Deals, deliberations and distance from Dan: Jacinta Allan takes a break from Melbourne’s crime on five-day trip to China
Jacinta Allan’s five day trip to China was no holiday – but it was an escape from machete-wielding teens, a cop killer on the loose and crumbling roads back home.
Jacinta Allan’s five day trip to China was no holiday. But it was an escape from the chaos back home.
Machete-wielding teens, a cop-killer on loose, fury in the regions, crumbling roads and an emerging prison crisis, not to mention a debt bomb on track to hit almost $200bn by 2030.
But she believes she’s got it all under control.
Speeding down a highway in China’s Sichuan Province from a construction site to a giant panda tour on her final day in the People’s Republic, Allan told the Herald Sun she had three top priorities heading into next year’s election.
Jobs, housing and growing opportunities across the state, particularly in regional Victoria.
Two of three will rely on China — a nation Allan has described as a trusted partner and friend.
“When we look to what that future means in terms of jobs, opportunities for young people, the future stability of our communities relies on having a good relationship (with China),” she says.
She wants more jobs reliant on a forecast 800,000 yearly visitors from China, farmers reliant on the export of goods and more Chinese investment in public transport.
“And that comes back to that old friendship … it’s going to be very important for jobs, for our economy, but it’s a future that’s built on trust.”
A special friendship where Victorian politicians, journalists, bureaucrats and industry leaders are given security briefings and new phones before they visit the communist superpower.
Locally, the state’s towering debt, headed for $194bn by 2029, is clearly not keeping Allan up at night.
She’s confident that they’ll pull off an operating surplus next year – even if history suggests this government’s ability to manage fiscal forecasts is marred with constant blowouts. Last year’s surplus was $1bn less than expected.
Crime is also something she claims to have a handle on.
This is despite a serious escalation in violence in the past few weeks, with two teenage boys hacked to death in Cobblebank walking home from basketball.
Ms Allan, however, says she’s confident that recent bail changes — which wind back an easing of laws but are not as tough as changes made post the 2018 Bourke St massacre — and knife laws are working.
“The numbers – the data and the evidence – tells us that they are working,” she says.
“But we have to continue to do more.”
Allan, who previously ignored calls for more than a year for tougher bail and knife laws, is now in a race to finish her pipeline of safety reforms by the end of the year.
An extra week has been added to the parliamentary calendar to make room for stronger family violence laws, along with long-awaited protections for retail worker safety and protest laws.
But there will be no protest permits, despite the increasingly feral behaviour at weekly protests and pleas from business owners.
She’s backed on that point by her new police chief Mike Bush who she says is doing an “excellent job” amid challenging times, with police still on the hunt for cop killer Dezi Freeman.
But this week her focus was not on crime.
She was focused on locking deals in China, largely in an effort to retain voters ahead of next year’s election.
Only many of the Chinese voters back home just want to feel safe.
One Chinese-Victorian who joined the Premier’s ever-expanding entourage said while Allan’s focus on education was appreciated, safety was a major concern.
“I saw a motorbike with its keys sitting in it on the street – that’s how safe China is,” she said.
“You can’t do that in Melbourne.”
African parents who brought their families to Victoria for a better life are also seriously considering heading back to their war-torn countries, at least temporarily, because they feel that Melbourne streets are too dangerous for their children.
Despite these issues, if you go by recent polling, Labor is on track to win an unprecedented fourth term, which would also make Allan the first woman ever elected as Premier by the Victorian people.
Allan had slumped in the polls since taking over as premier but in recent months has seen an uptick that has given her and Labor a confidence boost.
The question is whether the polling reflects her leadership or the many faults of her deeply divided opposition.
In China on Friday, Allan refused to rate her own performance, saying it was up to voters.
It was her final day of her tour and her 52nd birthday.
After kicking it off the day in her happy place, in a hard hat and high vis on China’s SRL, she was then trapped on a bus with an increasingly weary press pack.
Not Allan though. She was up and about.
Fifty-two is not generally a milestone for most but for the Premier it marked half of her life in politics.
One of the longest serving members of parliament, she entered politics at just 26-years-old as the member for Bendigo East where she lives with her husband and two kids.
But despite her quarter century in politics and two years as Premier, many Victorians still don’t know her name.
And when asked who the premier is, some even confidently say Daniel Andrews.
That is what she is still trying to shake. And that was most obvious in China.
She even specifically pointed out the supposed differences between her China strategy and Andrews’.
So when Andrews took her spotlight, causing a media frenzy after he was posed for a photo with Russia’s Vladimir Putin and North Korea’s Kim Jong-un at Xi Jinping’s military parade, it was exactly that spectacle she was trying to avoid.
When asked by the Herald Sun how she differed from her predecessor, Allan was unable to provide a solid answer.
Although she mentioned two words: housing and people.
As she toured China, particularly when she got the chance to meet with school kids, her talent for people was clear and her enthusiasm was genuine.
Her staff and security personal, whom she was with all day everyday, say she is always full of energy, friendly and ready to go.
She was up before sunrise everyday, dragging her inner circle along on walks or dedicating herself to her 600+ day yoga streak in her hotel room, overlooking city buildings topped with Chinese flags.
She says Victorians should choose her because she knows what they want and she’s focused on them.
Convincing voters she truly is in control might be a harder task.
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