Thursday, 12 September 2024

Bills

Criminal Organisations Control Amendment Bill 2024

Second reading

Debate resumed.

James NEWBURY (Brighton) (14:58): It is urgent that we adjourn the matter that was before the house and debate these important issues. I note the reports of the protest group today, who have said reportedly:

… we must keep going …

We are the most radical part of the resistance on this continent …

These are not the words of people who are anything other than dangerous, so it is essential that this house moves on from the debate and debates the matters put by the Leader of the Opposition. We must do it now. Words are not enough in this place. We must take action, and this is an opportunity for the government to vote in unity, as the Premier alluded to in question time. This will be the government’s chance to prove it.

Juliana ADDISON (Wendouree) (14:59): I am very pleased; it is a lot calmer in here now than it was before lunch when this was raised, when our government business program was interrupted, when we were discussing the Criminal Organisations Control Amendment Bill 2024. I want to say how much I enjoyed the contributions from the member for Clarinda as well as the member for Sunbury. I was very much looking forward to the contributions from the members for Mordialloc and Frankston and Pascoe Vale and Laverton and Hastings and Yan Yean.

It seems pretty obvious to me that once again those opposite have exhausted their speaking list, because they do not often make great contributions. But now that they have all had a go at the bill and they have all been able to have their say, they seek to silence Labor members, who are very, very keen to contribute to this debate on this issue that is very important not only to them as individuals representing their electorates but also to our government. That really shrieks out disrespect to me – that just because the Liberal members and National members have all had an opportunity to contribute, the Labor members should not get that same responsibility.

It is nice to see the member for Mildura sitting in the front row, and it was great to see the member for Warrandyte in the front row earlier as well, because that diversity is what we have been looking for. We would love to see a bit more diversity on the front row, so I really want to congratulate the members for Warrandyte and Mildura. I hope you get comfortable in those seats, because like us – we are very proud of our female Premier –

James Newbury: On a point of order, Speaker, this is a procedural motion, and I would ask you to bring the member to the procedural motion.

The SPEAKER: I was listening to the debate on the procedural motion before the house before we broke for the lunch break. It was very far and wideranging. Member for Wendouree, I remind you it is a procedural debate.

Juliana ADDISON: It is a procedural motion of course. I have been talking about the opposition wanting to shut down members on the Labor side from contributing on the Criminal Organisations Control Amendment Bill 2024, which is before the house at the moment, and I am speaking against that because I think that it is not right that that is happening. I was merely commenting that before we went to lunch, during the procedural debate, we had a whole lot of people sitting on the front bench that are not normally there, and I was commenting about how important that is.

We have talked about it, and I know that the member for Brighton just mentioned it because he is frantic. As a schoolteacher for 12 years, you get to see when people are thinking, and I could see that the member for Brighton was thinking, ‘How can I pull her up? What am I going to jump up on next?’ But he made reference to the Premier’s comments during question time, and I would also like to make comments regarding the Premier’s comments during question time. She said that we want to stand united, that violence is unacceptable and that when the police asked for additional powers, she granted the additional powers, because it is all about keeping our community safe. She also responded last night to that adjournment question from the Liberal-preferenced member for Richmond, and she said:

Cowards will never win. Our city and great state –

James Newbury: On a point of order, Speaker, on relevance, I would ask you to bring the member back to the motion.

The SPEAKER: The member for Wendouree to come back to the motion.

Juliana ADDISON: To continue on the Premier’s comments, which I think are really important:

Our city and great state, though, will win, and I will always back the great people of our city and state to stand up to … cowardly division and violence and support our strong and cohesive community. In saying that very clearly, I will … always back and thank those members of Victoria Police …

What is at the heart of this procedural matter is police, and I want to say – and it is said often by our excellent Minister for Police – we have invested in 3600 additional police. That is a $4.5 billion investment in Victoria Police. We stand by them. We give them the powers they need. We work with them, because we believe that they make a really important point. Talking about working with people, Liberals working with the Greens in Richmond – (Time expired)

Assembly divided on John Pesutto’s motion:

Ayes (23): Brad Battin, Jade Benham, Roma Britnell, Tim Bull, Martin Cameron, Chris Crewther, Wayne Farnham, Sam Groth, David Hodgett, Emma Kealy, Tim McCurdy, Cindy McLeish, James Newbury, Danny O’Brien, Michael O’Brien, John Pesutto, Richard Riordan, Brad Rowswell, David Southwick, Bridget Vallence, Peter Walsh, Kim Wells, Nicole Werner

Noes (51): Juliana Addison, Jacinta Allan, Colin Brooks, Josh Bull, Anthony Carbines, Ben Carroll, Anthony Cianflone, Sarah Connolly, Chris Couzens, Jordan Crugnale, Lily D’Ambrosio, Daniela De Martino, Gabrielle de Vietri, Steve Dimopoulos, Paul Edbrooke, Matt Fregon, Ella George, Luba Grigorovitch, Bronwyn Halfpenny, Katie Hall, Paul Hamer, Sam Hibbins, Mathew Hilakari, Natalie Hutchins, Lauren Kathage, Sonya Kilkenny, Nathan Lambert, Kathleen Matthews-Ward, Steve McGhie, Paul Mercurio, John Mullahy, Tim Pallas, Danny Pearson, Tim Read, Pauline Richards, Tim Richardson, Ellen Sandell, Michaela Settle, Ros Spence, Nick Staikos, Natalie Suleyman, Meng Heang Tak, Jackson Taylor, Nina Taylor, Kat Theophanous, Mary-Anne Thomas, Emma Vulin, Iwan Walters, Vicki Ward, Dylan Wight, Belinda Wilson

Motion defeated.

Paul MERCURIO (Hastings) (15:09): I rise to give my contribution to the Criminal Organisations Control Amendment Bill 2024. I might first say wow, it has been a couple of intense days here in Melbourne and here in the chamber with varying debates going back and forth. I must say also my heart bleeds a bit for our beautiful city of Melbourne with the violent protests that have been going on. I understand that peaceful protests are a right. Violent protests are criminal. I would like to join with my colleagues in saying thank you to our police women and men for looking after the community, for putting themselves on the line and for their courage and dedication.

This bill aims to prevent and disrupt serious and organised crime in Victoria through a variety of reforms to the Criminal Organisations Control Act 2012, continuing our response to organised crime in the state. Essentially this bill will be giving Victoria Police additional support so they can continue to disrupt and prevent serious organised crime in Victoria. This will be achieved through a raft of amendments to strengthen the existing unlawful association powers in part 5A of the act and provide for oversight of the scheme by IBAC. It will provide a new scheme for the making of serious crime prevention orders in Victoria, enabling the court to impose conditions restricting the activities of a person subject to an order in place of the existing declaration and control order scheme. It will prohibit the public display of designated insignia or gang colours in Victoria, and it will create a new offence prohibiting members of declared organised crime groups from entering government worksites.

I do remember the last time I went to the amazing Frankston Hospital build, to an event. There were hundreds of construction workers there, working hard, and they were an amazing group of people, but I did notice there were a couple of people that did seem out of place. I now understand from the media reports and what is going on who they were and why they were there. Every person in our community deserves to feel safe in their workspace. No-one should go to their workspace feeling intimidated, stood over or frightened. This bill will address those issues.

Serious and organised crime costs Australians up to $60 billion each year. That is an eye-watering amount by anyone’s standards. It is being used to traffic drugs, buy firearms, commit financial fraud and scams, attack small businesses that sell tobacco and more. These reforms will give Victoria Police broader powers to crack down on criminals, which will improve the safety of all communities. I note the ongoing work the Victorian government is undertaking to tackle all forms of crime with the recent passing of the Confiscation Amendment (Unexplained Wealth) Act 2024. That, for example, will exist to combat the rise of cybercrime. Additionally, last month we made further recommendations and amendments to the Youth Justice Bill 2024 to address concerns with youth crime.

