I have been contacted by a family from Rowville which is very concerned that there is no bus route along Kelletts Road which travels directly north along Stud Road past Scoresby Secondary College.

The closest bus service, route 682, travels south via Stud Road shopping centre, and the Telebus service also requires a further connection at Stud Park. Although their school is only 6 kilometres from home, my constituents find bus services are neither well-connected nor frequent enough for travelling by bus to be a practical transport option.

WELLS (Rowville) (10:33:24) — I would like to speak on the report, The Performance of the Independent Broad-based Anti-corruption Commission and the Victorian Inspectorate — 2016–17. As chair of the Independent Broad-based Anti-corruption Commission Committee, I am pleased to speak to the fifth report of our committee. Under the Parliamentary Committees Act 2003, the committee has the function of monitoring the performance of IBAC and the Victorian Inspectorate. Members of the house will remember that in November last year I tabled the framework for monitoring the performance of IBAC. As I mentioned, one of the duties of the committee is to monitor the performance of IBAC and the Victorian Inspectorate, and of course you have to have a framework to make an assessment against. The committee appointed Professor A. J. Brown to assist us to put together a framework, which is one of the first in the world. It is difficult, obviously, to judge the performance of an anti-corruption body anywhere in the world as it is to judge the Victorian Inspectorate and to understand how they are performing year on year. That work was groundbreaking, and it has been picked up by a number of overseas bodies which are looking at how we actually put that framework together.

From the outset, I would like to acknowledge both the IBAC commissioner, Mr Stephen O’Bryan, QC, and the inspector, Mr Robin Brett, QC, for their important working in establishing their organisations as essential parts of Victoria’s anti-corruption and integrity system. In particular, under Commissioner O’Bryan’s leadership, IBAC has become a mature anti-corruption agency with a reputation for exposing corruption in ways that have led to significant reforms in the Victorian public sector. IBAC has also begun to play a leading role in informing and educating the public about corruption prevention, notably with its first large-scale community anti-corruption campaign. As the statutory terms of both the commissioner, Stephen O’Bryan, and the inspector, Robin Brett, expired on 31 December 2017, I would like to congratulate them and wish them well in their future endeavours. The committee has already met with the new commissioner and the new Victorian inspector and it looks forward to working with them over their term.

The report gives an overview of the achievements of IBAC and the Victorian Inspectorate during the year as well as the challenges they faced in identifying, investigating, exposing and preventing corruption and misconduct in Victoria and in ensuring compliance with the law. IBAC’s achievements include the assessment of allegations in a timely fashion, the greater number of investigations it undertook and the completion of important operations and inquiries. These exposed significant corruption in some parts of the public sector as well as misconduct and corruption risks in the corrections system and Victoria Police.

IBAC has also expanded its education functions, which the committee sees as a very important role, particularly through its very successful community anti-corruption campaign, which used a wide range of media channels. In addition, IBAC plans to make greater use of digital media and videos to educate Victorians about the harm of corruption and how to prevent it.

IBAC faced a number of challenges, including with its current electronic case management system, which it is planning to replace, which is good news from the committee’s point of view. IBAC is also keen to enhance support for protected disclosure coordinators so that whistleblowers have the confidence to report wrongdoing in the public sector. The IBAC commissioner has also emphasised that a follow-the-dollar power would enable IBAC to better investigate public sector corruption, which often involves complex private sector financial arrangements, so it is similar to the powers that the Auditor-General has.

I would like to thank my committee colleagues for their cooperative and bipartisan approach to the preparation of this report: my deputy, the member for Footscray; the member for Prahran, the member for Gippsland South and the member for Mordialloc in this house; and Jaclyn Symes and Simon Ramsay. Finally, I would like to thank the secretariat for their hard work: Ms Sandy Cook, executive officer; Dr Stephen James, research officer; and Ms Justine Donohue, administrative officer. I commend this report to the Parliament.

Mr WELLS (Rowville) (16:05:14) — This statement condemns Labor’s rushed and desperate announcement that they will extend prison facilities at Lara. The announcement of Labor’s fourth Minister for Corrections, Gayle Tierney, seems to have been written on the back of an envelope. The minister could not say how much the prison extension would cost, how much was budgeted for the project, where the money was coming from, when the project would be built or even how many actual prison beds an extension would provide. Nor could the minister provide any information about the acquisition of land needed for the project. Like residents in Werribee, people in Lara have had this announcement dumped on them without any detail to go on.

