Ms Catherine King (Ballarat, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Health) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The 20th of January will be marked as a very tragic day for the people of Victoria and Melbourne. I, like many people, was shocked to see and hear of the terrible carnage that occurred in one of our most iconic locations in our iconic, great city. My family and I—my husband and my little boy, Ryan—were in Melbourne that day. We were juggling work and family commitments on the last week of school holidays. We had driven up to Melbourne to go and see a performance of Operation Ouch!, a great kids program that was on at the arts centre. We parked at the arts centre. We had had my father-in-law staying overnight, so we walked up to Flinders Street Station to see him onto the train back to his suburban house in Blackburn. As we stood and said farewell to him at the Flinders Street Station, Mark and I turned to each other and thought, 'What are we going to do for lunch?' We talked about going and walking up Swanston Street and heading to the mall. But we then thought, 'Well, we've got an hour and a half; perhaps we'd better head back the other way and head to the arts centre.' And that is what we did. Had we made the decision to go to Swanston Street, we would have been right at the site of where this terrible tragedy occurred right at that time.

And that is what happened for many families and many people: it was an accident, in the wrong place at the wrong time with someone who had decided to commit a terrible act. People just making ordinary decisions: whether they would walk down one side of the street or go on the other side; if they had not brought their lunch into work that day, whether they needed to whip out to go and buy lunch; coming into town and thinking about what they would do in their last week of school holidays, 'Let's head into Myers, let's head into DJs, into the Bourke Street Mall and do some shopping.' All of those are decisions that ordinary people make every single day. You expect you would be able to go and get your lunch during your lunch hour, go and visit the city, go into the Bourke Street Mall and be safe. And normally you are, except for these terrible, terrible circumstances that happened on this day.

I cannot imagine what the families of the people we have lost are going through, and my heart goes out to every single one of them. I cannot imagine the trauma that was inflicted on our city on that day. As we sat having lunch at the Arts Centre, my husband, as he is wont to do, was checking the Twitter account. He looked up and said, 'You know, there's something happening in the mall.' I said, 'What's going on?' He said, 'A car's driven down there.' 'What do you mean a car's driven down the mall? What's going on?' As we started to hear the reports coming through and the terror that gripped the city, it was a frightening experience to be part of. I can only imagine what it was like to be there.

As the shadow minister for health, I think it is particularly incumbent upon me to reflect on and to thank deeply the incredible health professionals who came to the fore in Melbourne. I will do that in a minute. I first want to reflect on the incredible bravery and courage of the many people in that mall that day, who would have been absolutely terrified. It is not normal to experience that level of fear when you go on your lunch break, to have to actually deal with something so frightening and so traumatic, and so to actually run into danger to help your fellow citizens—to comfort, to care—and to then go back to work the very next day and to have to revisit that site is an extraordinary thing, and I want to reflect on this and thank them.

But as I said, as shadow minister for health I particularly want to say thank you to our health workforce. You were extraordinary. I have talked to a number of emergency department workers, people who were around on that day, and I know many of them still carry with them today what happened on that day. We had an off-duty doctor named Michael who was on the scene and who assisted paramedics. We have heard about an orthopaedic surgeon who was on the scene and who provided support and comfort to victims, helping them until ambulances could get to the scene. There was the off-duty orthopaedic surgeon using brochures to strap someone's leg, while workers at a nearby pharmacy got equipment to people as well. We have heard stories of incredible, well-functioning emergency departments across our major city hospitals dealing with this crisis in such an incredibly professional way. There were 37 people hospitalised that afternoon. The injured were taken to five hospitals across our city—the Royal Children's Hospital, the Royal Melbourne Hospital, St Vincent's Hospital, the Royal Victorian Eye and Ear Hospital, and the Alfred. Their emergency departments did us proud, every single one of them, and we thank them for that: the specialist doctors, the surgeons, the nurses, the theatre workers, the many who fought incredibly hard to save lives. Tragically, we lost six people—five Melburnians and an overseas visitor—but many, many lives were saved on that day, and we do recognise there are many people who are still injured and who are recovering from those injuries. We had more than 40 ambulances turn out, dispatched to the scene. Again, it was such a small space and a chaotic scene; they would have been facing incredibly difficult circumstances.