In addition to the changes made concerning organised crime, this bill will also be disrupting outlaw motorcycle gangs with reforms that will prohibit the public display of designated insignia and gang colours in Victoria. We know that those involved with outlaw motorcycle gangs like to use their colours and patches to intimidate the community and also to promote themselves and to attract new members. These new reforms will ban the display of insignia in all public areas as well as private property where the insignia is visible from public places and from a public point of view. Just to be clear, this will only apply to the insignia of organisations that have been prescribed in regulations made under the Criminal Organisations Control Act 2012. Moreover, this is to target those organisations that are involved in serious criminal activity, preventing them from displaying insignia that could lead to them recruiting new members who may then go on to commit serious crimes and bring harm to the community. Additionally, it provides our police with powers to directly remove offending insignia, and if necessary, seize the offending insignia. It is also part of the new tools being given to Victoria Police to assist them in the hard work they do each and every day in our community.

Further changes this bill will be making are to the unlawful association scheme. Under these new laws a police officer of or above the rank of sergeant or senior sergeant may issue a notice to prohibit people from associating with each other if one of the persons is an eligible offender. The bill removes some of the red tape that has been associated with the current scheme’s set-up, namely that someone under an unlawful association notice is deemed to commit an offence once they have associated with another such person on three or more occasions in a three-month period or on six or more occasions in a 12-month period. This bill will reduce that down to just one occasion, which absolutely makes sense. It should not have to take two people meeting three times who could well be meeting to discuss criminal activities, organise a large drug deal or plan which businesses to target next. In any case they should be deterred from meeting with each other at all. These new laws will deter such meetings from taking place whilst importantly giving our hardworking police officers the power to act on it as well.

Furthermore, the definition of ‘family member’ has been narrowed so that it applies to a more confined group of people. This will be put in place to deter loopholes that could be exploited with the term ‘family member’. I am sure everyone in this place has those very close friends that they consider to be like family but where there is not actually a family connection. The changes made to the scheme in this bill will seek to stop people from using that as an excuse to continue to associate and cause poor behaviour and criminal actions to occur.

What this bill will also achieve is the introduction of a new serious crime prevention order scheme. Only one other state has a serious crime prevention order scheme in place, which is New South Wales. What this scheme will mean is that a court order will be issued to individuals that have engaged in serious criminal activity, achieved by allowing the Chief Commissioner of Police to apply to a court that will impose conditions on someone who has been involved in serious crimes or is likely to help someone else that is involved in serious criminal behaviour. An example of this might be that a serious crime prevention order has a condition that a person cannot leave the state, have firearms in their possession or even hold certain amounts of cash. Those found in breach of this order can be hit with a fine of up to $118,500 or five years in prison or even both if the court sees it to be appropriate. The serious crime prevention order scheme is aimed to directly restrict the activities of the organised crime group leaders, the ones who are the decision-makers and root causes of the planning of major criminal activities that affect not only Victorians but all Australians. In addition to this scheme and who it will target, it will give the courts power to register a corresponding interstate order, if sought by Victoria Police, to enable its effect here. This will mean that Victoria can prevent someone who has a similar order placed on them in another state from entering Victoria, further stymieing criminal activities and sending a clear message to those wanting to cause issues here that they will not be allowed in.

Firstly, I just want to be really clear: our unions do an incredible job day in and day out supporting the working class and fighting for better working conditions and a fair day’s wage. What has been reported lately in the media has not and will not ever take away from the sheer amount of hard work the trade union movement has achieved over decades of its existence. I have met and talked with members from teaching unions, nursing unions and construction unions too. They are people. They are members of our community, hardworking mums and dads that just want to see their work respected and be compensated fairly for it. It is a great shame that a very small bunch have caused a rotten culture to be cultivated and denigrate the important work that our unions do.

What has been reported in the media and witnessed on government worksites must be addressed, and there is certainly no place for someone who is associated with serious criminal activity to work on government worksites or to facilitate that shocking and poor behaviour, which is why this government has chosen to act and commit to stamping out this rotten culture and taking crucial steps to ensure it is avoided in the future. The conduct of unions is regulated under federal, not state, laws, but we will do what we can to toughen anti-bikie laws so that the police can exercise adequate responses to things like unlawful association.

To put a little bit of a happy spin on all of this, the construction of Frankston Hospital – $1.1 billion – is on time, on schedule. I commend the bill to the house.

Tim READ (Brunswick) (15:20): The bill we have before us today is the Criminal Organisations Control Amendment Bill 2024, which seeks to amend the Criminal Organisations Control Act 2012 with four main changes. First, it makes it easier for police to issue unlawful association notices, with reduced thresholds and increased penalties. For example, the current threshold for an unlawful association offence requires three or more occasions in a three-month period of meeting someone from a prescribed organisation, or six occasions in a 12-month period, to be guilty of unlawful association. With this bill, that threshold will be lowered so that unlawful association would occur after one meeting. The maximum penalty threshold will also be increased from five to 10 years. On the positive side, IBAC would have a review and reporting function in relation to the issue of unlawful association notices.

Secondly, it creates new serious crime prevention orders to replace the existing declaration and control order scheme. Third, it creates a criminal offence which prohibits a person over 18 from displaying the insignia of certain organisations in a public place or public view, including when that person ought reasonably to know that the mark is an insignia of that organisation. The precise insignia are yet to be determined and, as I understand it, will be subjected to further decision in regulations by the Attorney-General, based on the advice of the Chief Commissioner of Police. It creates a worksite prohibition offence excluding members of certain organisations from Victorian government worksites.

All of the legal organisations we have consulted so far have been very clear that they have numerous concerns about this bill, not least because it is yet another expansion of police powers, given that Victoria still does not have an independent police ombudsman. Interestingly, community legal centres such as the Victorian Aboriginal Legal Service and the Federation of Community Legal Centres have communicated clearly with us that they do not support this bill, as they are concerned about a number of unintended consequences. The bill is intended to apply to people involved in serious criminal activity and organised crime in Victoria, but these organisations outline that the broadening of police discretion and creation of new criminal offences in the bill may be disproportionately used against a broader cohort than intended, resulting in discriminatory policing and the criminalisation of marginalised community members, particularly the overpolicing of Aboriginal people. They oppose the prohibition of members of part 5C organisations from entering Victorian government worksites without more information about how part 5C organisations will be prescribed in the regulations. Going to work is a protective factor for many people with previous criminal involvement to earn a stable income, and it is an opportunity for them to move away from organised crime. So they are concerned that preventing a person from working on public construction sites because of membership or associations outside of work may lead to people losing their income and becoming more reliant on connections with prescribed organisations.

With regard to the new offence about insignias, we are told there could be a risk that police will use these new powers to target any group of people wearing clothing or marks that police interpret to represent their membership of a particular group, regardless of whether the group is engaged in alleged serious criminal activities. There have been several instances across different regions of Victoria where groups of Aboriginal people, for example, have been stopped and questioned and sometimes subsequently arrested because the police said they were a gang and were wearing outfits that represented membership of a gang. In all circumstances the groups of people have been wearing similar clothing as part of an event or club. Police have stopped several groups of people for questioning when they were wearing sporting gear or even memorial T-shirts for deceased loved ones. This kind of practice poses significant risk of further criminalisation. Research clearly demonstrates that discretionary police powers tend to be used with disproportionate effect on minority communities.

The Greens are concerned by ongoing reports of organised crime operating in Victoria, and we support efforts to use the justice system to control this, but we have seen too much evidence of overuse of police power to endorse this bill in its current form. In addition to those mentioned, we have other concerns about the bill, and so we will have more to say about this bill when it reaches the other place.

Lauren KATHAGE (Yan Yean) (15:25): It pleases me to rise to speak on the Criminal Organisations Control Amendment Bill 2024. Going through the details of this bill really brought home to me what we are doing around men’s behaviour change, to be honest. Reading about outlaw motorcycle gangs, I realised that there is a lot of egregious behaviour within those groups relating to their treatment of women which needs to be condemned. We often hear of public crimes getting more attention than family violence, and a lot of attention is paid to crime rates but not as much to family violence rates.

I was interested to learn about research that was undertaken by the Australian Institute of Criminology. Forty per cent of outlaw motorcycle gang members have been proceeded against for a domestic violence offence in the last 10 years. They are twice as likely to have been proceeded against for domestic violence than the wider male offending population – so amongst men who already have offended, members of those gangs are twice as likely to have been proceeded against for domestic and family violence. We know that their offending is more harmful. Unfortunately, we read absolutely shocking and devastating stories in the paper regarding the types of crimes committed by members of such gangs and that in these groups women can be treated by members as property who can be sexualised, objectified and subjected to acts of sexual degradation and violence. We have read about that recently in the news, for example. I do not want to say their names or give any undue attention to members of such gangs who basically carry out psychopathic attacks against women, forcing them to kneel while they chop off their hair, berating them for bleeding on the carpet after attacking them, committing absolutely horrific sexual violence against women who they purport to love. It is such awful behaviour. We know that strangulation is more common amongst such groups.

