A Liberals and Nationals Government will restore community safety, reduce crime and ensure a stop to organised criminal networks wreaking havoc across Victoria.
The commitment comes as another suspicious firebombing this week highlighted the escalating public safety crisis linked to the illicit tobacco trade, with organised crime increasingly endangering families, businesses and entire communities under the Allan Labor Government.
Shadow Minister for Gaming and Liquor, Tim McCurdy, said the latest attack following a string of incidents in Richmond, Mentone, Thomastown, Tarneit and Warragul, showed violent crime was becoming an alarming feature of everyday life in Victoria.
"These attacks are no longer isolated incidents, they are almost a daily occurrence," Mr McCurdy said.
"Families are being evacuated, businesses are being destroyed, public transport services are being disrupted, and emergency services are being stretched responding to lawless, violent criminal activity."
"No Victorian should have to worry that their local shopping strip, the business next door or their own neighbourhood could be firebombed at any moment. Yet under the Allan Labor Government, this is becoming an increasingly common reality."
Mr McCurdy said the Allan Labor Government had failed to take control of organised crime, allowing Victoria to become the illicit tobacco capital of Australia at the expense of terrified communities.
"Closing one illegal shopfront is not enough if the same criminal network can simply reopen under a different name. Rather than play whack-a-mole, we need to look at the big picture and dismantle the organisations behind these attacks, not just chase them from one location to another," he said.
"The underworld has done very well out of this government, being showered with money through the Big Build one minute and conveniently ignored when they torch family businesses the next. Victorians have had enough."
A Liberals and Nationals Government is committed to strengthening laws by introducing tougher measures to prevent repeat offending and phoenix operations, impose stronger obligations on commercial landlords, increase consequences for repeat offending premises, and improve intelligence sharing between enforcement agencies.
"Victorians deserve to feel safe in their homes, on their streets and in their local communities," Mr McCurdy said. "Restoring law and order will be a top priority of a Liberals and Nationals Government."
Shadow Minister for Police and Corrections Brad Battin said the recent firebombings further justified the Liberals and Nationals push for a bolstered police force and tougher laws.
"Only a Liberal and Nationals Government will recruit 3,000 more police officers and back them with the resources they need to restore community safety," Mr Battin said.
"We'll strengthen Labor's weak Adult Time for Violent Crime laws by expanding them to include arson."
