29 November 2010

Victoria heads back to dark days of union thuggery under Brumby

John Brumby needs to take tough action against union intimidation and thuggery to stop Victoria sinking back into an industrial Dark Age of union militancy and disruption.

Melbourne’s train commuters have already suffered because of disputes between factions of the Rail Tram and Bus Union; now, the West Gate Bridge upgrade and anti-suicide safety barriers are being delayed because of action by the Construction Forestry Mining and Energy Union (CFMEU).

“As Premier, John Brumby needs to publicly condemn violence and illegal conduct by unions, and ensure the law is enforced so that people can go about their lawful business,” Shadow Minister for Industrial Relations Robert Clark said today.

“As the Parliamentary Leader of the Victorian Labor Party, John Brumby needs to take action within Labor to expel unions that persistently and flagrantly use violence and intimidation,” Mr Clark said.

“Before the 2007 federal election, Kevin Rudd made a big show of forcing unionist Dean Mighell out of the ALP, and John Brumby supported that expulsion.

“John Brumby now needs to show that the ALP is serious in disassociating itself from union intimidation and violence by moving against the CFMEU and Australian Manufacturing Workers Union (AMWU) for their violent picket lines on the West Gate Bridge safety barrier project.

“There have already been claims that Kevin Rudd secretly promised construction unions before the 2007 federal election that he would scrap the Howard Government laws that restored peace to building sites.

“It is now time for John Brumby to show whether Labor is prepared to act against union thuggery whenever it occurs, or whether Labor’s ‘tough on unions’ claims were just a pre-election charade.

“The violence at the West Gate Bridge site, including claims of bikie gang involvement, is just the latest example of the union militancy and coercion that has surged in Victoria since the election of the Rudd Government,” Mr Clark said.

Victorians have had to endure months of train delays and cancellations as part of a union campaign of disruption and coercion that led to Connex agreeing to a 15 per cent pay rise in an attempt to buy industrial peace.

There have been long-running pickets and confrontations on the Royal Children’s Hospital site as the CFMEU has tried to resist the introduction of swipe cards for site access, including allegations of a serious assault against an Australian Building and Construction Commission inspector, and a further confrontation on a Carlton building site leading to charges being laid.

“This return to union militancy will deter employment and investment and cost more Victorian jobs, both for union members and for other workers, at a time when John Brumby should be encouraging employers to hire more Victorians,” Mr Clark said.

Brumby's bikie law refusal risks turning Victoria into outlaw bikie haven

The Brumby Government’s refusal to consider enacting anti-bikie laws could make Victoria the bikie crime capital of Australia, Shadow Attorney-General Robert Clark said today.

Ahead of today’s national meeting of Attorneys-General to discuss tackling the surge in bikie gang violence across Australia, Attorney-General Rob Hulls has refused to even consider new laws that would allow criminal bikie gangs to be outlawed.

“Victorians would be horrified that the arrogant Brumby Government is claiming it already has all the answers and won’t even talk about joining other states in a national effort,” Mr Clark said.

“John Brumby has his head in the sand if he thinks that criminal bikie gangs won’t shift their operations to Victoria once they decide Victoria is the weakest link.

The Australian Crime Commission (ACC) has already made it clear that ‘anticipating legislation that will effectively outlaw motorcycle gangs in South Australia, there are indications that some outlaw groups have already relocated to other jurisdictions’ (Source: ACC submission to the Inquiry into the legislative arrangements to outlaw serious and organised crime groups).

As Commonwealth Attorney-General, Robert McClelland, said on ABC Radio ‘it’s important that there’s national consistency, because if you don’t have national consistency, well you’ll simply see these gangs going to the weakest point’ (Source: ABC Radio National Breakfast, 9 April).

And New South Wales Attorney-General John Hatzistergos has said that a jurisdiction that refuses to take part in national action risks becoming an ‘oasis for these criminal organisations to establish themselves with a level of impunity’ (Source: ABC AM Program, 16 April).

“It’s not good enough for Rob Hulls to claim Victoria will target individual criminal behaviour, not gangs, because members of these gangs get their strength by intimidating and coercing people through openly displaying gang colours and insignia and being able to call in other gang members,” Mr Clark said.

“Specific laws that allow criminal gangs to be outlawed are able to disrupt this sort of coercion and allow police to act without having to prove that explicit threats were used.