The strong group identity within outlaw motorcycle gangs reinforces those attitudes and norms that lead to that sort of behaviour and that hypermacho, violent image that they seek to promote within their groups. It is just terrible, because we know gang affiliates are carrying out crimes against the intimate partners of other affiliates at the other affiliates’ behest. We know that there is absolutely abhorrent treatment of women, and we do not want young men – or men – to be joining these gangs. We do not want them to be influenced by these men who would, to a much more frequent degree, treat women as property and so harmfully. We do not want them to be causing harm to women in our community, so I fully support the provisions of this bill.

Some of the work that this bill will do is around strengthening the existing unlawful association scheme so that it is easier for police to issue and enforce an unlawful association notice. Currently it is around whether the officer believes that prohibiting the association can prevent the commission of an offence, which is quite a high threshold, whereas this reform that we are discussing today is around being able to prevent or inhibit the establishment, maintenance or expansion of a criminal group or a criminal network, and it is appropriate in all the circumstances.

Another provision of the bill is to introduce a new serious crime prevention order. This is something that will be overseen by the courts, and it will prevent and inhibit the involvement of individuals in serious criminal activity. So essentially it is designed to restrict the activities of organised crime group leaders, and it can prohibit people from things like possessing firearms, from leaving Victoria and from having certain amounts of cash. So the court needs to be satisfied that there are reasonable grounds to believe that compliance with these conditions would protect the public by preventing or inhibiting an individual’s involved in serious criminal activity, and I am going to come back to that provision because I think it is a very promising provision for other parts of the work that our government is undertaking. The other provisions are around prohibiting the public display of insignia or gang colours, and this is what I mean when I say we want to prevent young men being attracted to such groups through the display of gang colours or insignia – young men who are looking for somewhere to belong and who are looking for guidance in their journey, essentially.

For me, this bill is actually going to contribute to the impact that we are having on reducing family violence through focusing on men’s behaviour change. We saw the appointment of a Parliamentary Secretary for Men’s Behaviour Change, and we have a government certainly that has invested so much in preventing and reducing family violence; in fact it is nation leading. We have implemented all 227 ‍recommendations of the royal commission – more money and effort than any other jurisdiction. We have opened 36 Orange Doors for immediate, simple access for people escaping violence, but we are also looking at why men are enacting this sort of behaviour and how we can reduce and change that behaviour. We have had excellent work from the Parliamentary Secretary for Men’s Behaviour Change, and he joined me recently at Dardi Munwurro, a program in my electorate that supports and works with men who have used violence and who have been incarcerated for using violence. When we met with the men there everybody – the minister, the parliamentary secretary and I – all left absolutely stunned and really overcome by the amount of honesty and truth spoken by those men, who took absolute accountability for their actions, who absolutely took ownership of what they had done to the people that they loved and who had taken responsibility for changing their behaviours. So our government will continue to support services like that, which work to change men’s behaviour. We will continue to propose bills such as this that reduce the chance that men will join groups that are known to have such abhorrent views and actions towards women.

I hope we will be able to take the learnings that we have from the provisions around the serious crime prevention order and apply them to the women’s safety package that this government is working on. We know that our government is looking at all levers available to it to ensure that women are kept safe. In terms of the policing and legal responses, I look forward to seeing and working on this government’s legislation as another way to keep women in this state safe. There is no stone that we will leave unturned, there is no person that we will not seek to help and there is no way this government will stop working to protect women in Victoria.

Wayne FARNHAM (Narracan) (15:35): I am pleased to rise today to speak on the Criminal Organisations Control Amendment Bill 2024, but just before I get stuck into the bill I will take this opportunity to thank the hardworking members of the Victorian police force, and I also believe there are New South Wales and Queensland police assisting our forces over the next three days. With the behaviour they have to put up with from the protesters down there at Jeff’s Shed, to work in those conditions would be absolutely horrible. To have urine thrown at you and horse excrement and all the other things they are doing down there – it is a shame that members of this house support that type of behaviour. I do not think any of us normal people in this house would support that type of behaviour. My thoughts are with Victoria Police and the other police helping them at the moment, because they do have a tough few days. Their workplace safety is at risk as we speak, and I think it is just a pity that Melbourne, which is such a great city, now is seen in this light. We all know in this chamber that Melbourne is a good place, yet we have this certain element of ratbag behaviour, and people that want to protest for the sake of protesting just take it as an opportunity to make an absolute nuisance of themselves and put not only the public at risk but our police at risk and probably our emergency services at risk – ambulance services as well. So my thoughts are with them at the moment, and I thank them for what they are doing and for trying to keep our community safe, and I wish they all get home safely to their families. We already know there have been about 27 injured, and I hope they can recover quickly and get back to work. It is disgraceful behaviour, what is going on there. Melbourne is better than that, and people in this chamber should be better than to incite that type of behaviour.

I will get into the bill. The purpose of the bill is to make changes to the unlawful association scheme ‍– part 5A of the act – and provide for the Independent Broad-based Anti-corruption Commission, or IBAC, to have oversight functions in relation to the unlawful association scheme; replace the scheme for making declaration and control orders with a scheme for making serious crime prevention orders; prohibit the public display of insignia of certain organisations; and prohibit adult members of certain organisations from entering certain areas on Victorian government worksites. I am going to start with that point, as I imagine no-one would be surprised I would.

It is disappointing that four weeks ago the Liberal–National team tried to introduce a bill to stop the bikies going onto Victorian government worksites. I worked on that bill. I said it at the time. I worked on that bill, and the reason I got involved with it is because I know the industry well and I know what is going on. It is just a shame at points in time in this chamber, even though we are on this side, if we bring forward a bill that we know is common sense and that we know will make a difference, that the government does not support it.

It was the same with the Denyer bill. We brought the Denyer bill to this place. It got knocked out by the government, got voted down, and then a few months later the government brought in essentially the same bill. I can see the member for Frankston sitting there, and I give him credit on changing the government’s mind on the Denyer bill. It was an important piece of legislation that targeted one person who was an abhorrent human being and always will be. I did not get a chance to speak on the Denyer bill at the time, but I give the member for Frankston an awesome amount of credit for what did to get that bill back into this house.

This is my point: just because we are on this side of the chamber does not mean we do not have good ideas. It does not mean that we do not have the best interests of Victorians – Victorian taxpayers or Victorian building sites – at heart. When we introduced a bill four weeks ago to ban bikies from Victorian government building sites, we did that with good reason. We did it because we know the infiltration of the construction industry is out of control. We have heard the stories. We have seen the clips on 60 Minutes. We have seen the interviews on 60 Minutes about the bikie behaviour. I wish the government had got behind us then to support us on that bill.

I can tell you now, I had a builder ring me the other day. The CFMEU turned up on his site and he asked them to sign into the site, which is a requirement. It is a requirement on any building site now that you have to sign in; it is an OH&S requirement. The representatives from the CFMEU refused to sign in but still entered the site. That is unlawful entry. They are that arrogant now that they are pushing back. They are basically saying, ‘You will not push us around. You will not tell us what to do.’ And they are still using intimidation tactics. That is what the CFMEU is doing, and they have been doing it for a very long time.

I heard today the member for Evelyn bring up the fact that what we are dealing with now was happening back in 2015. Why did we take 10 years to fix it, and will this fix it? You have to excuse my pessimism if I do not believe that the government will really follow through with what they are proposing at the moment. Back in 2015, it was noted today, it was the now Premier who was in charge of that portfolio. I was not around here then; I am not going to pretend to know the ins and outs of that conversation. It would be stupid to do that. But being pragmatic, if it was happening in 2015 and we had the person who is now Premier with that under her portfolio and nothing happened then, what faith do I have in the Premier and the government to make sure that this gets followed through with now? It is a pretty big ask to sit back and say, ‘You failed nine years ago but now you think it’s the right thing to do’. Back then it was, ‘We have to clean up the industry,’ and now it is, ‘We still have to clean up the industry, but now we have the Premier in charge’. I am a little bit pessimistic about whether this will work.

