So when I reflect on this bill, I too have come to a conclusion, particularly after watching a very special video that the Premier put out, talking to parents – talking to mums like myself – about the importance of trying to keep our kids safe.

It has been really good to hear the contributions here in this house, even from those opposite who are speaking against this bill. At the end of the day, this is a bill that is about a trial, and it is about trying to save some kids’ lives. We may not be able to save them all, because if you are going to take a pill at a music festival, for instance, it is voluntary to go and have it tested. I really hope that those in the upcoming season of music festivals that want to take a pill – whether they are a kid, a young person, or an adult – get it tested if the option is there, because it could save their life. We know it does save lives. We do trust in the research that we have undertaken and received from overseas. We know testing saves lives. No-one deserves to lose their life because of a drug overdose, whether it is at a music festival or on the streets of Richmond.

Appallingly, the member for Brighton talked about the Premier not standing for anything, which was absolutely ridiculous. I feel that the Premier in this instance is standing up for the kids – standing up for young people who take a silly risk and make what I think is an absolutely stupid decision at a music festival, because drugs do ruin lives. They do not just ruin the person’s life who takes them, they ruin the family that are then left with the aftermath of permanent damage, if not death, of that person in some instances. The Premier is standing up for young people, and she is standing up for families that have tragically lost their loved ones to drug taking and drug overdose and drug effects. Also, she is standing up and trying to prevent it from happening again. Indeed when this bill passes this place, lives will be saved. Never forget that – lives will be saved. We just will not hear about it, right, but they will be saved, no doubt, this upcoming festival season.

As a parent, I love to say that my darling, newly minted 14-year-old Emily, and Leo at age 11, will never take drugs. I would like to think they will not even drink alcohol. I freak out thinking of them driving a car. But I am not as much of an idiot not to think that the time will come when they will do some of this stuff.

The member for Narracan talked about the importance of education. Education is so important, and that is why we have had a real focus on making sure kids at school, as part of the curriculum, get the right education about drug taking, about sex and even about things like vaping and the effects that they can have on you and the consequences on your life. I hope to God that my kids are listening to that advice. I hope they listen to their mother and they listen to their father. What frightens me most is if they are out and they listen to their friends and they make a split-second decision, a decision that could change their life.

I know this has been talked about previously and the number of people that died unnecessarily from taking drugs at music festivals last season was listed. We know by following New South Wales what is happening there. We do not want to see a repeat of that. I do not want my kids to be a statistic. They might not ever take drugs, and I would certainly not be encouraging them to do so. But this bill that we are talking about here today – I hope that it does pass this place and that those in the Legislative Council go ahead and pass it in their place – is about saving the lives of people that make that split-second decision. Maybe they have thought about it in the days before. Maybe they have done it before. We know that just because you have taken drugs before does not mean that from the pill in your pocket you are going to come out okay. Some people are okay to take that kind of risk, and some people are not. We have heard, here in this place, us as adults reflecting on whether we were that kind of risk-taker. I was never that kind of risk-taker. I still do not think I am today – it is just not in me. That was not because of my parents, who said, ‘Yes, drugs are bad. Don’t take them,’ it was purely because in my family my mother’s adopted brother has been a terrible heroin addict who has spent his life in and out of jail – overdoses, the whole thing. This man has a terrible life. The drugs have ruined his life. He is now I think in his seventies, completely estranged from his family, dirt broke, and, do you know what, he still takes drugs.

It amazes my family that he has survived to be in his 70s, and if it was not for charities and it was not for religious services that are happy to be non-judgemental and look after people coming in and out of prison, he would be on the streets. Indeed many times in his life he has lived on the streets, much to the horror of his mother, my mother and her siblings. But that is what scared me off drugs. I also did not like losing my mind. I like having my mind; I like knowing what I am doing.

So I was never one to take those risks, but I watched all of those people around me, and there were many growing up in the surfing town that I grew up in – everyone was taking drugs. They never thought twice about what was in them, just like we know that hundreds of thousands if not millions of people across the world are addicted to vaping or are starting vaping or are occasional vapers. It is an illegal substance. You do not know what is in that either, and that is certainly not tested, and it is usually chopped up and cut on the same floors where heroin and other horrible, horrible drugs are being imported into this country. That is not tested either. We know that people do take risks, and sometimes they do not see them as risks. They just do not think twice about it. They like it and they have fun doing it, or it is what their friends do. But this bill and this debate here today is not about us legalising drugs or encouraging people to take drugs; it is about saving the lives of people who are otherwise going to take a drug at a music festival, and we want to find out this year at these music festivals how many people are happy to have their pill tested and how many people are worried about what they put in their mouth when they swallow and, in the hours to come, what will happen to them.

We have heard great contributions here in this place, and I will not go through them again, about the terrible, terrible things and extremities that are in these drugs and making them more potent than heroin. As I said before, I saw what happened to an adopted uncle who has been a heroin user his whole life and how terribly addictive that was and how many times when I was at my nan’s place he was completely off his face. I remember that as a child quite clearly. Again, he has never been able to beat that addiction. Drugs, in my mind, ruin lives, and the people that are taking them at music festivals are not bad people. They are there to have fun, and they think the drug will enhance that fun. The last thing we want to have happen to those people, particularly our young people, and the last thing I ever want to see happen to my children is for them to make that decision and not come home at the end of the night, when, had they had an option, which they may or may not have taken, to have that pill tested, that service was available to them there and then.

I also want to put on record that it is really disgusting hearing the member for Brighton try and highlight, exacerbate and be hysterical about the amount of consultation or lack of consultation that he and his party have had. It is my understanding that the member for Brighton and the member for Lowan were some of the very few members that turned up to a briefing on Thursday that lasted for 32 minutes, I think, not to be too exact. They asked 17 questions, and all 17 questions have been answered. So for the member for Brighton and the member for Mildura to sit there and pretend otherwise gives a sense of really how seriously they take this debate.

Because this debate is so important, here in this place I do want to reiterate that I wholeheartedly support the bill. As someone that does not believe in taking drugs, I do want to see this option available as a trial at the upcoming music festival. I would encourage people that attend that music festival: if you are intending to take a drug, think twice, but also go and have that pill tested, because you never know – it could save your life and save a whole lot of heartache with you not being around at the end of that day. I commend the bill to the house.