In the weeks afterwards we have had Red Cross workers remaining in the mall to give psychological support to members of the public. Again, it would have been impossible to actually deal with and help people on the day itself, because there were so many injured and so many people who needed assistance that many people would have left the scene—gone back to their offices and only when they got home that night would they have really started to process what had actually happened to them—and then had to go back onto the scene the next day to work.

Of course, every single emergency responder on the day—the paramedics, police officers and emergency service workers did an extraordinary job. Ambulance Victoria has put out a beautiful video, thanking members of the public. If people have not seen it, I really encourage them to have a look at it. I am pretty tough. I do not often cry a lot but I have to admit that it moved me to tears when I looked at it. We often hear stories of our ambulance workers working in pretty awful circumstances where sometimes they are not always looked after by members of the public, and here were some of our toughest ambos thanking the members of the public just for their incredible support on the day.

We also had, as I said, members of the public rushing to comfort people. These events show the worst of our community but they also give us the opportunity to see the best of our community, and I do not think you could have seen any braver group of people than were in the Bourke Street Mall on the twentieth. As I said at the start, it was an accident of fate as to who was there and why they were there at that particular time. It could have happened to anybody who was in the city making a decision on that day. I want to say to the families of the six people who died, 'You will always be in our hearts. We mourn with you. We thank the people who supported you and who hopefully will continue to support you in the many years ahead.'

This was a terrible tragedy that we will learn from but I also think has bravely shown some of the best of our nature—where we saw people running into danger to help their fellow Australians, sheltering them from the burning sun. It was an incredibly hot day that day. They were comforting and welcoming the many tourists who were in our region as well, making sure that they felt safe and that the fear subsided as quickly as it could. Again, I do particularly want to thank our incredible health workforce. That was an extraordinarily difficult day and remains so. One of the nurses I have spoken to said that normally when you are treating people in emergencies you do not know a lot about them—you do not know their family history; you do not know about their background—but what is happening in this circumstance is that their stories are being told in the newspapers so they are becoming much more than just a patient. They are becoming very real, and that, of course, leaves its own challenges and traumas for our nurses and our hospital staff. Again, in recognising the great work that they do we say, 'Thank you.' We pay tribute to them and we mourn with the Victorian community.

Scott Buchholz (Wright, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the honourable member for that heartfelt contribution. It was an absolute tragedy.

Kelly O'Dwyer (Higgins, Liberal Party, Minister for Revenue and Financial Services) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I join with those in this chamber who have combined to try and put into words some of the feelings that we all have about what occurred on 20 January 2017. What we know of that day is that it was a very typical Friday afternoon. Melbourne city streets were buzzing with people. City workers were grabbing a bite to eat. Tourists were exploring the beautiful Melbourne neighbourhood. Families were in town to do a bit of shopping. My brother was just returning to work from lunch and he had left just 10 minutes before this shocking crime.

Just before 2 pm, a mystery car was used as a weapon as it hurtled through Bourke Street along the pedestrian walkway. Frantic pedestrians were seen desperately trying to get out of the way, running into nearby shops to avoid being hit. Many were lucky but unfortunately many were not. There were six victims who lost their lives, all tragically young: 33-year-old father Matthew Si; 33-year-old Bhavita Patel; a 25-year-old Japanese national; 22-year-old Jess Mudie, 10-year-old Thalia Hakin; and little Zachary Bryant, who was just three months old. And there were many more who were injured, some of whom remain in hospital.

The devastating attack that occurred in Melbourne's Bourke Street was a random, callous and shocking attack, and it has left enduring scars on the Victorian community. There are few words that can truly express the horrors of that day because it all happened so quickly, but the grief experienced by the families of these victims is truly unimaginable. We as a country grieve with them.

But we are also thankful that Australians are overwhelmingly good and kind people. We are thankful for the Samaritans who stopped to help and comfort the injured and distressed. We are thankful for the countless emergency service workers who turned up in force to assist. We thank our incredible health workers who dealt with those who were injured. And we are thankful for all of those who are still providing a shoulder to lean on for the people whose lives will be forever changed.

What we saw and still see today is a credit to these people and a true testament to the spirit of the Victorian people. Our local community and all levels of government worked together in the immediate aftermath of the event. The Victorian government set up the Bourke Street Fund and contributed $100,000 towards it, and we as a federal government have also contributed $100,000 to this fund and have made a commitment that the Bourke Street Fund has deductible gift recipient status and that the contributions to the fund will be tax deductible. As the responsible minister, I will introduce this legislation into the parliament tomorrow. The City of Melbourne is also considering the idea of a plaque to commemorate those who lost their lives.