The bill we proposed to put forward was basically saying anyone on a government worksite had to have a police check. Police checks are not abnormal. We have to have them as MPs, nurses or teachers, so why won’t we introduce that? Why won’t we introduce that every person on a government worksite has to have a police check? If it is brought up that they are not a fit and proper person, they cannot enter that site. If it is brought up that they are associated with bikie gangs, whether it be the Rebels, the Mongols, the Comancheros or whatever list of moronic gangs they want to join, why don’t we have that? It is a very simple thing to do to protect the industry. I love the industry; the industry gave me a great career. It really did. So why won’t we do everything we can to protect it? I do not think this goes far enough; I really do not. I think that police check should be brought in. And yes, if the police have to do a bit of extra work, so what? If the builder has to do a bit of extra work, so what? Let it happen. Bring the police checks in to get the ratbags out of the construction industry.

I said this last time I got up to speak about the CFMEU: there are a lot of good people that work in the CFMEU. There are a lot of people that go to work to provide for their families, to put their kids through school, to put food on the table and to pay the bills. Why don’t they deserve a safe and proper workplace? They should, as every Victorian should, no matter whether you are in the construction industry or whether you work in a hospital. Let us bring in the police checks. Let us really clean up the industry. Get rid of the bikie morons. We do not want them. Why would we? They hunt in packs. They are gutless, and all they do is intimidate people to get their own way. What they have done to the construction industry in this state is disgraceful. That is the only way I can put it.

I will reiterate that there are very, very good people who work in the CFMEU that just want to provide for their families. I do not think this bill goes far enough. We do not oppose this bill, but I would like to see it go further. I would like to see police checks on every Victorian government worksite to get rid of the riffraff.

Paul EDBROOKE (Frankston) (15:45): It is fantastic to be up and speaking on the Criminal Organisations Control Amendment Bill 2024 this afternoon. I follow on from the member for Narracan, and he made a very good point. He acknowledged our hardworking police. I must admit I get pretty puzzled at times in here when we have the Greens party not calling out their own people. We have got Greens members in here talking about this bill, talking about police and thanking police, and on the other hand they are trying to refer our hardworking police to IBAC. So it is with great confusion that I stand here now – and I will get to the bill. I have friends who are police officers, and there are now 30 police officers that have been injured in the action that took place yesterday that achieved nothing. I was talking with my good friend the member for Northcote before and she said, ‘What would have happened if the police weren’t there?’ The protesters would not be protected from themselves; they would essentially turn on each other, I think. But I take umbrage with Greens members not calling out their friends, their colleagues and their parliamentary colleagues in their party, coming in here talking about a bill to increase powers for police while at the same time referring police to IBAC.

I tell you what, there are a lot of things I would give not to have been on the front line of the police force yesterday. Having acid thrown at you, having urine thrown at you, having faeces thrown at you, having people chanting foul rants at you – and rocks. Is that the kind of thing we expect our police to have to put up with? But, do you know what, on Instagram there was one of our Greens colleagues, one of our parliamentary colleagues we will say – not colleagues in the strict sense of the word – telling people how they should protest. I have got no problem with protesting. I have been on the megaphone at times – peaceful protest. I am a lover, not a hater, but I want to get what I want; I want to make my point. But peaceful protests do not happen and people who were intending to protest peacefully do not do so by bringing jars of acid to a protest. One thing I did note, going back to that Instagram post from the member for Richmond, was that she did not at all, not even once, say, ‘This is a peaceful protest, and here is how you do that.’

If you are going to turn up to protest this, first, know what you are protesting. It might not be fashionable, but I am just going to say it: the Land Forces convention actually is a convention that shows the tools that our army use to protect our troops overseas. We do have an army, we have a standing army, and a defence force in Australia. Maybe you should go protest at Puckapunyal if you do not like it. But the issue is I think that the Greens members opposite do not understand the sense of irony of attending a protest, not being in here to speak for their community but attending a protest to get all up in social media and get some likes and whatnot, a protest that has not achieved anything – and I would argue that with anyone. I would argue that all it has done is cost businesses and cause reputational damage. On the news last night there was a clip of a woman who was in a car and this poor woman said, ‘All I want to do is pick up my kids from school. I agree with the protesters,’ and then they started beating her car and throwing stuff at her car. It is unbelievable. For members of this house to support that – because that is what they are doing. If you attend that, you are supporting that, supporting people who do not even know the meaning of their chants. As we heard on the radio, the chant that I will not say that includes the words ‘rivers’ and ‘sea’, people were actually confused about that. You kind of start thinking: are we dealing with –

The ACTING SPEAKER (Daniela De Martino): Through the Chair, please.

Paul EDBROOKE: Thank you, Chair, I appreciate you reminding me of that. Are we just dealing with professional protesters? I kind of think we are. The member for Richmond is showing that. I am not the only person in this place that is starting to feel a little bit targeted, maybe even a little bit unsafe, when the Greens party – and I should say not all Greens members but some Greens members – are connected with issues that close down this house. We have seen some pretty dramatic things happen overseas when members of Parliament have been assaulted. Members of Parliament have actually died because of protests; they have been murdered. Of course I refer to the poor MP in the UK. I just wonder, in the UK at that time, who saw the tipping point and where was the tipping point? I would love to know where we are at on that spectrum right now. Where is the tipping point where the words that people say in this house and out the front of protests inspire people and radicalise people to do really dramatic, terrible things, because they are guilty of it at the moment in every phrase, in every word. I have heard it personally. I do not call this kind of thing out lightly. To come in here and to speak on this bill – with respect to the advisers here, I actually will get to the bill in a minute – and to say they support police after seeing and bearing witness to those police yesterday, not siding with the police, not trying to calm a mob down from throwing acid at police, from punching police and innocent people as well: well, they are just part of the problem and have made themselves part of that problem.

This bill intends to try and deal with another problem, and I think it will. A while ago I was chairing the firearm safety committee in Victoria, and we saw the firearm prohibition orders introduced. There was a little bit of apprehension about those at the time, but I think that the model application of this and the example that people took that told them that this was not targeting innocent people was when the father of a criminal outlaw motorcycle gang member was told he could not have his firearm legally. We saw those acts working the way we wanted them to. I think this goes a lot further in that we are strengthening those existing unlawful association powers in part 5 of the act and providing for the oversight of the scheme in IBAC as well. We have heard people talk about the provision of a new scheme for making a serious crime prevention order in Victoria to replace the existing declaration and control order scheme, which I think really will slow up and hopefully make some people cease who have been involved in organised crime when it is known they have been involved in organised crime ‍– they have been charged; they have served sentences. I think this will go a long way to slowing that up.

This bill also will prohibit the public display of designated insignia or gang colours in Victoria. I think I heard someone saying before that this is not a first, and it is not. But in legislating this we are going a lot further than states like New South Wales and South Australia, which ban the wearing or carrying of clothing and other items displaying insignia in licensed premises only. So this is a broader ban, and it does a lot more. I think this legislation is great legislation. I think the use of gang insignia to intimidate members of our community does not make people feel safe. Really it is a bit of a social psychology setting, isn’t it? People hang around in gangs for various reasons, none of them ever very good, and we know that; we know it across the world.

Can I again say how disgusted I am that we have members of Parliament who are attending rallies where police have been assaulted – violently assaulted. I have been in this chamber 10 years, and I have never, ever seen someone come into this chamber with that smirk on their face while 30 police officers have been injured. I have got to say it is just disgusting. If people want to change their communities, this is the place to do it, but they have to be here. It is a very powerful place. It is a place where you are privileged to be, not out there encouraging people who are doing the wrong thing, people who are carrying out criminal activities against our police. To come back in here and have members of that party talking about how they appreciate the police and whatnot – it just has to be called out. It is pathetic, and I think people are right in asking the member for Richmond to actually apologise to this chamber and apologise to Victoria Police.

