Wednesday, 14 August 2024

Government performance

Gabrielle DE VIETRI (Richmond) (19:09): (777) My adjournment is for the Premier, and the action that I seek is to stop breaking promises. On election night in 2022 the former Premier declared that the Labor government would deliver each and every one of its promises, so let us take a look at them.

They promised to keep young people out of the criminal justice system by raising the age of criminal responsibility to 14, but just this week they have turned their back on that promise, caving in to media and conservative pressure instead of listening to the advice of legal and health experts, of the Yoorrook Justice Commission and of First Nations groups. This heartless decision will put more Victorian kids, especially First Nations kids, in prison. This is a complete betrayal.

Labor promised to make our bail laws fairer, yet they abandoned part of their own bill just before it was due to be debated – the part that would have made it easier for children on minor charges to get bail so 12-year-olds would not have to go to prison without a sentence.

Labor promised to save lives by opening up more medically supervised injecting rooms, but despite even having bought a building in the CBD for it – and against the recommendations from health experts, from a former police commissioner and from 78 community organisations in the face of undeniable evidence that this saves lives – they reneged. Instead the Premier has said that Victoria will never get another supervised injecting room under her leadership.

At the federal level Labor has walked away from the promise to protect our LGBTIQA+ community from discrimination. Labor also promised a new hospital in North Melbourne, a sick pay guarantee and to strengthen anti-corruption – scrapped, all of them. Aircon in public housing towers – well, we would need to have public housing in the first place for that one to be possible. And, guess what, public and community housing at the Fitzroy Gasworks – cancelled. In fact the only promise that the Premier has kept is to demolish public housing, and if anything, they are overcommitting on this one. They are rushing ahead as if funding their next election campaign depended on it.

It is clear that Labor makes all sorts of promises, especially before an election. And to be honest we do not actually expect them to have to keep every single one of them, but this is extraordinary. This is unheard of. How do Labor expect us to trust anything they promise when their track record is so abysmal – when they have betrayed the public so wholly across so many promises? Where once we saw Labor rolling out progressive reforms on a semiregular basis, under this Premier each one has been upended, sending Labor lurching further and further to the right. My only question left is: what promise will they break next?

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Before I call the member for Glen Waverley, member for Richmond, the action you mentioned did not seem to relate to government administration. Are you able to rephrase your action to relate to government administration?

Gabrielle DE VIETRI: My action is: follow through on the policies that have been announced through legislation.