Victoria to push for national machete bans following amnesty program data

Victoria will push for a national ban on the sale or possession of machetes following new data that more than 1,300 weapons had been surrendered in just two weeks.

According to figures released on Tuesday by Victorian Government, 1,362 machetes and knives have been surrendered since new laws targeting the weapons came into force on September 1.

An additional 3,400 have been surrendered by retailers.

Under the law, anyone caught possessing or selling a machete without a valid exemption, such as for agricultural workers, faces up to two years in prison or a fine of more than $47,000.

An amnesty process has been rolled out and will run until November 30, with 45 bins placed outside police stations across the state.

It comes after the deaths of Dau Akueng, 15, and his friend Chol Achiek, 12, who were walking home from a basketball game when they were ambushed by a group of up to eight masked people wielding machetes and long-edged weapons, according to police.

Both boys died after they were stabbed during the ambush in the northwest Melbourne suburb of Cobblebank, near Melton.

Speaking at the time, Detective Inspector Graham Banks said the fatal stabbing was “one of the most horrific crimes” which had the “hallmarks of a youth gang crime”, but could be a case of mistaken identity.

Victorian Police Minister Anthony Carbines said the government was seeking to dry up supply of the blades, with police seizing 10,800 edged weapons in 2025.

He said he would push for a national ban on machetes during a meeting of Australia’s state and territory police ministers in Canberra later this month.

“Knife crime has devastating consequences – that’s why we’re drying up the supply of these dangerous weapons with our nation-leading ban and expanded stop-and-search powers to get them off the streets for good,” he said.

“There are 10 weeks left of the amnesty, if you still have machetes drop them off at a bin to avoid harsh penalties, including jail time.”

Spruiking a Coalition plan to reduce youth crime outside the Melbourne Magistrates Court, Victorian opposition leader Brad Battin slammed the $13 million amnesty program, saying the state government was not listening to the “real solutions”.

“The program is an absolute failure when it comes to taking machetes off the street,” he said.

“I stood next on one of those machete bins and the only people handing in those machetes were farmers and gardeners who are the ones that would probably be exempt. It’s not the crooks handing them in, they’ve still got them in their hands.”

Instead Mr Battin has pledged to introduce Jack’s Law, a policy to allow police to wand people for weapons without a warrant, if elected Premier at the next state election.

Jack’s Law was introduced by the Queensland Government in 2023 and named after Jack Beasley who was fatally stabbed on the Gold Coast in 2019.