Richard RIORDAN (Polwarth) (15:55): I wish to rise to make a small contribution to the Criminal Organisations Control Amendment Bill 2024. This bill is sort of continuing a theme of this government where, when they come under media pressure in particular or pressure from the opposition ‍– a scandal of the day if you like – we see a piece of legislation come to the fore. It is of no surprise to anybody in Victoria that with the Victorian Labor government’s Big Build projects – which have seen billions and billions and billions of dollars spent and blown out and wasted and which are still underway around the capital city; unfortunately there are almost no projects outside the capital, but here in Melbourne there are the tunnel projects and the level crossing removal projects and a couple of other large projects underway – there has been a constant call from the commercial sector that these worksites and building sites are out of control. There have been allegations of bikie infiltration and other criminal gang infiltration, and we know whether it is state or federal government it does not matter. When a government interferes in the market process, when the government gets in and thinks it knows better and it opens up the chequebook, opens up the coffers and goes full bore without proper accountability and management, things go wrong.

All Victorians will remember a few years back when the federal government made a similar mistake. They thought that they could go and insulate everybody’s homes without much management or thought. In a very short amount of time we had deaths, we had businesses going broke and we had a complete and utter failure of the market because government tried to take over. This is what has happened with the Big Build in Victoria. Where there has been an opportunity to fleece this government and take advantage of endless resources, the criminals have moved in.

What is frustrating for so many with the introduction of this bill is that the government is touting this as the fine-tuning of a piece of legislation that has been in place for the best part of 10 years. In those 10 years the government has failed to use it. We can talk and debate about how you have a piece of legislation that is designed to keep criminal groups out of government projects and government spending and government influence – we have already got the legislation there – and despite everything that we now know, despite exposés in our commercial media and in other forums, this government still has not been able to lay a glove on it.

There is a real worry that this is again a little bit of grandstanding: ‘Oh, look at us. We’re introducing some tweaks to an act and we’re going to clamp down on these things.’ But we have to ask the question: why is the existing legislation so spectacularly unsuccessful at getting anywhere in managing good governance, good business, on-time and on-budget projects, and how do we make sure that Victorian taxpayers are getting a fair deal? What is it that is stopping that? Is it because ministers do not see those as valuable traits in the way that we manage public projects? Is it because the government of the day gets the emails? We saw recently with the 60 Minutes exposé that the minister saw it, key government operatives saw it, various people in the government and through the bureaucracy were aware of the problems and the crime gangs and the corruption that was going on, and yet no-one did anything. Is it because there is blind ignorance in play at the highest levels? Or are these people aware of it and passing it through to the legal and the justice system, and the legal and justice system is just not resourced? The Minister for Police might like to enlighten the house when his contribution comes up as to why these clearly dishonest and corrupt and unwelcome events are happening on big government projects and why we are unable to reel them in and bring some control and order back to the system. This legislation is designed to do that.

Another quirk in this system: as Shadow Minister for Emergency Services I was somewhat perplexed as to why we have decided to carve out our emergency service agencies as places where associations and affiliations can be exempted. That did not make a lot of sense to me. There was not an explanation in the bill briefings as to why in theory we could have a whole bunch of bikie or criminal groups taking over CFA groups or SES groups or other emergency management groups and operating clandestinely. That did not make a lot of sense. All those volunteer emergency services groups have available to them an ability to vet each of their members. I would hope that nothing in this bill will diminish the right of the operators – the brigade captains, the unit captains of our SES and CFA and our surf lifesaving clubs – and that nothing in this legislation will prevent them from continuing to monitor and vet the good nature, good reputation and good character of people that sign up to those agencies. If that is the case, then we do not have much to worry about in that one little exclusion.

Some of my colleagues have raised that good crime management and good corruption management require the government of the day to provide the resources and the finances. I made the comment earlier that a lot of these problems have been known for quite some time. We certainly have many laws in Victoria that do not allow for fraud and corruption and standover tactics and others, and the question is: is it just that we do not have the resources to police these and follow these up? We have seen time and time again that our anti-corruption watchdogs in this state constantly seem to have their hands tied. I know many of my colleagues in the opposition have time and time again submitted areas of concern to the various watchdogs, and not only do we wait what seems an interminable amount of time – months and months and months to get a response back – but the Victorian public and the Victorian members of Parliament are all left very much in the dark as to where our monitoring of crime and corruption and fraudulent behaviour runs.

What makes this I think an even worse category when we are talking about managing government projects and government resources is that this is taxpayers money, and in a state at the moment where we cannot get our ambulances out of hours-long ramping, when we cannot make sure that we can finish projects on time and on budget and when we cannot make sure that we are funding our SES and our CFA to appropriate levels so that we do not have periods like we have just seen, when SES volunteers are out working day in and day out for many, many hours, all for free, and yet when they finish that they have actually got to dive into their own pockets to pay for petrol, pay for new replacement cords on the chainsaw, get the chain sharpened on the chainsaw and replace broken straps and safety banners. These are things that our volunteers should not do, and it should concern all Victorians that this government has been so slow to clamp down on the essential elements of good governance, good practice and fiduciary responsibility.

Anthony CIANFLONE (Pascoe Vale) (16:03): I too rise to speak in support of the Criminal Organisations Control Amendment Bill 2024. In doing so I would like to acknowledge the Attorney-General in the other place, the Minister for Police, who is at the table, and their respective teams and departments for the work they have done in bringing the bill to the house.

I would like to begin by acknowledging the work of Victoria Police. Victoria Police of course work every single day, 365 days a year, 24 hours a day to keep each of our communities safe, and I thank them for the work they do across Victoria and across my community of Merri-bek, Pascoe Vale, Coburg and Brunswick West and for their efforts yesterday in their response to the protests and events at the Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre. While every Victorian has the right to protest of course and while some in the crowd yesterday may have been well intentioned, passionate and protesting in good faith, there is no doubt that, egged on by the member for Richmond, many conducted themselves in an unacceptably violent, aggressive and threatening manner towards police members, with bags of liquid laced with acid being thrown, reportedly, and horse excrement, and attacking and assaulting police. We have seen police, as we heard today from the minister, injured and in hospital, and our thoughts and our prayers are with them and the rest of the police that remain in the CBD to keep our community safe.

As the Premier said last night, the tragic violence and conflict in the Middle East, which we all want to come to an end – we all want it to come to a peaceful end – is not an excuse to stoke fear, hate and division, and to bring violence and conflict to the streets of Melbourne is simply totally unacceptable and has no place in Victoria.

As members of Parliament, I think we all have responsibility and stewardship, regardless of whatever side we are on, to always work to bring people together, to foster social cohesion and to promote peace and harmony in our proudly multicultural and diverse community, no matter our differences. That is why I am so appalled by the Greens member for Richmond for her role in stoking the flames of division yesterday; undermining community confidence; conducting herself as a chief community activist, not as a leader of our community; calling for peace on one hand yet supporting violent and intimidating conduct on our streets; coming into this place last night seeking to claim the moral high ground while simultaneously climbing that mountain of hypocrisy; and, frankly, for conducting herself in a manner that is entirely unbecoming and inconsistent with being a member of this place. Inciting hate, division and fear will not win here in Victoria. I want to thank the members of Victoria Police, including those from Merri-bek and all those who work under Inspector Andrew Markakis, for keeping our streets and our communities safe every day, because we all as Victorians have the right feel safe and be safe whether it is in our homes, in our communities or in our workplaces.

Every day as a government we are working through our agencies to help support Victorians to lead lives that are free from violence and crime or the fear of crime. That is why since 2014 we have continued to make those record investments of more than $4.5 billion into Victoria Police to deliver Victorians the modern, world-class policing services that they deserve. This has included $1 billion towards new and upgraded police stations, more than 3600 additional police officers since 2014, $214 million in funding to roll out tasers to all frontline police offices and PSOs and significant investments and initiatives in crime prevention and early interventions to address those root causes of crime. However, we know along with those investments to support Victoria Police with those frontline tools to identify, investigate and combat crime across our local suburbs, ensuring we provide the appropriate and accompanying legislation to prevent and deter crime, especially organised crime, which infiltrates and underpins a lot of the crime and overall crime activity, is absolutely critical. Along with having introduced and passed the Confiscation Amendment (Unexplained Wealth) Bill 2024 in May of this year, today’s bill will also help provide Victoria Police with those further powers they need to tackle organised crime and keep our neighbourhoods safe.

