Calls for the Victorian government to go into caretaker mode amid widening claims over its electoral practices have been shrugged off by the premier Daniel Andrews.

The state’s police fraud squad has already arrested and interviewed 17 Labor staffers as part of its investigation into the systematic misuse of $388,000 in taxpayer money to partially fund the party’s 2014 election campaign.

As the investigation continues, the Liberal-Nationals opposition has called for the government to secure bipartisan support for major government decisions, therefore acting in caretaker mode, the same restriction imposed in the period immediately before an election.

Andrews was quick to reject the proposal.

“They never got out of caretaker mode,” he said of the previous Coalition government.



“They squandered the opportunity and the obligation they had to set our state up for the future, the contrast could not be clearer.”

The opposition leader, Matthew Guy, continued his calls for six ministers linked to the scandal to stand down while police investigate.

“It beggars belief that you’ve got six ministers under police investigation who are refusing to stand down from their posts until that investigation is complete,” Guy said outside parliament.

“These ministers putting their own self-interest first have no interest in looking after integrity in government – they’re more interested in saving their own jobs.”

During the latest sitting of a parliamentary inquiry into the scandal, senior bureaucrat Peter Lochert denied previous evidence from scheme architect John Lenders that the pair met and workshopped the plan.

Ombudsman Deborah Glass in March found 21 past and present Labor MPs breached parliamentary guidelines by directing staff employed as electorate officers to campaign for candidates.



Seventeen former campaign staffers across Victoria, New South Wales and the Northern Territory were last week arrested and interviewed as part of the fraud probe but no charges were laid.

Labor has since repaid the $388,000.