But we must also take the opportunity to learn from this terrible crime. The 26-year-old man responsible for this senseless act was on bail at the time of the incident after a long history of violence. Our police need strengthened powers to directly intervene before harm occurs, and the bail system needs to be changed to better protect our community.

The 20th of January 2017 is a date that will be forever ingrained into the hearts of all Australians. We remember the victims, their families, those who were witnesses to this horror and the first responders. But we also remember this day as a day when we saw the true strength and compassion of our Victorian and Australian people.

Andrew Hastie (Canning, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the honourable member for her heartfelt remarks.

Andrew Giles (Scullin, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I rise to make some very brief remarks on this very important issue, and I am pleased to have been here for those remarks just made by the member for Higgins and also those from the member for Ballarat. The way in which they conveyed their thoughts I think stands as testament to how the Victorian community has responded to the awful events of last month. As I am a Melburnian and someone who has spent almost all of my working life in the Melbourne CBD in and around the area where the tragedy occurred, these events feel very close to home. As the member for Ballarat said so effectively, it is so easy to put ourselves in the shoes of those who found themselves in unimaginable circumstances. It is so easy to put ourselves in their shoes, so it should be easy for us to reach out from this place to those who will no doubt need support well beyond today.

It is important to acknowledge the six people who lost their lives, to mourn for them and to recognise that there are many others who will be in mourning for some time. It is important again that we ensure that every support is given to them and to the 37 people hospitalised that day. As we mourn, we must also recognise the manner in which others responded. People have spoken about the first responders, and I am in awe of the work that they did under the most trying of circumstances. I am in awe of the first responders and—again as the member for Ballarat set out—those in hospitals who gave treatment, recognising the extraordinary circumstances under which they were treating those people. It is simply inspiring, though, to appreciate the bystanders—the ordinary people working, shopping and otherwise enjoying what should have been a typical summer day in Melbourne—who put themselves in harm's way to look after others—others they did not know. That was the best of Victoria.

In the days that followed, it was heartening to see the way in which the community, at every level, responded and the remarks of the Prime Minister, the Leader of the Opposition, the Premier of Victoria—who made the point, 'We are stronger than what happened,' and that is a point that has already been proven correct—and the Lord Mayor of Melbourne. The way in which Melburnians and others have come to show publicly their tribute and their thoughts is something that I have been struck by and that I am sure we will continue to be struck by.

In this place, Australia's parliament, it is so important that we make a stand here—a stand in memory and in tribute to those who lost their lives, those close to them, everyone who was directly affected and those many hundreds of people who will continue to be directly affected. It is also important, as other speakers have said, that we reflect on what happened. I think it is important that we do so in a measured way and that we do not react for the sake of reacting in response to such unimaginable and grotesque awfulness. I think the tribute that we can and should pay to all those directly affected is to continue to recognise—

A division having been called in the House of Representatives—

Sitting suspended from 17:07 to 17:20

In conclusion, it is important that those of us in this place have an opportunity to pay tribute with words to all those affected by the tragic events of 20 January. It is more important, of course, that in our deeds those of us with the capacity to act do so and do so appropriately, that we take the time to learn what can be learned from that terrible day, that we continue to pay tribute to all of those who lost their lives and all of those affected by the loss of loved ones, that we continue to take every step to ensure that all those in need of support receive the support that they need and that as Melburnians we continue to go about our lives and to support one another and to show the fantastic spirit that was demonstrated by our first responders and ordinary citizens on that day.

Tim Wilson (Goldstein, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I want to continue on this motion on the Bourke Street tragedy and particularly a statement on indulgence regarding the tragedy that occurred. Kaitlyn Offer from the Australian Associated Press recently wrote and started an article by saying:

It was six minutes of mayhem. A rampage that has cast a giant, lingering shadow over Melbourne.

She is correct. This time and this tragic event has rightly focused the minds of Victorians on the importance and primacy of safety wherever you are in Melbourne and a concern about their ongoing lives and making sure that they live lives free from crime.