“Existing laws against organised crime, such as coercive questioning, asset confiscation, consorting and witness protection are all worthwhile, but Victoria should not be lecturing other states that these laws are a comprehensive answer to the bikie problem.

“Victorians, as well as those living in other jurisdictions, should be very angry that the Brumby Government is undermining a strong national crackdown on criminal bikie gangs and turning our state into a soft underbelly for bikie crime,” Mr Clark said.

Report highlights emergency warning shortcomings

The report into the emergency services response to last April’s windstorms and power blackouts, released without announcement by the government last week, raises serious issues about how well emergency services were prepared for summer’s tragic bushfires, Shadow Minister for Energy and Resources Robert Clark said today.

The Review of the April 08 Windstorm Melbourne, Victoria (August 2008) by Emergency Services Commissioner Bruce Esplin lists numerous failures in the emergency services handling of the windstorms on 2 April. These include:

• over half of more than 25,000 calls for emergency assistance were not answered (p.46, Fig 1)
• weather warning information was not passed on, or was received late. In particular, the Telstra 000 service was not given warning, and thus could not gear up for increased call numbers (p.43)
• there were long delays in transferring calls from Telstra 000 to the emergency services call centre (ESTA) due to ESTA being overloaded. This in turn reduced Testra 000’s capacity to take further calls (p.46)
• many calls were made to 000 simply seeking information, or seeking SES assistance, which added to delays (p.45)
• the CFA’s arrangements for diverting overflow calls to local brigades and volunteers meant volunteers received emergency calls without warning and often did not know how to handle them. Many made calls to inappropriate numbers to try to deal with the issue, further congesting the system (pp.46-48)
• the emergency pager system (EAS) can handle a maximum of 149,266 characters per hour before becoming overloaded, leading to delays (p.52) and error messages, often false, being received by ESTA operators, causing further delays (p.54)
• the CFA’s VHF radio system experienced severe congestion (p.55)
• the seriousness of the manner in which the severe weather warning was conveyed to the public “was not adequate for the event that followed” (p.59)

Overall, the report found that ‘significant improvements can be made in respect of public warnings, coordination and the provision of public information’ (p.2).

The report makes a wide range of recommendations for improvements to Victoria’s emergency warnings and response arrangements, including:

• that ‘Victoria progress, as a matter of priority, a telephony based public emergency notification system to reduce demand on Triple Zero and other emergency telephone lines during a major emergency’ (Recommendation 24)

• establishing a public system to provide emergency warnings and alerts (p.57)
• better provision of information to the media, effective use of the media to inform the public about current events, and use of new technology such as a direct web portal (p.57).

The report observes that ‘The proposed public system to provide emergency warnings and alerts provides an ideal opportunity to target specific geographic areas and update the community on
events …’ (p.57).

“This report paints a graphic picture of an emergency response system that was not properly prepared and couldn’t cope with the load of emergency calls last April, leading to confusion, delays and emergency calls going unanswered,” Mr Clark said.

“The report makes clear that the system needed urgent improvements. In the absence of those improvements, Victoria’s emergency response system seemed destined to fail again in any future similar emergencies.

“It is therefore extremely concerning that many of the report’s recommendations seem not to have been acted on prior to summer’s tragic bushfires.

“According to the government’s published response to the report, none of the report’s 35 recommendations has been fully implemented. According to the response, 19 recommendations are in the process of being implemented, while the government “intends” to implement the remaining 16,” Mr Clark said.

Recommendations that are still ‘being implemented’ include such basic items as:

• emergency services and the ESTA agreeing on the direct telephone numbers to use to contact each other (Recommendation 22)
• suspending scheduled call centre maintenance and testing during emergencies (Recommendation 21)

Recommendations the government still “intends” to act on include:

• fixing the problems with CFA overflow emergency calls being diverted to brigades and volunteers (Recommendation 18)
• testing of call queuing and recorded voice announcements to make sure they are working properly (Recommendation 19)
• ensuring the distribution list of emergency services recipients of Bureau of Meteorology weather warnings is kept up to date (Recommendation 13)
• establishing and implementing a model for communications flows during emergencies (Recommendation 14)

“This report was received by the government in August last year. It is unbelievable that so little seems to have been done in response between last August and February this year,” Mr Clark said.

“The Royal Commission should inquire into whether lives or property could have been saved if recommendations in this report had of been fully implemented immediately.”

