is something I am incredibly proud of. I have not wasted a day since I arrived, and I do not intend to start wasting days now. We have got a job to do; we are getting on with it. I am so pleased and delighted that we have been afforded the great privilege of a third term in government.

Members applauded.

Sonya KILKENNY (Carrum – Minister for Planning, Minister for Outdoor Recreation) (16:30): I move:

That the debate be now adjourned.

Motion agreed to and debate adjourned until later this day.