Minister Tierney said in her announcement:

… we’re planning for that growth now.

She also said:

Planning for growth in the prison population is what good governments do.

However, back in 2015 the Andrews government were warned by Ombudsman Deborah Glass that Victorian prisons would reach maximum capacity by 2019, even with the opening of the 1000 new beds at the coalition-funded Ravenhall prison. When the coalition signed the $670 million Ravenhall contracts in 2014, Minister Tierney was deeply critical of the coalition for spending money on new prisons. This did not stop the minister describing her great pleasure and delight when she opened Ravenhall last year.

Victorians are outraged by lenient prison sentences that are sometimes less than half those in New South Wales.

WELLS (Rowville) (11:44:31) — (13 926) The question I wish to raise is for the Minister for Energy, Environment and Climate Change. Minister, what assurances can you give Knox businesses that the government has any plan to ensure reliable electricity supply regardless of the weather? Businesses in my electorate have contacted me following two power outages in recent weeks. The first of these outages lasted two days. One business with 33 local employees was forced to cancel half a morning shift and all of an afternoon shift, sending people home rather that have them wait around until the lights came back on.

The business bore the cost of the loss of production that day as well as still needing to cover the costs of the employee wages. The outage was still below the threshold at which the owner could claim insurance, and the business will have to carry those losses in full. Worse still, they experienced another outage the following week. Minister, a huge number of businesses in my Rowville electorate, along with many in the south-east, have lost valuable productivity as a direct result of power outages on your watch.

Mr WELLS (Rowville) (14:50:25) — (13 398) The question I wish to raise is for the Minister for Roads and Road Safety. Minister, can you explain how a level crossing removal at Noble Park will have any positive benefit for local traffic congestion almost 10 kilometres away from the corner of Stud and Wellington roads in Rowville? Late last year, I asked you a constituency question about VicRoads’ plans for accommodating extra local traffic from the 800-household development at Kingston Links, on the corner of Stud and Wellington roads. I was very surprised to read in your reply that the level crossings removal program would assist traffic congestion. I had explained that Rowville drivers struggle to reach major roads, such as EastLink and the Monash Freeway, due to heavy local traffic. City-bound commuters on EastLink and the Monash Freeway completely bypass the nearest level crossing removal at Noble Park. Your reply contained no information from VicRoads about Kingston Links. I am even more disappointed that you did not take the time to read my question and take it seriously enough to provide even this level of detail to Knox residents.

The Liberal-Nationals will protect Knox drivers and vote against any Andrews Labor government proposal to amend the CityLink concession deed to extend CityLink tolls in order to fund the West Gate tunnel. Knox drivers already pay every day for Labor’s broken promise to not toll the Scoresby freeway. Labor claim they will not toll the Eastern Freeway, but there are genuine fears that the Premier will try to tax his way out of the $9.5 billion cost blowout on north-east link and slug motorists on the Eastern Freeway with a new toll.

Whether the Premier comes clean on his toll plans or not, history shows that Labor cannot be trusted to look after Knox drivers.

Without the east–west link, the north–east link will cause more chaos, dumping extra traffic from the northern suburbs onto the Eastern Freeway. The Premier wants to make Knox drivers pay an extra 12 years of tolls on the Monash Freeway by extending CityLink tolls to pay for the West Gate tunnel. Even Labor’s infrastructure experts say the best solution for traffic is to hit drivers heading into Melbourne with a congestion tax. Without the east–west link, Labor have no plan to deal with inner city congestion other than taxing or tolling. Labor need to come clean on their plans to toll the Eastern Freeway.

 

ANSWER

Whilst the Eastern Freeway will be significantly overhauled and modernised to increase capacity and reliability as part of the North East Link project, there is no intention to apply tolls to any part of the Eastern Freeway. Parliament of Victoria Hon Luke Donnellan MP Minister for Roads and Road Safety

Parliament of Victoria

MR WELLS (Rowville) (11:34:00) — (13 742) The question I wish to raise is for the Minister for Planning. Minister, under changes proposed by Labor’s so-called smart planning system what requirements will be in place to ensure communities are consulted about new developments and to protect the freedom of residents to have their say and raise objections to planning applications that impact on their own neighbourhoods? The Rowville residents are deeply concerned that the reform advisory group, the expert panel advising Labor’s Victoria Planning Provisions framework, does not include residents or community groups although local government representatives and industry bodies are on the panel. They are also concerned at the prospect of some parts of the planning process being privatised and an expansion of a number of planning applications which will not require a permit, particularly if those include medium and high-density developments.