The Criminal Organisations Control Amendment Bill before us today amends the Criminal Organisations Control Act 2012 to reform Victoria’s unlawful association scheme, introduces a new serious crime prevention order, prohibits the public display of insignia of proscribed organisations – namely, those insignias, signals and patches of outlaw motorcycle gangs – and prohibits members of proscribed organisations from entering Victorian government worksites.

Organised crime has been a concern of course for authorities across Australia and its territories and states for many, many years. The laws as they relate to consorting between criminals were first introduced to deal with people considered to be consorting with vagrants and thieves. Australian anti-consorting laws have their origins in medieval English vagrancy laws from when vagrants were seen as protocriminals and there was a perceived nexus between the vagrancy and the criminality. Concerns about the behaviour of convicts who had finished their sentences also influenced the development of early Australian vagrancy laws. In 1852 the first vagrancy law in Victoria was introduced, and anti-consorting laws were first introduced in 1931 by the Police Offences (Consorting) Act 1931. Part of the reason for the introduction of this offence was to stop people coming to Victoria for criminal activities. The Police Offences (Consorting) Act prohibited people from habitually consorting with either reputed thieves, prostitutes or vagrants, and if they were found to have done so, a person could be imprisoned for a sentence of no more than 12 months. Those people would have been imprisoned, dare I say it, back in Pentridge when it was well and truly in operation. Mr Slater, who led the passage of the bill at the time, further stated that the bill would provide:

… the safeguards which protect the general community – to prevent the congregation of criminals, men who, after coming out of prison, are able to consort, to conceive crime and ultimately to carry it into execution …

The law since then of course has not remained static. It has continued to evolve and be amended and strengthened over time as organised crime has as well. Victoria modernised the state’s anti-consorting legislation in 2012 with the passing of the Criminal Organisations Control Bill 2012, later supplemented with the Criminal Organisations Control Regulations 2013 and the subsequent Criminal Organisations Control and Other Acts Amendment Bill 2014, which broadened the range of criminal offences that could trigger making declarations against a person or an organisation. That followed on in 2015 with the Criminal Organisations Control Amendment (Unlawful Associations) Act 2015. The Confiscation and Other Matters Amendment Act 2016 then further simplified the declaration provisions when it comes to individuals or organisations to make it easier for Victoria Police to obtain a declaration as the basis for a control order condition preventing the organisation from operating, carrying on business or taking on new members.

However, notwithstanding these reforms, over recent years more has needed to be done when it has come to tackling organised crime. As we have heard throughout the debate today, the Australian Institute of Criminology placed the cost of serious and organised crime to Australian communities at over $60 billion in 2020–21 alone, including $16.5 billion in illicit drug activity, $4.9 billion in illicit commodities and $700 million in crimes against the person.

When it comes to organised crime, it is organised outlaw motorcycle gangs that continue to represent some of the more highly visible but certainly not the only organised crime groups known to Victoria Police. Motorcycle gangs, as I understand after doing a bit of research ahead of today, emerged in the United States after World War II as informal support networks for returned servicemen. It was in the 1960s that Australia experienced a rise in these motorcycle gangs. While most motorcycle gangs have a devolved structure, they have also often developed strict, military-inspired hierarchical structures and have fostered broader outlaw cultures categorised by violence and recklessness but also camaraderie and loyalty. While not all members of these organisations are involved in criminal activities, some estimates suggest that about three-quarters of organised motorcycle gang members have criminal records, mostly related to fighting, traffic violations, drug possession or disorderly conduct. Victoria Police reports that 26 recognised outlaw motorcycle gangs are reportedly operating in some sort of capacity in Victoria, and there are 2000 outlaw motorcycle gang members and associates who have links to Victorian addresses. This bill will help support Victoria Police to further continue to crack down and take the action they need when it comes to organised crime, particularly outlaw motorcycle gangs.

In the time I have remaining, I would like to talk about and thank again my local Merri-bek Victoria Police members, particularly my local area commander Andrew Markakis. On 22 May our local police hosted a community neighbourhood policing forum at the Coburg town hall, attended by a hundred local residents. Locals were provided with an update on crime trends, crime prevention initiatives, road safety, family violence, men’s violence, women’s safety, young people and many other issues. It was an excellent evening with excellent discussion that was very much appreciated by the community.

The overall offences-recorded rate in Merri-bek was reported as being below the state’s average offence rate per 100,000 of population – 12,750 in 2023, lower than the prepandemic levels of 14,300. The top five recorded crimes across Merri-bek that were reported included theft from a motor vehicle, 1800 offences, mainly from unlocked vehicles; other types of theft, 1200 incidents; breaches of family violence orders, 1000 incidents; criminal damage, 960 incidents; and obtaining benefit or property by deception, 670 incidents. When it comes to road safety, Merri-bek TAC hospitalisation claims had reduced from 199 in 2019 to 142 in 2022.

On the issue of family violence, Acting Sergeant Sam Spencer in particular gave a very fantastic presentation about the work they are doing every single day to support women and children in need across our community, with total family violence incidents recorded at 1840 in 2023, again lower than prepandemic levels. The community sentiment survey reported a number of issues of priority for the community: safety in public places, road safety and safety of property and possessions amongst other issues. I commend the bill in the name of my local Victoria Police members.

David SOUTHWICK (Caulfield) (16:13): I rise to speak on the Criminal Organisations Control Amendment Bill 2024, and at the outset I thank the member for Malvern for his amendment that he has put forward and also the Shadow Minister for Police, who is with us here today and who has been working very hard and diligently with our members of Victoria Police. We have seen in the last few days our hardworking Victoria Police being very tested by extremist protesters that have sought to not only disrupt but cause violence on our streets, so our strongest thanks go out to those hardworking men and women of Victoria Police not just for the last few days but for each and every day and particularly over the last few years from the time of lockdowns, when I had many Victoria Police members talk to me about just how difficult their jobs were. Certainly in the last 12 months with the increased amount of protesting and increased activity we are seeing people wanting to bring problems from thousands of miles away onto our streets. Unfortunately it is the hardworking men of Victoria Police that are there that have tried to restore safety and social cohesion to their best ability. So I do want to pay my respects for their work.

I also want to just thank an intern in my office, Sathvik Jain, who has been working on a number of things for me – he is of Indian background – doing stuff in trade and investment, but in particular he was in Parliament here yesterday and looking especially at this particular bill.

This particular bill looks at OMCGs, outlaw motorcycle gangs – or, as we quite commonly refer to them, bikie gangs – and it was brought to our attention particularly with the CFMEU, the former CFMEU boss John Setka and the activities of bikie gangs on Big Build sites. We heard Nick McKenzie refer to the Big Build as the rotten Big Build largely because these bikies have been allowed to run rampant on the sites not just for the last few months but for years, for a decade, under the Premier as the Premier but also as the infrastructure minister for those 10 years. We have had these laws that have been weak for a very, very long time, and that prompted us to bring in our bikie bill, which was about ensuring that there was safety on these worksites, that there were consequences and that those that sought to enter worksites would be prevented from doing so. There would be checks in terms of appropriate types of individuals on these sites, and those that were associating with criminal organisations and were associated with bikie gangs as such would not be allowed to work on a Big Build site.

I am pleased to some extent that the government has finally followed suit in terms of what we proposed a few months back, but again this does not go far enough. It is a weak version of what we proposed a few months back in terms of booting bikies off Big Build sites. This bill is about more than just the Big Build sites, but certainly where there has been corruption identified, specifically with the work from Nick McKenzie and his story on 60 Minutes and that which then followed in the Age, that shows what the flow-on effects are. We know when you have got criminal organisations that seek to profit by their bullying tactics, you need to crack down on that, and that is why it has been very important. Unfortunately, the government has been missing in action all this stuff for far too long. There are many attempts here, but again I do not think it goes anywhere near far enough.

I just want to share with you quickly a story. A few months back I was heading to a multicultural event in Brunswick and going down Sydney Road, and just to the side at a motor inn there were a whole lot of bikies who seemed to be gathering outside this motor inn with big signage. They were effectively promoting a conference they were having at this motor inn, and I just could not believe that it was so public. As we proceeded further up the road to be where we were going we saw some of these bikies in some of the pawnshops and other shops around Sydney Road as well, so who knows what was happening. When I got to the multicultural event there were a number of Victoria Police who happened to be at the event, multicultural engagement officers for Victoria Police. I asked them about this kind of stuff and what was happening in the area, and we got on to a discussion about the weak laws around criminal association and the police doing their job with one arm tied behind their back.

