Archives: June 2014

I rise to express my disappointment on behalf of West Heidelberg residents at the fact that because of government cuts the West Heidelberg campus of the Northern Melbourne Institute of TAFE (NMIT) is introducing parking fees for TAFE students from 1 July. TAFE students will now be paying up to $5 a day - something like $1000 a year - to park their cars at the campus.

I am pleased to follow a former Parliamentary Secretary for Police and Emergency Services who is particularly familiar with interventions in high-level police command matters. In making my contribution to debate on the Crime Statistics Bill 2014 I note that the Labor Party has previously touched on these matters. The Leader of the Opposition and Leader of the Parliamentary Labor Party believes that this plan has merit and is long overdue.

I raise a matter for the attention of the Minister for Education. The action I seek is for the minister to direct his Department of Education and Early Childhood Development to remove the old, empty, redundant and dilapidated classroom building at Rosanna Primary School which the school council has determined is unsafe for students.

The Banksia Palliative Care Service has provided specialist care for over 7000 people living at home or in aged-care facilities in my electorate of Ivanhoe who have been diagnosed with a progressive terminal illness.

I am pleased to rise to make a contribution with regard to the state budget. It says a lot about a government when it is building more prison beds than providing funding for hospital beds.

I note that in the 15-minute contribution from the Premier not once did he find time to mention any initiatives in the Ivanhoe electorate, and not very many at all in the northern suburbs of Melbourne, an area that has been neglected these past three years and certainly in four budgets under this Liberal government.

I also raise the issue of Northern Melbourne Institute of TAFE (NMIT). I refer to an article in the Age today headed 'Funding cut leaves NMIT $30 million in red'. It is not a surprise that the Heidelberg West campus has been decimated by this government's cuts to TAFE.