Labor’s failure to invest a cent in the Knox arterial road network is taking its toll. Our outer eastern suburbs are growing rapidly. Residents tell me traffic congestion has never been worse. Labor’s shameful scrapping of the much-needed east–west link put infrastructure development on hold for four years and wasted $1.3 billion. Making room for our growing population is only possible with better roads, and this announcement shows that only the Liberal-Nationals have a plan to help outer eastern suburbs like Knox.

WELLS (Rowville) (10:27:29) — Yesterday I was pleased to table the fourth report of the Independent Broad-based Anti-corruption Commission Committee, A Framework for Monitoring the Performance of the Independent Broad-based Anti-corruption Commission. Effective performance measurement reporting systems are an essential part of transparent and accountable government. This is no less true for IBAC than for any other public institution. Indeed the need is far greater for an anti-corruption agency like IBAC, given its special role in ensuring Victoria’s confidence in the public sector and the considerable investigative powers it quite rightly possesses.Under the Parliamentary Committees Act 2003, the IBAC committee has the functions of monitoring and reviewing the performance of IBAC. Until now the committee has carried out these functions by reviewing relevant reports, conducting hearings on IBAC’s performance and undertaking relevant reviews and inquiries, and the most recent was on the whistleblower laws. For more than a decade, however, there have been calls for parliamentary oversight bodies to develop formal frameworks to monitor and assess the performance of anti-corruption agencies. For example, Transparency International has developed guidelines and measures to evaluate their performance. After five years in operation, the committee thought it timely to enhance its oversight work by developing a framework for a more systematic monitoring of IBAC based on best practice principles. To assist with this process, the committee engaged Professor A. J. Brown of Griffith University as a consultant.I will now go through an overview of the report. The report sets out a proposed performance monitoring and review framework, to be led and oversighted by the IBAC Committee, for ensuring the effective performance and accountability of IBAC. The framework draws on international best practice to develop a range of measures of IBAC’s performance across its legislative functions. It also draws on IBAC’s own measurement of its performance set out in its corporate plan 2015–18, recognising that the framework needs to support rather than hinder IBAC’s fulfilment of its responsibilities.The proposed framework provides rigorous criteria for assessing IBAC’s performance in the following main areas: investigating, exposing and addressing corrupt conduct and police misconduct; preventing corruption and informing the public sector and Victorians about that; impacting positively on levels of integrity and public trust in the public sector; ensuring IBAC’s accountability and integrity; ensuring that IBAC has effective governance; and monitoring IBAC’s legal and financial capacity.The committee recognises that the assessment of IBAC’s performance needs to take proper account of not only the activities it engages in but also their impact on corruption in Victoria. The report makes three recommendations. Firstly, that the Independent Broad-based Anti-corruption Commission Act 2011 be amended to require that the IBAC committee undertake a comprehensive review of IBAC’s performance every four years. Secondly, that the IBAC act and the Victorian Inspectorate Act 2011 be amended to ensure greater clarity about the monitoring and oversight roles of the Victorian Inspectorate. Thirdly, that the Victorian government support, and assist in the implementation of, the framework. As noted, the committee appreciates that the four-yearly review needs to take account of IBAC’s own systems for performance monitoring.

As chair of the committee, I would like to thank Professor Brown for his insights and expertise. I would also like to thank my committee colleagues, the deputy chair, the member for Footscray, the member for Prahran, the member for Gippsland South, the member for Mordialloc and Mr Simon Ramsay and Ms Jaclyn Symes in the Council, for their cooperative and bipartisan approach to the preparation of this report. Finally, I would like to thank the secretariat for their hard work: the executive officer, Ms Sandy Cook, the research officer, Dr Stephen James, and the committee administrative officer, Ms Justine Donohue. The committee looks forward to further developing and implementing this pioneering framework in the coming year, confident that it will strengthen the committee’s oversight and work and make a distinctive contribution to Victoria’s anti-corruption commission and its system.