It just reminded me that time and time again we certainly have members of the government that are very quick to recognise the work that Victoria Police do but who unfortunately do not go far enough in providing the powers for them to actually do their job. We have spoken about that certainly time and time again with things like move-on laws, and we believe it is very, very important to get them in. Having move-on laws gives you the opportunity, with those people that seek to disrupt in a very deliberate way and that seek to incite, to really cut it off right before any of that sort of stuff happens.

As I mentioned yesterday – and I will continue to mention this – the kinds of activities that we are seeing from these individuals did not happen overnight. Police being put in harm’s way yesterday is something that has been brewing for a very long time. You need consequences, you need move-on laws and you need the kinds of criminal association controls we are talking about but going a bit further, like in the bikie bill we had a month or so ago, which send a very clear message that if you seek to profit, if you seek to bully, there is no place for you.

We need to ensure that, particularly in my portfolio of infrastructure, the Big Build does not end up being a ‘Big Bill’ because you have bikies that seek to profit from bullying and intimidating workers on construction sites. We have got to get confidence back. We see $40 billion worth of blowouts on major projects and infrastructure. We have certainly heard that at the moment bullying, intimidation and corruption on the Big Build and on infrastructure can lead to a 30 per cent increase on these contracts. I know that the federal government is doing some work on that, but again we need to ensure that we clean that up and get rid of that mess. That is what we need to do.

In finishing and demonstrating some of the differences between the bill we have today and our bill, the Government Construction Projects Integrity Bill 2024 explicitly specified which gangs need to be banned. That is what we were looking at doing, so we talked specifically about a ban, whereas this bill depends on the Criminal Organisations Control Act 2012, which causes delays and has not worked as effectively. The other part of this bill that I think is important to talk about is IBAC, because the bill seeks to utilise IBAC and the government at the same time has starved IBAC of any funding. IBAC does not have the money and does not have the powers. You cannot keep throwing it more work to look at criminal activity and corruption if you do not properly fund your corruption watchdog and do not give them the right powers.

Again, there has been some of this stuff with the CFMEU corruption on the worksites – things like ghost shifting, which we spoke about 12 months ago, where people would be double signing up for shifts that they were not even there for. We had situations where we had one person signing up to three jobs at once, and they were not at any of those jobs. They were receiving three lots of income and not being at any of them. Because the Premier would not answer it here, we referred it to Victoria Police and IBAC, and in both instances they came back saying they did not have the powers to do that. Those are the kinds of examples where it is not enough to just say about something, ‘Let’s refer it to IBAC.’ They have got to have the powers, and they got to have the funding. We support anything we possibly can to strengthen laws and get rid of corruption in this state, but at the moment unfortunately we have not seen that happen under the Allan Labor government. That is what needs to happen in terms of restoring integrity.

Sarah CONNOLLY (Laverton) (16:23): I too rise to make a contribution on the Criminal Organisations Control Amendment Bill 2024. Before I go ahead and address the specifics of this bill, I want to pass on my deepest sympathies and also my best wishes to the police officers here in Victoria, who do a remarkable job day in, day out but have been confronted, particularly yesterday, with terrible violence on the streets of Melbourne. It was very sad to hear overnight about the number of police officers who have been admitted to hospital suffering injuries inflicted by those who attended the protest – indeed they have been referred to as riots – on the streets of Melbourne yesterday. It has also filled me with a great sense of concern, concern that I have not really felt since going through those two difficult years of COVID, about the dog whistling in this place for violence on our streets. It is about time that this side of the chamber started to call out those opposite, the Greens and particularly the member for Richmond, for dog whistling for violence on our streets. This type of fake, phoney, shameful standard of politics has no place here in Victoria. This is not who we are.

The Premier had to come into our chamber last night, and she noted that the member for Richmond did not even have the respect to be in the chamber – somewhere that she should be, actually. Being an MP means that you are in the chamber for adjournment –

Luba Grigorovitch interjected.

Sarah CONNOLLY: particularly – that is right, member for Kororoit – if you ask a question. It is a fundamental rule of being a member of Parliament here in this place. If you ask a question, you stick around for the response. But the fact is that the Premier had to come in and explain to this place and indeed the absent member for Richmond that hate will not win. Violence has no place in the streets and local neighbourhoods of Melbourne and Victoria. The fact that we had to have a Premier, a Labor Premier, stand here again and call out the dog whistling and gutter politics for what it is – this time not by those opposite, the Liberal Party, but the Greens – is just something that everyone here in this place does feel deeply ashamed about.

The police do a remarkable job in our community. I see them day in, day out in my local community. I have been to, I say, the three big cop shops in Melbourne’s west; we have got Sunshine, we have got Wyndham North and we have got Werribee. I have talked to them about challenging issues that our local community in Melbourne’s west is facing. Being a police officer here in this state or indeed across Australia or the country or the world is a really difficult job. But we need police officers to keep the community safe, and we turn to them in our time of need. The fact that they are assaulted and have to turn up and be assaulted, including the horses, is just one of the most appalling things. It was appalling to have to watch it on the news last night with my kids – we all watch the news together – and to have to explain that that kind of violence is not who we are in Victoria. We guard our right to freedom of speech and being able to protest peacefully. We guard that so strongly and we protect that here in this state, as we should. But protest needs to be peaceful, and we see what happens when that gets out of control.

I was deeply disappointed and angry to see that the member for Richmond had done a video, actually, on her social media explaining to constituents, explaining to young people, how to know their limits when they go to a protest or they turn up to an event like that – when they are waiting for the violence to take place, knowing what their hard limits are, knowing how to wash their eyes out when they are sprayed with pepper spray or other things. It is irresponsible. It is not what a member of Parliament in this place should be. This place is about raising the standard, time and time again, encouraging our community to lift itself up and be the best that it can be.

The member for Richmond was dog whistling for the worst of behaviour on Melbourne’s streets yesterday. I think the member for Melbourne, who is quite a decent lady who I like very much – I am deeply disappointed that she turned up. She knows better – that this type of politics, gutter politics, a fake and phoney type of politics, has no place in this house, has no place here in Melbourne and has no place in Victoria. This is about just trying to sweep up votes at a federal election and a state election in two years time. People got hurt yesterday. Protesters got hurt. People got hurt that should not have been hurt. There is a place and a time for peaceful protest, but there is no place for dog whistling on the streets of Victoria.

Shame on the member for Richmond. I think that she should apologise, actually. She should apologise to Victoria Police, to the protesters who attended and to the constituents and the young people that she was dog whistling to to attend and get involved in that kind of violence. She should apologise to her community. I wish her community could see her for the fake and phoney that she is. She is not here in this house. It will be surprising if they even turn up this afternoon for a vote. Very few times do they make a contribution in this place, and indeed I would have to say that if anyone did a check in Hansard how many contributions the member for Richmond has made in this place about her community – positive things in her community and young people here in Victoria – they would find that she contributes right at the bottom of the list of all members here in this place.

That is something that should actually be reported on, and I might indeed go and have a look at that. I am someone who absolutely loves standing in this place talking about their community time and time again, talking about the great, positive things that are happening in this state, helping uplift their community. That is what MPs are here to do. This is the place that you come to to have debate, respectful debate, and change things the right way, the peaceful way, not the way in which we saw with that kind of violent behaviour happening in our streets in Melbourne yesterday. I also felt really bad for the westies who were stuck in traffic yesterday, many of them just trying to get to work, trying to go and visit friends and family, doing the day in, day out things they needed to do, picking up their kids from school. This is not who we are.

I have to say it was a near miss when I had one of those climate protesters, actually – I was going to say not necessarily parking a van – get a huge truck, an Avis truck, and cut across two lanes on the West Gate Bridge to basically terrorise people from the western suburbs and indeed as far-reaching as Geelong who were just trying to get to work that day. Twenty-five kilometres of traffic that caused. Those people sat on the roof of that truck. They had to come and be arrested and taken down. The amount of disruption that caused to folks that day is completely unacceptable. Again the member for Richmond I think was key and instrumental in dog whistling that kind of behaviour. I think she even liked the post at one stage, I saw. It is absolutely appalling behaviour.

