We have pushed the government to take up our policies through campaigns and electoral and parliamentary pressure.
Climate action
- The Greens campaigned with the community to get a ban on toxic gas fracking in Victoria.
- Together with the local community and environment groups, we successfully campaigned to stop a giant new gas terminal in Westernport Bay.
- We are leading the charge against the Victorian Labor Government’s EV Tax, and our campaigning helped push Labor to announce a support package for the EV industry. Learn more and add your name »
- We supported the local community and Traditional Owners to successfully reject plans for an environment-wrecking open-cut mineral sands mine in East Gippsland.
- We successfully lobbied the state government to introduce a legally-binding Renewable Energy Target.
- In 2020 Victoria got a $1.6 billion investment in new renewable energy projects, including many of the initiatives the Greens took to the 2018 state election.
- In 2014, the Greens successfully campaigned to stop the East West Link toll road from ripping up Royal Park and further contributing to climate pollution from thousands of cars.
Housing and Equality
- During the COVID-19 crisis, the Greens fought for better protections for renters, and we secured a ban on evictions and rent increases for tenants until March 2021.
- For years we fought to get minimum standards for rental properties and more rights for renters to a safe, secure and comfortable home. In 2018 we secured many reforms that provided greater rights, including rights to a pet and secure locks.
- Following strong pressure from the community and the Greens, the 2020 budget promised $5.3bn of funding to build 12,000 new social housing homes in Victoria.
- We kept up the pressure on the state government's cosy relationship with Crown and on the casino's scandals. Now there will be an independent gambling regulator to make help sure we put people before corporate interests.
- Making property developers pay their fair share of tax is a policy we took to the last state election. In 2021, the Labor Government adopted our policy for a Developer Tax on land value gains from rezoning.
Protecting nature
- Together with First Nations, environmental and community groups, the Greens pushed the Victorian Labor Government to end native forest logging by January 2023.
- The Greens campaigned for years to end single-use plastics and we have now passed laws so that from 2023 many single-use plastics will be banned in Victoria, including plastic cutlery, plates and polystyrene food containers.
- After the Greens initiated a Parliamentary Inquiry into Victoria's recycling crisis and years of campaigning, the Greens secured a 10c ‘cash for cans’ scheme for Victoria, which will boost recycling and reduce waste.
- After campaigning for a decade, in 2021 the Greens secured a ban on horse-drawn carriages in Melbourne’s CBD.
- The Greens led the charge against single-use plastic bags in Victoria, introducing legislation to parliament and finally securing a ban on single-use plastic bags in 2017 ahead of the by-election in Northcote.
- After the wombat culls were revealed in 2019, we pushed in parliament to protect wombats and were successful in getting wombats to be declared a protected species across the entire state.
Caring for communities during COVID-19
- We successfully called on the Victorian Labor Government to provide a COVID bonus to nurses, paramedics, and hospital staff providing critical care.
- We secured fairer fines for Victorians on low incomes. For the first time in Victoria, people on lower incomes will not be paying the same sized fine as the wealthy.
- The Greens negotiated with the state government to create better public health laws for managing pandemics – laws which are more transparent and fairer for the whole Victorian community.
- The Greens helped to reunite families by fixing Victoria's inaccurate vaccination data, so families in Victoria and South Australia could reunite.
OTHER GREENS ACHIEVEMENTS
✔️ More support for maternity care
In 2021, we led a campaign to win $13 million extra for midwives and Victoria’s public maternity system.
✔️Protecting women’s reproductive rights
The Greens have always been on the forefront of ensuring women’s reproductive rights. In 2008, Greens MP Colleen Hartland was the first MP to reveal she had had an abortion and advocated strongly for reforms to make abortion legal in Victoria, which we helped pass parliament.
✔️First Aboriginal woman to the Victorian Parliament
In 2017, the prominent activist and community leader Lidia Thorpe became the first Aboriginal woman elected to the Victorian Parliament as the Greens MP for Northcote. The Greens support for her candidacy, together with the voting community, made history. Lidia has now gone on to be elected the first Aboriginal Senator for Victoria in our Federal Parliament!
✔️An overhaul of our broken recycling system
For many years, the Greens were the only party calling to fix our recycling system. When the system fell into deep crisis in 2018-19 and recycling was being dumped in landfill, we established an inquiry and helped achieve several commitments to fix the system, including separate glass and organic bins for households, funding to boost the recycling industry and ensuring that recycled materials get used in infrastructure projects, like roads.
✔️ Improved public transport
The Greens have always campaigned strongly for more frequent, reliable public transport and safer, better bike infrastructure. Through strong electoral and local campaigns, we have secured significant upgrades of South Yarra Station and an upgrade of facilities at South Kensington Station, one meter minimum passing laws for cars overtaking cyclists to help keep people safe, bike lanes on St Kilda Road, and will keep fighting for more.
✔️ Reform to political donations laws
The Greens don’t take donations from corporations and vested interests, like big property developers and the gambling industry. But the two old parties do. For years we have campaigned to stop corperate influence over government policies by banning corporate donations to political parties. In 2017, in the lead up to the Northcote by-election (which the Greens won), the Victorian Government announced it would cap donations to political parties to $1000 per year.
✔️ Safe injecting rooms established
The Greens have continuously and courageously advocated for these vital health services for drug users, because our policies are based on evidence. In the lead up to the Northcote by-election in 2017, which the Greens looked set to win, the Labor Government finally backflipped on its long-term position and committed to a safe injecting service. Since the safe injecting service began in Victoria in 2018, it has proven to save lives and reduce ambulance call outs.
✔️ Dying with dignity laws
The Greens campaigned for compassionate deaths for terminally ill people for a long time, first introducing a bill to achieve this in 2008. Along with Dying with Dignity Victoria, we kept this issue on the agenda and our first action after the 2014 election was to introduce a motion for policy reform. A Parliamentary inquiry was established and we were successful in influencing the members of the inquiry to recommend law reform. This reform was finally achieved with a conscience vote in 2017.
✔️ A ban on ATMs from pokies venues
The Greens are the only party that continues to speak up about the harms of pokies. When the government required the Greens vote on gambling legislation, we negotiated to secure stronger bans on ATMs in pokies venues from 2012, which significantly cut gambling losses.
✔️ WorkCover for firefighters with cancer
For years, the Greens stood alongside firefighters and unions calling for automatic compensation for firefighters who contract work-related cancer. WorkCover for cancer was almost impossible for firefighters to obtain and it was impossible to prove the exact cause. After years of campaigning, including the Greens introducing a bill in 2008, the legislation passed in 2019 to enable firefighters to get proper WorkCover.
✔️ Safe cladding on apartments
Working with the community, the Greens led the way securing support from the government for our proposed package of support to make apartment buildings safe from flammable cladding.
✔️ Secured divestment of State Government funds from tobacco
The Greens believe government investments should be ethical. In 2013pressured the Victorian Funds Management Corporation, which manages the Victoran Government’s investments, into divesting $200 million dollars from the tobacco industry.
✔️ Shipping containers moved off trucks and onto rail
The Greens, together with the local community, have campaigned strongly to get dirty diesel trucks off local streets in the inner west of Melbourne, and to connect the Port of Melbourne with rail for moving freight. Thanks to this pressure, the government announced curfews for container trucks on some residential streets, and made connecting the Port to rail for moving freight part of the Port lease requirements.
✔️ New schools for students
The Greens have pushed to ensure our kids have the schools they need to get a quality education. We have successfully campaigned with the community for new schools to be established in Prahran and the Docklands by our Lower House Members for Prahran and Melbourne.