Here’s one for the ‘Tell This Isn’t a Government Operation’ files: after three months, and a cost of $13 million taxpayer dollars, Victoria’s ludicrous machete bins have been sent to the scrapyard.
In a triumph of government efficiency, the whole programme worked out to over $1400 per machete. Oh, and the bins couldn’t be re-purposed as general rubbish bins.
Tell This Isn’t a Government Operation!
Now the bins are gone, Victorians will need to contact the police to dispose of machetes or other bladed weapons.
So, how many machetes and knives actually got put in the bins? A grand total of 9,000. Another 5,000 were handed to police by retailers.
This makes a mockery of Premier Jacinta Allan’s previous claim of 25,000. But then, ‘mockery’ is what most of us immediately think of when it comes to Victoria.
It comes as several public place machete brawls, predominately allegedly perpetrated by [African] teenagers and young men, took place within the same three months as the amnesty.
One alleged altercation in the final week of the amnesty broke out between two rival machete-wielding [African] groups at a shopping centre northeast of the CBD about 6pm on the last Thursday of November.
Another alleged attack in the city’s outer eastern suburbs saw a couple slashed at for no apparent reason on a high street in Belgrave at the beginning of November.
I’m sure you’re as convinced as I am that Victoria’s crime rate will plummet, now.
It had become evident earlier in 2025 that Victoria was facing an increase in criminal incidents when financial year crime statistics revealed the state saw a 17 per cent per capita crime jump to 18.097 incidents per 100,000 people.
Oh, it became evident a long time before that. The politicians, police and media just lied through their teeth about it until it became just too obvious even for them to lie about it.
Victoria has been plagued by break-ins (52,093 in the last financial year); thefts (246,654); assaults (53,854); and public order and weapons crimes (29,763).
Jacinta Allan announced new protections for retail and hospitality workers ahead of the Christmas shopping period in November.
It followed laws addressing violence at protests, and other announcements targeting youth crime.
Well, it’s all worked so well, hasn’t it?
Stopping short of borrowing David Crisafulli’s “adult crime, adult time” slogan, Jacinta Allan drafted an “Adult Time for Violent Crime” bill to increase the likelihood of a child getting sent to prison for certain crimes.
Except that they’ll all get bailed again, as usual. Nearly half of Victoria’s 126 million crimes per year are committed by just 5,400 repeat offenders. Which amounts to an astonishing over 9,000 crimes each. That figure includes 1128 ‘child’ offenders (aged 10–17).
I’m sure that $13 million spent on machete bills will make all the difference.