I know that folks in my community, when they think about police or they think about mounted police, want to know that those police are in their community catching the people that are committing crimes in our local community but also indeed attending the massive amount of call-outs that happen in my local community and Melbourne’s west when it comes to family violence and domestic violence happening at home. We need those cops out in places in the inner and outer west, catching proper criminals and crimes as they are happening. We do not need them there in the heart of Melbourne having to basically try and keep civil order on our local streets.

This bill is a really important bill. I know I said I would get to some of the things that it talks about, but I do want to commend the minister for putting it before the house. We have put up some really great bills lately when it comes to crime and crime prevention here in this state, and this is indeed another really important bill that I know has had many contributions from both sides of the chamber. I do think it is another positive step towards strengthening our ability to tackle crime, and for this particular bill it is organised crime, which makes it even more important, because we want to see less of that type of behaviour and that type of crime happening on our local streets. The ultimate benefit of stamping out this kind of crime is that police and law enforcement can better focus their efforts on keeping our community safe, because at the end of the day that is what we need them to do. That is why I commend the bill to the house.

Tim RICHARDSON (Mordialloc) (16:33): It is a pleasure to rise and speak on the Criminal Organisations Control Amendment Bill 2024. It follows significant support for the law reform of Victoria Police and comes at an important time in their work and engagement around addressing some of the really concerning elements of organised crime in our local communities. I really want to reflect on some of the journey to this point in time in my contribution but also place on the record our thanks and appreciation to members of Victoria Police for the work that has been done to get to this point with the Chief Commissioner of Police’s work on behalf of thousands of serving Victoria Police members and the importance of strengthening law reforms around unlawful association schemes. I will take a moment, though, to reflect. I think the member for Frankston has said this before, and the member for Laverton gave a great summary on some of the elements of peaceful association and protest. We see in this bill particularly a prohibition on members of declared organised crime groups entering or associating on Victorian government worksites.

This is an important step with some of the concerns that we have seen from some elements that have been reported by the Age and exposed by Nick McKenzie. But I want to be very clear for the 150,000 ‍construction workers in Australia who build and support our communities that this is not a reflection on them. They front up in some of the most dangerous sectors and industries each and every day on behalf of their communities and help build the state for a better future. I have seen example after example in my local community of construction workers who have helped shape and build our community, and we will be eternally grateful. They are members of our community in a range of different community associations and organisations; some have been there for decades. I could name projects like the Mordi freeway, level crossing removals, the Metro Tunnel and the soon-to-be Suburban Rail Loop. I cross them every day in the street, and they have that collective disappointment in some of the things that have been uncovered and exposed and the concerns that have been raised.

In response to some of those changes – and this is a great hallmark of democracy – we saw construction unions and their partners come to the streets of Melbourne. Many of us, when we were fronting up through the Your Rights at Work campaign, which changed the rules, on one occasion marched with 170,000 fellow Victorians through the middle of Melbourne. That was one of the most incredible displays. I have never seen so many people, except for at the Essendon grand final in 2000. It was absolutely going off tap. The importance of that is that, with 170,000 people, do you know what was really interesting that day? I did not see anyone bringing goggles, I did not see anyone bringing face masks, I did not see anyone fronting up with acid or bringing any sort of projectiles. I did not see Victoria Police having any sense of heightened anxiety about whether they would safely return to their family that night – nothing of that behaviour. And I think that is a really important frame to what we saw and the impacts on Victoria Police.

It is ironic as well for the Greens political party to front up and speak on a bill that talks about strengthening police powers while at the same time not one of them yesterday, not one of those members of the Greens political party in this place, could bring themselves to acknowledge the injury and impact that was had on their fellow Victorians as serving members of Victoria Police – not one. They were asked; they tried. It was like when Adam Bandt is asked about various things on housing, that uncomfortableness of saying something that agrees with either the Labor Party or the coalition. They just could not bring themselves to be decent Victorians yesterday and acknowledge that there were people who violently came to that protest with a one-track mind on impacting and attacking Victoria Police. When we then accept that as a behaviour and say that that is the norm – and we spoke about this yesterday on different matters around the matter of public importance – then we see a degradation of society’s standards and an undermining of the law enforcement, and the job of Victoria Police is so difficult each and every day.

I just wish one of them had the ability to say that what we saw yesterday was unacceptable. Instead we had members of Parliament wanting to go down to a protest of 1200 people and saying that there would be 25,000 there, heightening the impact going forward. The member for Richmond was reflecting on this being peaceful and asked the Premier two weeks ago during the sitting week about this protest, about what Victoria Police’s actions would be and about the human rights of protesters at that time and said that it would be peaceful and obstructionist. I wonder if the member for Richmond stands by that categorisation of it being peaceful and obstructionist or whether it was violent, intimidating and disgusting.

The contrast, I say, is because you see the union movement that has been protesting and you see some of the changes that we are making around the prohibitions but also then the people fronting up and protesting and sharing their voice. We have seen some really disappointing things. It is always threatened that the Greens political party could be a third force of political relevance in Victoria, but we see time and time again they are taking the low road, choosing to go against the interests of Victorians and constantly undermining the health and wellbeing of Victorians, like yesterday. So those Victoria Police members that are trying to pick themselves up today, those that were hit with acid, those that had rocks thrown at them – imagine if you had to front up to their community and their families and have a chat to them about how that was appropriate when they go home to their families tomorrow. It is just ironic that the Greens political party would speak on a bill that talks about strengthening police powers and oversight by IBAC while at the same time demonising and derogating our police men and women and the service people in our local communities.

This bill is a really important reflection on the outlaw motorcycle gangs and organised crime groups that we have seen. It is becoming more and more complicated for Victoria Police to do their job. The sophistication in technological advancement and engagement means that they have to be at the forefront of police powers and interventions. We see the adaptability of organised crime outfits or unlawful associations, so we need to make sure that we are listening to Victoria Police on all those occasions.

That is why my community would really welcome the introduction of serious crime prevention orders. I think that is particularly important. The bill talks about allowing the Chief Commissioner of Police to apply to a court to impose a broad range of conditions on someone who has been participating in serious criminal activity or is likely to help another person who is engaging in serious criminal behaviour. If they have got tip-offs, if they have got intelligence that there is something serious going on or something serious about to happen, we want to make sure that we are preventing serious crime and its impact going forward. It complements some of the changes we have seen and made recently around funds or properties or assets that have been acquired that do not have a link or traceable means to earnings or outcomes. I think that is a really important frame as well to make sure that we are supporting Victoria Police in all elements in how they are protecting and supporting communities.

We have seen some pretty serious crime instances recently. We have seen the impact on tobacco outlets and some of the escalations in violent offending. We have seen the engagement –

James Newbury interjected.

Tim RICHARDSON: The member for Brighton offers a tour. I do not think I need it; we are bayside colleagues. We can go for a little trundle, but I will not take him up on that offer. Prohibiting the display of designated insignia like gang colours is another important element of this bill. We do not want that subculture of glorification of violence, intimidation and threats, so making sure that those powers are in place and Victoria Police are empowered to do that is really important as well.

This bill is another element of the support that the Victorian Allan Labor government has for Victoria Police. It started back with thousands of Victoria Police members being funded in the greatest increase in police that we have seen in Victoria, and indeed at that moment the biggest in the nation. We see it with that collective, ongoing engagement from the Minister for Police and the Premier in powers around youth offending and how to better protect and support our communities. We have seen it in the prevention of family violence space where Victoria Police has been at the forefront of innovation, engagement and assertive outreach to support and protect people in our community who are subjected to family violence and gender-based violence.

In all facets we have had the support of Victoria Police and the powers. We have funded and resourced additional police as well, and on behalf of my local community I thank them for the work that they do each and every day. I have had the opportunity to connect with the Minister for Police on a number of occasions at Springvale, at Cheltenham and at Mordialloc. He is a hands-on police minister, and we really appreciate his leadership and work. We hear directly of the work and the challenging environment that they are in, and the need to bring in these changes is welcomed by our local community. On behalf of the community I represent, I commend the bill to the house.

Natalie HUTCHINS (Sydenham – Minister for Jobs and Industry, Minister for Treaty and First Peoples, Minister for Women) (16:43): I move:

That the debate be now adjourned.

Motion agreed to and debate adjourned.

Ordered that debate be adjourned until later this day.