Rail union coercion is bad news for Victoria

Reports that the Rail, Tram and Bus Union has agreed to drop its previous refusal to operate trains with “minor faults” in exchange for a 15 per cent pay rise sends the message that union coercion and intimidation will get results under the Rudd and Brumby governments.

As a result, Victorians can look forward to many future disruptions as other unions across Victoria use coercion and intimidation to get their way.

It is deplorable that instead of condemning the months-long campaign of disruption of our train system, the Premier has welcomed Connex’s capitulation to union intimidation.

“The willingness of the Rail, Tram and Bus Union to drop its objections to driving trains with ‘minor faults’ in exchange for a 15 per cent pay rise shows there was no justification for these bans in the first place,” Shadow Minister for Industrial Relations Robert Clark said today.

“Commuters have had to endure hundreds of train cancellations for no reason other than an underhand attempt to coerce Connex into paying higher wages. A reported 35 per cent of all train cancellations over the past year have been due to these so-called ‘minor faults’.

“This has not been an open and honest strike as part of wage negotiations; it has been disruption and intimidation based on spurious safety claims.

“This union campaign against Connex has been running at the same time as Victorians are seeing increasingly violent disputes on building sites, as well as union pickets against the installation of safety barriers on the West Gate Bridge.

“It’s clear that under the Rudd and Brumby governments, the militant unions are starting to flex their muscles again.

“Labor’s claim that it has a good working relationship with the unions that will reduce strikes and disruptions has once more been proven false.

“Labor Party Ministers have no trouble making contact with their union mates when it comes to lining up factional deals and power plays, but when it comes to the public interest they have been unable or unwilling to tell those same union mates that this coercion and bloody-mindedness must stop,” Mr Clark said.

Box Hill Hospital: fundind needed in this year's budget

ASSEMBLY Box Hill Hospital: funding

Mr CLARK (Box Hill) — Parliament’s next sitting week is budget week. For eastern suburbs residents, the crucial budget issue is whether the government will finally proceed with the redevelopment of Box Hill Hospital or whether the money the government should have provided for the redevelopment has been lost on blow-outs on bungled projects like myki, the Monash Freeway extension or police IT systems, meaning that the redevelopment is doomed to disappear, just as the government scrapped the hospital’s 2002 redevelopment plans.

The Labor Party promised in the 2006 election campaign that it would continue with the redevelopment of the hospital until the new facility was completed. However, that promise was broken.

The first preliminary stage was completed by August last year, yet there was no funding from the government to continue the project, and because of that lack of commitment, the project has been in limbo for almost a year.

In the Whitehorse Leader of 14 May last year the Minister for Gaming, who is the member for Mitcham, was reported as saying he was ‘very confident’ the government would provide the $850 million or so needed within the next 12 months. That 12 months is now almost up.

In its statement of intentions 2009 document the government said at page 21:

“In 2009, the government will deliver a number of key projects to improve service delivery in health and education for Victorians, including … Box Hill Hospital … “

Yet no similar reference to the government’s plans was included in its submission to the Legislative Council inquiry into public hospitals.

Waiting lists and waiting times at Box Hill Hospital, even on the published figures, are now amongst the worst in the state, as the hospital’s rapidly ageing facilities cannot cope. It is vital that the Labor Party fund the project in this year’s budget.

Ringwood bomb scare highlights power supply security concerns

Today’s bomb scare at a Ringwood electricity sub-station shows once again the continued failure of the Brumby government to act to improve the security of our electricity supply system and other critical infrastructure.

Concerns are made even greater by reports that the electricity company in question was unable to get in contact with the Victoria Police counter-terrorism unit, as agreed protocols require, because the relevant police officer was in Queensland and the mobile phones of other designated police contacts went unanswered.

This apparent extraordinary breakdown in counter-terrorist communications comes despite the Auditor-General warning in January that Victoria’s terrorism response system is ‘confusing to agencies and hinders coordination’.

The Victorian Liberal Nationals Coalition warned following the Auditor-General’s report that: Labor’s failure to introduce proper response systems means if a terrorist attack were to target a power station, train line or dam, our response could be undermined by poor coordination and a lack of leadership. (Media Release, 21 January 2009)

“The Brumby Government policy’s on terrorism threats seems to be ‘out of sight, out of mind’,” Shadow Minister for Energy and Resources Robert Clark said.

