My adjournment matter this evening is for the Premier, and the action I seek from the Premier is for the Premier to have a fully transparent tender process for the quarantine station that is to be built at a destination still unknown. I noted today some comments by Mr David Fox that were given to Neil Mitchell’s 3AW Mornings program. He said it was disrespectful for the opposition to ask questions of the Premier with regard to his relationship with the Fox family. I would have thought those comments were a bit rich, frankly. I think they are a bit rich because, frankly, it is disrespectful to spend public money without a tender process. I think that we have seen previously from this government the way that they treat public money, particularly the signing of a $30 million contract last year for security guards at the failed previous hotel quarantine program that resulted in 801 deaths, the second wave of coronavirus, a mental health crisis and 250 000 jobs lost, where that contract was thrown out the door in 6 hours. These are matters of public record that were heard at the Coate inquiry. It is a great shame that those recommendations from the Coate inquiry have been completely ignored, hence we had a five-day lockdown last week because of further failures in hotel quarantine.
But I make the point again: there are many sites that are appropriate for a purpose-built quarantine station in Victoria. I have raised Point Nepean on a number of occasions in the media. Point Nepean was a quarantine station going back 150 years. It had $40 million spent on it five years ago. It is an appropriate place. There are many other appropriate places, but it is my view, it is the public’s view and indeed it is the opposition’s view that we must have a fully transparent, independently oversighted tender process for any new quarantine station that is to be built, because let us face it, the only major business leader to come out and support the Premier at the height of the second wave last October was Mr Fox. That is a matter of public record. Mr Fox is a great Victorian—that is Lindsay Fox I am talking about. He is a great Victorian, but I think it is appropriate for issues of probity and of transparency and indeed for the respect of this process that a fully independent, transparent tender process is embarked upon before a site is decided for this new quarantine station.