This tragic event has particularly hit our Goldstein community hard and in a deeply personal way for one family. I recently spoke in a 90-second statement about Thalia Hakin. Our community is grieving for the tragic loss of her life all too young as a victim of the Bourke Street carnage that shocked Melbourne on 20 January. She was only 10 years old. We continue to stand with the Hakin family and send our heartfelt best wishes to Thalia's mother, Nathalie, and her sister, Maggie, who remain critically injured from the event.

As I previously said in this place, it has been deeply moving to see the Bentleigh community and the Goldstein community generally stand shoulder to shoulder with Thalia's father, Tony, and particularly the support that Tony and his family have enjoyed from Melbourne's Jewish community within the Goldstein community and also the neighbouring electorate of Melbourne Ports. They have come together in moments of remembrance and at services as well as at Thalia's funeral to share the loss together and help support each other in an incredibly difficult and heartbreaking time. But the strength of our community bonds and efforts to rally and support this family reflect the absolute best of the Australian spirit, particularly in difficult times.

However, this lingering shadow has shown cracks in the Victorian people after such horrific tragedy as people are rightly coming together, trying to understand this event, the cause of it and then how they should properly respond. Quite rightly, many people are mourning, and that mourning has progressively turned to anger. The question that is being asked is: how does something like this occur? Hindsight gives Victorians answers. The accused driver—I will not mention his name because I do not believe, in any way, in acknowledging horrific crimes and giving them any sort of recognition—has been charged with five counts of murder and is expected to be charged with a sixth. He was out on bail. The anger in the community over the past two years has progressively shifted to a concern about whether there is enough focus on making sure that those people who have committed crimes remain incarcerated in a way that they cannot commit these sorts of ugly crimes into the future.

At the heart of this event is the fact that innocent people were mowed down in a street like any other in Melbourne. I think that, for a lot of us, this tragic event draws a terrible parallel with our own lives because it was one of those genuine occasions of: 'There but for the grace of God go I.' That is why it has hit the Victorian community so strongly and why the Victorian community has also taken the opportunity to come together, to band together, to share the pain and the experience and to try and improve the sense of community that we all share in difficult times. It is at these times that it is important to acknowledge not only the commitment of everybody who has come together and supported the Hakin family, who have lived in Goldstein and continue to live in Goldstein, but also the enduring strength of the Victorian community, so that we can all move forward together.

Adam Bandt (Melbourne, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

On Friday, 20 January I was on one of the last days of my holiday. I was with my three-month-old and 1½-year-old daughters outside of Melbourne in the forest at Toolangi. It is an amazing place. As you walk through the forest and look up, you see some of the tallest flowering trees in the world, and you understand what it means to be alive and to connect with this amazing world around us. It is also a place that is out of range for mobile devices—certainly the part that we were walking in. We came back from Toolangi into the city, and the closer you get to the city the more you start to check in to find out what is happening in the world around you. At that point things were coming in in dribs and drabs, but what became crystal clear was that in the heart of my electorate, in the middle of Melbourne, there was a horrific act of violence that was unimaginable to many people and that also had everyone, as the previous member said, thinking, 'There but for the grace of God go I.' As the information started to come in over—

A division having been called in the House of Representatives—

Proceedings suspended from 17:28 to 17:46

I was saying before the break that, on Friday, 20 January I was heading back into town with my three-month-old and my 1½-year-old in the back of the car together with my wife after having spent the day walking through the forest in Toolangi. Never do you feel more connected to your family and other people in the world around you and understand what it means to be alive than when you are doing that. As we came back to town we learnt, bit-by-bit, of the chaos and the enormous act of violence that was unfolding right in the middle of my electorate in Bourke Street. We did what I think pretty much everyone in Melbourne did at that stage in the evening, and that was put the pieces of information together as they came out and began to understand the true horror and enormity of what had happened.

I did what I think probably pretty much everyone in Melbourne did, and that is piece together the route that that car took on that day. You could not help but remember the last time that you were there. We have heard people, including in this chamber today, say that it was just an act of luck that saw them not standing there. As you see pictures of upturned prams and as you read of cries of mothers saying, 'Where is my baby? Have you seen my baby?' you remember that you can count the days since the last time you stood on one of those corners with your kids. You understand why this struck at Melbourne's heart. It was not just, 'It could have been me.' It was everyone acknowledging that it could have been any one of us.

