Inflation nightclub – dealt with unfairly?
Jun 22, 2017
Ms PATTEN (Northern Metropolitan) — My adjournment matter is for the Minister for Police. I am seeking an explanation or some information from the minister on the conduct of police in responding to some recent overdoses at the Inflation Nightclub. I was very sad to hear of the overdoses on 10 June. I am always appreciative of the police responding to these difficult situations, but I have to say that as I learned more about the incident I became more curious and concerned about the series of events.
The police and paramedics attended Inflation after staff called 000 alerting them to the overdose. The...
Push for Drug driving testing review
Jun 8, 2017
Ms PATTEN (Northern Metropolitan) — My adjournment matter today is directed to the Minister for Police. The action I am seeking from the minister is to review the evidence base underpinning roadside testing and to look at the policy and practice that is used to develop that roadside testing. This is as a result of looking at the recent Transport Accident Commission advertising campaign that shows a young driver whose driving was clearly not impaired but who tested positive when stopped for a roadside drug test. The justification for this was that even though the person may not feel impaired they...
‘Chuck a Healthie’
May 10, 2017
Ms PATTEN (Northern Metropolitan) — My adjournment matter this evening is for the Minister for Health, Jill Hennessy, and the action I am seeking from her is that she consider ways that we can enable and encourage employers to allow employees to use a sick day to have a health day. This was raised by one of my constituents, who gave me some interesting figures, although they are national. Preventable illness among the Australian workforce costs the economy tens of billions of dollars each year. This includes presenteeism — working while sick. Bupa said in a 2017 study that presenteeism...
Mental Health Patients
Mar 22, 2017
Ms PATTEN (Northern Metropolitan) — My adjournment is for the Minister for Mental Health, and the action I am seeking is for better triaging of mental health patients in emergency departments. In 2014 the former government established a psychiatric assessment and planning unit — a PAPU, as it is known — at the Maroondah Hospital to improve patient access and ease the demand on the emergency department (ED).
The four-bed unit provides fast access for approximately 400 patients per year to short-term specialist assessment and treatment for people experiencing acute mental illness, without requiring admission to an acute mental health inpatient bed, which we know...
Port Phillip Bay bait fishing
Feb 23, 2017
Ms PATTEN (Northern Metropolitan) — My adjournment matter is for the Minister for Agriculture. The matter I would like her to consider is strategies to allow a small amount of bait fish — pilchards and whitebait — to continue to be caught in Port Phillip Bay to supply the ever-growing number of recreational fishers in the bay. As we saw with the closure of commercial fishing in Port Phillip Bay, not only did that close down commercial fishing but it also closed down the fishers who were catching bait fish. Now, with the ever-growing number of recreational fishers and the government's Target One...
Public transport
Feb 8, 2017
Ms PATTEN (Northern Metropolitan) — My adjournment matter is for the Minister for Public Transport, and the action I seek from the minister is to appoint an expert panel to assess the viability of Victoria's public transport privatisation model. It is kind of interesting that we are calling it privatisation, yet we seem to spend billions and billions of dollars on privatisation. I understand we have probably spent about $10 billion on contractors for the privatisation of our public transport. I am suggesting that an expert panel could provide insight into a better practice of contracting.
We have seen Dr John Stone, a senior...
Santa’s flight path
Dec 8, 2016
Ms PATTEN (Northern Metropolitan) — My adjournment matter is somewhat urgent. It is for the Premier, and it comes from a young member of my electorate. He is very concerned about the safe travels of Santa across Victoria in late December. The weather is clearly becoming more unpredictable because of the effects of climate change. As a result we are seeing hotter days, storms coming from nowhere — it is like Mongolian soup sticks out there sometimes — and a threat of both bushfires and floods. My young constituent is very worried that it is getting harder for Santa to...
Abortion services
Dec 7, 2016
Ms PATTEN (Northern Metropolitan) — My question is for the minister representing the Minister for Health, Minister Mikakos. Publicly funded abortion services are deteriorating across the state, causing women to travel long distances for private care that costs hundreds of dollars. Leading women's health researchers are urging the government to make abortion services mandatory at some regional hospitals in response to concerns about reduced access to surgical abortion raised by doctors, nurses and clinic managers. How is the government addressing this issue, which is placing women's health and wellbeing at risk?
Ms PATTEN (Northern Metropolitan) — Thank you, Minister, for that response, and...
Riverside Meats
Nov 24, 2016
Ms PATTEN (Northern Metropolitan) — My adjournment matter is directed to the Minister for Agriculture, Ms Pulford. I am requesting that the minister look into taking action against Riverside Meats abattoir after seeing the shocking acts of animal cruelty at that facility. More than 170 hours of footage were provided to the regulator, PrimeSafe. I saw a few minutes of it, and it really was just horrific, with calves being beaten and stun guns being used. What really struck me was the joy and laughter coming from the staff members who were doing this. It was really quite horrific. In the short bits...
Saving Princess Mary Club
Nov 22, 2016
Ms Patten (Northern Metropolitan) — My adjournment matter is about an urgent call for action from the Minister for Women in helping to save a unique part of Victorian women's history. Heritage Victoria notified me and Sophie Paterson, whose grandfather raised the funds to build the Princess Mary Club, last week that they had tragically approved the demolition of this unique building. This building was designed by the renowned Melbourne architect Alec Eggleston and is a significant building in itself, but it is its social significance that is so important.
Just to recap, the Princess Mary Club was built in 1926...