Today’s incident also follows a series of invasions of electricity supply generators by environmental extremists, which threaten to cut off power supplies and cause widespread blackouts.

The latest of these invasions was at Hazelwood power station on Saturday, and follows previous invasions last year at Loy Yang on 3 September and Hazelwood on 6 November .

“These invasions highlight the need to improve security at power plants and substations to protect not only against extremist protestors, but also against terrorism, vandalism and theft of wire and other crucial components,” Mr Clark said.

”The government needs to help, rather than hinder, power companies to upgrade security. The government also needs to introduce clear offences with tough penalties for those who invade vital infrastructure, rather than allow them to treat existing trespass laws with contempt.

“I raised these problems in Parliament in December last year. Unfortunately, while the Minister criticised those who invade power facilities, he seems to have done nothing since then to improve power supply security.”

“Victorians are fortunate that the object involved in today’s scare turned out not to be a bomb. However, what happened today shows how inadequate our power supply protection arrangements would be in the face of a real and serious threat,” Mr Clark said.

Labor charter fails to protect Victorians from violent bikies

Reports that Victoria Police were concerned they could not join a national campaign against criminal motorcycle gangs because it might violate bikies’ human rights show once again that Rob Hulls’ so-called Charter of Human Rights and Responsibilities is undermining Victorians’ rights instead of protecting them.

“It’s appalling that Victoria Police are being forced to fight crime with one arm tied behind their back because Labor insisted on passing this absurd law that puts the rights of criminals ahead of the rights of law-abiding citizens,” Shadow Attorney-General Robert Clark said today.

“If Victoria is flanked by states that are pushing bikie gangs out, bikies will come here and police are saying that is already occurring,” Mr Clark said.
“The nation is now ready to go to war with bikie gangs, and if Victoria refuses to join the fight then it is obvious that Victoria risks becoming the bikie capital of Australia.

“Claims by Rob Hulls that he didn’t ‘intend’ his charter to block campaigns like this make no difference – once the law has been passed, it’s up to a court or tribunal to decide on its application.

“Labor has taken control away from the community through Parliament and government and put vital anti-crime campaigns at the mercy of a sweeping and open-ended charter and its interpretation by a judge or VCAT member.

“It’s too late now for Rob Hulls to say he really didn’t mean it, because the damage has been done and law-abiding Victorians are paying the price for his folly.

“Rob Hulls has spent millions of dollars of taxpayers’ funds telling public authorities that they must obey his charter, and now hard-working police must give priority to obeying his stupid and ill-considered law ahead of doing their job of protecting the public from criminal gangs.

“Police won’t risk breaching the charter if legal advice states that joining the national campaign against criminal gangs would breach the charter, and if they defied the charter Rob Hulls would be one of the first to publicly attack them.

“The charter deems that human rights include freedom of association and the right for people not to have their reputations unlawfully attacked, rights which police were concerned might be breached by the national campaign.

“The charter also states it is unlawful for a public authority, including Victoria Police, to act in a way that is incompatible with a human right set out in the charter.

“Victoria Police should make its legal advice public, so Victorians can see for themselves the difficulties caused by Labor’s charter.

“Labor cannot provide enough police on the streets to protect Victorians, and the absurd restrictions imposed by its Human Rights Charter now mean that police are handicapped in doing their work and stopping criminal gangs threatening the safety of the public,” Mr Clark said.

Vic coalition helps preserves independence of key Victorian law body

The Victorian Liberal Nationals Coalition has helped to preserve the independence of a key Victorian law body by stopping the Victoria Law Foundation from being dominated by Labor cronies.

Shadow Attorney-General Robert Clark said today amendments passed by the Legislative Council and accepted by the government this week would help protect the independence of the Victoria Law Foundation.

“Labor has a well-deserved reputation for stacking boards and agencies with its political flunkies, but won’t be able to do that with the Victoria Law Foundation,” Mr Clark said.

“The Foundation has been a significant part of the Victorian legal landscape for more than 40 years, working hard to improve legal education and research and enhance community understanding of the law and the legal system.

“The Brumby Government had attempted to replace the current independent board of the Foundation with a board consisting solely of members chosen by the Attorney-General.

“The amendments made to the Victoria Law Foundation Bill mean that at least half of the members of the Foundation’s board, including the chair, must be independent nominees.

