I too join my colleagues to rise today to speak on the Cladding Safety Victoria Bill 2020. This bill continues our government’s determination to make sure that our buildings are only built with the safest materials. It seems like a lifetime ago that combustible cladding was one of the most pressing issues that required government action. At the core of this issue is safety. We want all Victorians to trust that the buildings they enter are safe to be in, that their homes are safe to live in and that their apartment buildings are safe to sleep in.

We know from situations like Grenfell, half a world away, how problems with cladding can be dangerous and can take lives. How can any of us here ever forget switching on our TVs and watching the horror unfold on 14 June 2017. I just want to take a moment this morning to take our minds back to Grenfell. A fire broke out just before 1.00 am in the 24-storey Grenfell Tower block of flats in North Kensington, west London. As the member for Sunbury pointed out, it tragically caused 72 deaths. More than 70 others were injured, and 223 people escaped with their lives. After numerous inquiries, we know that the fire was started by a malfunctioning fridge freezer on the fourth floor. It spread rapidly up the building’s exterior, bringing fire and bringing smoke to all the residential floors. This was due to the building’s cladding, the external insulation and the air gap between them which enabled the stack effect. The fire burned for about 60 hours before finally being extinguished. More than 250 London Fire Brigade firefighters and 70 fire engines were involved from stations right across London in efforts to control the fire and rescue residents. More than 100 London Ambulance Service crews on at least 20 ambulances attended, joined by specialist paramedics from the ambulance service’s hazardous area response team. The Metropolitan Police and London’s Air Ambulance were also involved and assisted in the rescue effort.

The world could only sit there and watch in horror. Then we needed to look to our own backyards for similar cladding insufficiencies. Now the Grenfell Tower Inquiry’s final report has been released, and it affirms that the building’s exterior did not comply with regulations and was indeed the central reason why the fire spread, and that the fire service was unfortunately too late in advising residents to evacuate.

Now, the safety of Victorians is something that our government takes incredibly seriously. That is why we have made a number of changes in the last year alone to regulate the building industry right here in Victoria. It is why we have imposed stricter regulations on architects and builders and their licensing schemes. It is why there are now greater penalties for architects who design buildings with unsafe materials. Victorians can be confident in our government’s track record on cladding, and this bill is a step further in the right direction.

The first key change this bill makes is that Victorians will now have an extra two years to sue builders who install combustible cladding in their homes. Under the current arrangements they have 10 years to pursue legal action. They will now have 12, and because our government takes this issue so seriously we will support home owners, in the most serious of cases, by pursuing legal action on their behalf. In these cases of extreme wrongdoing we are not going to keep home owners waiting while the courts deliberate. That is why the government will also pay the costs of rectifying unsafe homes while home owners pursue the builders through the courts, because those works cannot wait. These are huge changes. These are meaningful changes. These are changes that will protect Victorians and send a very, very clear warning to the wrongdoers: we are coming after you.

In addition, the bill will officially separate Cladding Safety Victoria, the CSV, from the Victorian Building Authority. While the VBA continues to regulate builders and the materials they use, CSV will carry out the work of the government’s $600 million cladding rectification program. I note the achievement that Victoria is one of the first jurisdictions in the world to tackle this cladding. This is something that we as a state should feel enormously proud of. I most certainly am proud to be part of a government that is committed to driving this change. As part of this program, CSV will team up with stakeholders in the building industry to remove unsafe cladding materials from high-risk buildings, and they have already begun to do this. Already CSV has developed plans to remove cladding from 250 buildings, and by the end of August works were already underway on seven important projects. Now, these works are continuing, even under current restrictions, following safety protocols in line with public health directives and following COVID-safe plans.

I would like to take a moment to acknowledge and thank those in the building industry and those involved in removing risky cladding during this time. Roughly 10 per cent of the Victorian workforce is employed in the construction industry, and throughout this lockdown these workers have persisted through operating under tough safety measures. Their work is so important in keeping Victorians safe, and just like everyone else working to keep us safe in these times I commend them for their hard work.

Prior to today I took a quick look on the Victorian Building Authority’s website, and there are about 1400 buildings across Victoria that are privately owned that have been identified to have unsafe cladding. Of these, Wyndham, the community I represent, has 21 buildings identified with cladding. Now, the electorate that I represent is home to a lot of development. It is home to an incredible amount of development. In Tarneit and Truganina we have seen a vibrant construction industry, with new homes being built regularly. New homes are being built before our very eyes. We are lucky that most of our development is new and has not used these materials and that we have had the luxury of our stronger safety laws. Unfortunately these issues are a greater problem for a lot of our older suburbs, and I note that my colleagues this week have talked about a number of issues in the building industry with unsafe cladding within their own electorates.

But our government is not going to stop here, because as part of this bill more high-risk buildings scheduled to have cladding removed will be fast-tracked as part of our state’s COVID recovery plan, and this will create jobs and boost our economic recovery. By 2022 our government aims to have 400 high-risk buildings here in Victoria cladding free, and to do this as efficiently as we can where it is possible we are going to use the original builder. Where it is possible to use the original builder we will go ahead and do that. Now, not only is it efficient using builders who designed the building and have that firsthand knowledge, but it is going to encourage goodwill and it will encourage cooperation with the building industry to help. They have the designs, the skills and the workforce to get this done. And of course when it comes to situations where we cannot get the original builders, the government will continue with our cost recovery process, organising the rectification of these buildings while recouping the cost later.

Either way, what I am pleased to see is that this program will create jobs. As has been said here this week, a tenth of Victorians work in the construction industry, and I know a lot of people living in Tarneit—great people—who work in this industry, and they cannot wait to get back to work and get on with things. Projects like these are exactly how we are going to do it, because this project is an infrastructure renewal project and we are making sure that buildings that house businesses and people are fit for purpose—that they are safe for the public. In doing so, we are stimulating an economy that we all know needs it and creating jobs for people who rely on them, and that is what is most important here.

Our government is prepared to meet the challenge of high-risk cladding head-on. We are one of the first in the world to act on this issue, and our cladding rectification program will help make Victorian buildings—our homes, apartments, shops and workplaces—safer for all Victorians. More than that, it is going to play a vital role in creating jobs and boosting our economy as part of Victoria’s COVID recovery. Our government understands the challenges posed by high-risk cladding. We have tackled it head-on and we are creating job opportunities in the process. It is for these reasons that I commend the bill to the house.