Thursday, 20 February 2025

Pascoe Vale community safety

Anthony CIANFLONE (Pascoe Vale) (17:26): (1028) My adjournment matter is for the Minister for Community Safety, and the action I seek is an update on the work being done by the Victorian Labor government to enhance community safety across my electorate. Every Victorian has the right to feel and be safe in their homes, their streets, their workplaces and their neighbourhoods. I commend and thank the work of all Victoria Police and emergency service personnel across the state, who work every day, 365 days a year, 24/7 to keep us safe. I also acknowledge all the housing, health and community workers, social workers and justice officials, who work daily with some of the most complex cases to keep us safe.

In this respect I am very proud to be part of a government that has continued to prioritise community safety, crime prevention and tackling the root causes of crime by a range of initiatives, including a record $4.5 billion investment to support Victoria Police with the powers, tools and resources they need to keep us safe, and recruiting an additional 3600 Victoria Police officers since 2014, including 180 extra police officers allocated to Merri-bek and 21 specialist family violence police deployed to Merri-bek. We have introduced stronger bail laws which deliver tougher consequences for serious and repeat offenders, including for home invasion and aggravated burglary. We have introduced stronger laws to crack down on organised crime, outlaw motorcycle gangs, unexplained wealth, the illicit tobacco trade and illegal dangerous weapons such as machetes. We have modernised our youth justice system to raise the age of criminal responsibility from 10 to 12 years of age and supported Victoria Police through Operation Trinity to crack down on and deter youth offending. We continue to support victims of crime and families of victims, and we continue to invest in those crime prevention and early intervention initiatives, all designed to tackle root causes of crime, whether it be housing, family violence, mental health, drug and alcohol issues, socio-economic disadvantage and others.

These initiatives ensure that my community of Merri-bek continues to experience overall lower crime rates and lower criminal incident rates than the state average. In this respect, I fully commend all of our local Victoria Police members for working 24/7 across Fawkner and Brunswick stations, including area commander Inspector Andrew Markakis and his whole team; Acting Sergeant Kristie Givney, who is taking ownership of Central Mall and Victoria Street Mall issues, leading a series of operations to respond to local safety concerns; Acting Sergeant Adam Biderman, who is leading safety initiatives across North Coburg and Newlands; Acting Senior Sergeant Mark Abela, who has taken a proactive approach to the removal of antisemitic slogans and offensive material across Merri-bek; and Sergeant Geoff Kwist, who is assessing all liquor licences. I commend all the officers involved in Operation Boston, dealing with car thefts, which has made nine arrests thus far.

On 3 April local police will be again hosting another Merri-bek community safety forum, which I again look forward to attending and encourage all residents to make time to come to. However, notwithstanding this work, there still remains a lot more to do to keep our community safe. A Pentridge Village community forum was held on 16 January, which I attended, as well as a Coburg traders forum on 30 January, which discussed some recent serious incidents that have impacted safety. Local residents greatly welcome ongoing support and action from government, police, social services and all stakeholders who respond to these matters and help us deter and prevent such incidents going into the future. That is why we will be working to establish a Central Coburg revitalisation working group to bring together all relevant representatives to help support Coburg revitalisation matters and community safety initiatives, including a range of other measures, with stakeholders and with community to keep our community safe and to revitalise central Coburg as well.