“We originally sought to ensure the independence of the Board by requiring that six of the eight members of the Board be non-government nominees, but rather than agree to retaining an independent board the Government let the Bill sit on the notice paper in the Legislative Council from August last year until late last month.

“Eventually, the Government accepted that at least half of the board should be independent and an amendment to that effect was carried with the support of the Greens,” Mr Clark said.

Under the Bill as amended, the board will consist of one nominee of each of the Chief Justice, the Law Institute, the Victorian Bar and the Federation of Community Legal Centres, and up to four people chosen by the Attorney-General.

The Greens and the DLP supported further Coalition amendments to require that the chair be the nominee of the Chief Justice, to require that the Attorney-General must fill any vacancy amongst independent nominees with the replacement nominee as soon as practicable, and to extend the functions of the Foundation to include research into legal education and the administration of justice.

“The Foundation has always operated with a board independent of government, and funded from interest earned on solicitors’ trust accounts – yet Labor wanted to seize control of this independent and well-regarded public institution and turn it into yet another instrument of political patronage.

“Fortunately the Coalition, with support from the minor parties, has ensured that a majority of votes on the board will be cast by members independent of the Brumby Government,” Mr Clark said.

Victorians pay even more for electricity but services continue to fail

Families in some Melbourne suburbs are being hit with big electricity price hikes – the same families that suffered most from last month’s substation malfunction which brought Melbourne to a standstill.

Half a million homes and businesses in places including St Albans, Essendon, Pascoe Vale, Werribee, Niddrie and Point Cook were without power, and all Melbourne’s trains were cancelled leaving commuters stranded in searing heat during a Friday night peak-hour.

Shadow Minister for Energy and Resources Robert Clark said the price hike would be a rude shock for families still counting the cost after throwing out hundreds of dollars worth of groceries lost during last month’s blackout.

“Honestly, many of these families would be wondering why their power bills are going up when their electricity is so often going down, and when John Brumby says he will not guarantee there won’t be a repeat of last month’s meltdown,” Mr Clark said.

“This is the fifth year in a row in which hundreds of thousands of Victorians have suffered major power blackouts. Since 2004, power reliability in Victoria has been going backwards.”

“Every time the Brumby Government fails Victorians on basic services, and every time John Brumby says he won’t guarantee basic services, life gets harder for families.

“With bills going up yet again, the least families can expect is for the government to fix the fundamentals and give them a power supply that doesn’t leave them in darkness every summer.”

Mr Clark urged households struggling to meet the cost demands to contact the Essential Services Commission for advice on how to shop around for competitive electricity suppliers.

Labor soft on youth gangs

John Brumby is again showing Labor is soft on crime by enabling juvenile offenders who avoid being charged for six months after committing an offence to escape being charged at all without their agreement or special permission from the Children’s Court.

“Labor’s rejection of attempts by the Victorian Liberal Nationals Coalition to keep the current twelve-month time limit means youth gangs who assault innocent Victorians or deface our trains and homes with graffiti can escape punishment if they can avoid being identified or caught for six months,” Shadow Attorney-General Robert Clark said today.

The new law will apply to all summary offences, including offences such as assault and graffiti.

The Attorney-General told Parliament last week he wants to ‘put the onus back on the police to commence and complete investigations within a timely period’ and if young offenders are not charged within six months ‘a whole range of therapeutic justice measures cannot be interacted with that young child’.

“There is no ‘therapeutic justice’ in allowing gangs of youths who assault innocent Victorians to escape justice because the police can’t identify them,” Mr Clark said.

“The statement by the Attorney-General that he is ‘put(ting) the onus back on the police’ is an insult to hard-working police who are swamped by violent crime and struggling to protect Victorians because of Labor’s failure to fund more police on our streets.

“Police put many hours of work into tracking down violent youths and matching graffiti tags with offenders, and can’t put investigations of burglaries, robberies or drug trafficking on hold while they rush to meet the six month deadline on filing graffiti charges.

“The Attorney-General’s absurd proposal to allow police to apply to the Children’s Court for extensions of time to up to 12 months from the time of the offence will put huge pressure on both police and the Children’s Court.

“Victoria’s Children’s Court already has the longest backlog of cases waiting to be heard of any Children’s Court in Australia, with 5,591 cases waiting to be heard as of June last year.

“The Attorney-General should abandon this foolish and ill-considered proposal which only serves to again prove the Brumby Government is soft on crime and out of touch with Victorians,” Mr Clark said.