The more that we learnt about the tragedy of that day the more we also learnt about Melbourne. A couple of days after I was on the corner of Bourke Street and Elizabeth Street, joining with many others standing in front of a sea of flowers, cards and stuffed toys. What was perhaps just as remarkable as the depth and breadth of the outpouring from Melburnians was that the people who were there to deliver their tributes were not just turning up, laying them and leaving; people were standing and reflecting. They were standing there, not necessarily to take photos on their phone but to pause in genuine honour and respect and to try to understand what had just happened and how we would deal with it. I do want to pay tribute to the services, particularly the volunteers from the Red Cross, who were there to support all of the people who had come along to pay their tributes.

Later that day I went to the service that was held in my electorate. They had the lord mayor speaking at it and paying appropriate tribute to the Premier, Daniel Andrews. The member for Higgins was there, the Leader of the Opposition was there and a number of members of parliament from Victoria were there too. There, we learnt more not just about the incident but also about Melbourne. One of the things that has stuck with me, and I think many other people in Melbourne, was a statement that was read out by Henry Dow, who was nearby when the car was running over people. He did what we would all like to think we would do—he ran towards what was happening rather than run away. At the service he read a post that he wrote on Facebook, and I would like to just read a part of it, because he spoke not about himself but about someone else. He said:

Administering first aid with me, under that skinny little tree, is a man named Lou: he is everything great and courageous you have seen, heard or read, rolled into one authentically humble bloke.

Having seen the car fly past, my legs carried me across the street almost on auto-pilot, swearing under my breath repeatedly as it sunk in what had just happened. Some basic Surf Life Saving training got me through the first stages of helping this poor woman: role her on her side, support her neck, we talked kindly and as calmly as we could to her.

Then the gunshots.

Holding her head, my hand was, for want of a better word, shaking. It was more like bouncing, moving several inches up and down as the fear and thoughts of what had happened, what could happen, raced through my head.

Lou grabbed my hand and firmly told me to keep it together, that I was ok and that we needed to keep strong for this woman.

In a level and loud voice, Lou barked orders at other pedestrians standing by, having not fled, but still too stunned to think or move.

He directed assistance to several of the victims laying on the pavement around us, all whilst keeping me calm and speaking lovingly to this woman: "I am Lou, you are going to be ok, we are looking after you".

It kept going through my head, "thank f**k I lucked out and have an emergency services veteran here with me". Surely Lou was Ambulance, Police or SAS. Lou was not.

Lou, in his white shirt and neat dark tie, was a taxi driver.

In our small story, of this much bigger tragedy, Lou took command and was a genuine hero.

Henry Dow, when he read those words out to the thousands of people gathered in Federation Square, had us hanging on every word. I think, in a world where the word 'hero' is used very often, a taxi driver who chooses to charge into the scene of an accident and stay there, while shots are being fired, to provide support to not only people who have been injured but also those who have come to help is a genuine hero.

We have learnt, over the last weeks, about more and more people like that. I want to pay tribute not only to them but also to the emergency services workers who were the first responders. I do not think anyone ever wants to attend a scene like that, and I know why: I have spoken to a number of other people who have said that those kind of scenes make you question whether you want to continue in the emergency services profession, and I can understand that. What I have also heard is that, that afternoon, the number of counsellors available to the emergency services personnel was exhausted—that is, so many members of the emergency services profession were reaching out for help that it took them a while to find enough people who could help. That is not a criticism; I think that is a very good thing. I think it is a very, very good thing that that is happening in Melbourne, and I want to pay tribute to all of those counsellors and all those people who stood by and supported.

I have seen many things happen in Melbourne that are talked about in terms of people coming together across the spectrum and uniting, but I have never seen something happen that so deliberately brings home that there is a common humanity and that, when a devastating act of violence occurs in the middle of a society, the answer is to come together, and it is the only answer.

I do want to pay tribute to the way in which relevant governments, especially the state government, have looked at how to deal with questions arising out of this. I do hope that in the coming months and years this never becomes something that is politicised but that, instead, we ask ourselves, 'What have we got to learn from this horrific act of violence and how do we prevent this coming together again?' But, most importantly, I hope that we remember that acts like this, especially if they ever happen again, will never divide us.

Joanne Ryan (Lalor, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is a little sad to think that it is only moments of great tragedy or great celebration that bring us together in this place. But I am pleased to join my colleagues from around Australia, particularly my colleagues from Victoria, to say a few words about the Bourke Street tragedy and to honour the victims of that tragedy.

A few weeks ago, the nation stood still as we heard reports of a man driving down a busy city street. That city street was Bourke Street. For Victorians, it was our Bourke Street. The incident resonated with many of us because of how surreal it was. It was shocking that people going about their business could be killed and injured by a man in an act of pure evil in what we consider to be our safe streets. Six people were murdered, and a bright summer's day was shattered by the actions of an uncaring individual. I have struggled with that adjective because it is only through the courts that we will find the adjectives for this person. To say that the act was selfish is, I think, fair in the circumstances. The footage will be remembered by all who watched in their lounge rooms and will be imprinted in the mind's eye of all who watched it unfold in real time at the scene because it was Bourke Street. It was our street—a street that all Victorians have roamed around aimlessly or busily. It is a street that I have spent my life walking along, first as a young person, a child, on my first trip to the city in my school uniform—we would get off at Spencer Street and walk up to Bourke Street—and then as a teenager on my first trip to the city with friends. I think I was 13 when I was first allowed to go to Bourke Street. On that day a few weeks ago, I thought of all the parents making the decision about their child going to the movies in the city for the first time or going shopping with friends.

I would like to offer my condolences to the families of the victims. I also wish to sincerely thank, as have many here, the first responders for their skill and bravery. Those responders were, of course, both paid and unpaid. They were members of the public reacting instinctively and members of services who are trained in these areas. They all went towards danger to help others, unthinkingly, reacting in their humanity. I spare a thought for the police officers who attended that day. Those who worked across the day will always feel connected to that event. In particular, I think of the police officers who made the decision to draw their weapons and all that that means for those officers—not just on that day but permanently. I say that because I have good friends and relatives who are in the Victoria Police and who have shared what that moment means for any police officer.

On that day, ordinary Victorians and Australians rushed to the aid of others, even in a moment of unimaginable darkness. They reminded us all of what is good in our society. Their actions were an affirmation of all of our humanity in response to what was such an inhumane and incredibly evil act. It is difficult to understand why people decide to perpetrate such evil. However, perhaps this incident offers an insight into the character traits that suggest an ability to carry out acts of evil like this. We all know hindsight is a great thing, but we need to look for patterns in behaviour so that we can predict behaviours. If you can predict it, you may have a chance to prevent it. It seems to me that a clear pattern is emerging, which we can see in this and in other circumstances, that domestic violence might be a precursor or a predictor of repeated and escalating violence, as it was tragically in this and other cases.

I hope that we can take the hindsight of this and other events. I hope that we can systematically act from the perspective of the Victorian Royal Commission into Family Violence. I hope that we can come together to grow new knowledge and new learning about what it is in our humanity that can suddenly become so inhumane repeatedly in these cases. I hope that, in Victoria and across Australia, our parliaments can come together—our members of parliament in this place and our senators in the other place, and those in our state parliaments—and work together. In our courts we look at case law. I hope that from this event we might pull together police, magistrates, academics, lawyers, psychologists, politicians, welfare workers and experts in this field to look at case studies to see if we can use that hindsight to create a new system. I hope that in our parliaments we can work together to study what that presents and that we can grow that knowledge to make evidence based decisions to find the appropriate balance between the presumption of innocence and the protection of the innocents.

On 20 January a violent person took the lives of Matthew Si; Jess Mudie; Bhavita Patel; a 25-year-old Japanese national; Thalia Hakin, aged 10; and Zachary Bryant, who was only three months old. I am pleased to hear that in response to this tragedy Daniel Andrews, Premier of Victoria, has announced bail law reform, so that perhaps we can prevent another tragedy, and has established a fund to assist affected families. I would urge anyone who wants to make a donation to do so through the Victorian government's website or by calling 1800 226 226.

The impact of this day will live with many Victorians for a long time. The impact on the families who lost loved ones on that day will be extraordinary. The impact on anyone who was in the city on that day, which will be forever linked to that event, will be extraordinary. It is awful to think that what played out so quickly on our television screens will have a permanent impact on so many people. It is in the interests of those that we lost that day, and the interests of those who will live with the vision, live with their reaction, live with the memory and live with the 'what if' and the 'if only'. It is for them that we need to continue to work in this space and come up with some real answers.

Andrew Hastie (Canning, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the honourable member for her remarks. As a mark of respect, I invite honourable members to rise in their places.

Honourable members having stood in their places—

I thank the chamber.