Parliament House, Melbourne

The Parliament of Victoria is the bicameral legislature of the Australian state of Victoria that follows a Westminster-derived parliamentary system. It consists of the Queen, represented by the Governor of Victoria, the Legislative Assembly and the Legislative Council. It has a fused executive drawn from members of both chambers. The parliament meets at Parliament House in the state capital Melbourne. The current Parliament was elected on 24 November 2018, sworn in on 19 December 2018 and is the 59th parliament in Victoria.The two Houses of Parliament have 128 members in total, 88 in the Legislative Assembly (lower house) and 40 in the Legislative Council (upper house). Victoria has compulsory voting and uses instant-runoff voting in single-member seats for the Legislative Assembly, and single transferable vote in multi-member seats for the proportionally represented Legislative Council. The council is described as a house of review. Majorities in the Legislative Council are rare, so the government of the day must negotiate with other parties to pass much of its legislative agenda. All members serve four-year terms. The parliament's functions and processes have evolved over time, undergoing significant changes as Victoria changed from an independent colony to a state within the federated Australia.The Parliament may make laws for any matter within Victoria, subject to the Victorian Constitution. Its power is further limited by the ability for the federal government to override it in some circumstances, subject to the Australian Constitution. Similarly, the Supreme Court of Victoria provides judicial oversight of Parliament and is vested with equal power. The parliament is also vested with other powers, such as the means to investigate matters, conduct research and summon witnesses.Government is formed by the party or parties who command confidence and supply within the Assembly. The leader of the governing party or parties is the Premier, the most senior elected member of Victoria's executive government. Victorians do not directly elect the Premier, and the leader of the majority party is appointed Premier by the Governor. Daniel Andrews has been the Premier since the Labor Party victory in the 2014 election.

Parliament railway station is an underground railway station in Melbourne, Australia. It is one of the five stations (and one of the three underground) on the City Loop, which encircles the Melbourne CBD. In 2017/2018 it was the fourth busiest station on Melbourne's metropolitan network, with 10.19 million passenger movements.The station services Melbourne's government district, and is underneath Parliament House and the intersection of Bourke and Spring Streets, at the eastern end of the CBD, and is currently the world's southernmost underground railway station, but will be surpassed by Anzac station when the Metro Tunnel opens in 2025.

Spring Street is a major street in the central business district of Melbourne, Australia. It runs roughly north-south and is the easternmost street in the original 1837 Hoddle Grid.Spring Street is famous as the traditional seat of the Government of Victoria, as well as being central to many of the state's major cultural institutions. The street's name is frequently used as a metonym to refer to the state's bureaucracy. Spring Street is also notable for its impressive Victorian architecture, including Melbourne Parliament House, the Old Treasury Building, the Windsor Hotel (also known as Duchess of Spring Street) and the Princess Theatre. The street is thought to be named after Baron Thomas Spring Rice, Chancellor of the Exchequer under Lord Melbourne. An alternative theory is that the name is due to the golden wattle trees in full bloom during Richard Bourke's visit.

The Hotel Windsor is a luxury hotel in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. Opened in 1884, the Windsor is notable for being Melbourne's only surviving purpose-built "grand" Victorian era hotel. The Windsor is situated on Bourke Hill in the Parliament Precinct on Spring Street, and is a Melbourne landmark of high Victorian architecture. For much of the 20th century, the hotel, dubbed the Duchess of Spring Street, was one of the most favoured and luxurious hotels in Melbourne. It has hosted many notable national and international guests, and has a 5-star rating.

The Palace Theatre (also known as The Palace) was an entertainment venue located in Melbourne, Australia. First built for live theatre in 1912, it was also used as a cinema and for live music. It was demolished except for its facade in 2020 after much community opposition, to be replaced by a hotel.

The Princess Theatre, originally Princess's Theatre, is a 1452-seat theatre in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. Established in 1854 and rebuilt in 1886 to a design by noted Melbourne architect William Pitt, it is the oldest surviving entertainment site on mainland Australia. Built in an elaborate Second Empire style, it reflects the opulence of the "Marvellous Melbourne" boom period, and had a number of innovative features, including state of the art electric stage lighting and the world's first sliding ceiling, which was rolled back on warm nights to give the effect of an open-air theatre. Located on Spring Street in Melbourne's East End Theatre District, it is listed by the National Trust of Australia and is on the Victorian Heritage Register.

The Waiter's Restaurant is an Italian restaurant in Melbourne, Australia, described as a "Melbourne institution". Founded in 1947 as the Italian Waiter's Club, it was initially a place for waiters (mainly of Italian and Spanish heritage) to have a meal, a drink and play cards after their work - in breach of the very strict liquor licensing laws in place at the time. As such it became popular with other late night workers such as reporters and policemen.The restaurant is located up a "steep flight of stairs [leading to] a plain white door" suggesting "a no-frills massage parlour rather than a no-frills Italian food joint".In 1978, the restaurant was the venue of a siege when Amos Atkinson, armed with two shotguns, held 30 people hostage and demanded the release of Melbourne underworld figure Mark "Chopper" Read, his criminal associate. After shots were fired the siege was lifted when Atkinson's mother, in her dressing gown, arrived at the restaurant to act as go-between. Atkinson's mother hit him over the head with her handbag and told him to stop being so stupid. Atkinson then surrendered.

East Melbourne was an electoral district of the Legislative Assembly in the Australian state of Victoria from 1859 to 1927. It was defined in the 1858 Electoral Act as: Commencing at that point on the north bank of the River Yarra Yarra intersected by a line passing through the centre of Elizabeth-street; thence north-westerly by a line passing through the centre of Elizabeth-street to Victoria-street; thence east by a line passing through the centre of Victoria-street and Victoria-parade to Gisborne-street; thence southward by the eastern side of Gisborne-street and a line bearing south to the River Yarra Yarra; and thence westerly by the north bank of the River Yarra Yarra to the commencing point.Initially the district was created with two members, this was reduced to one member from the Assembly elections of 1904.

Great Petition is a sculpture located in Burston Reserve, near the Victorian State Parliament Building, in Melbourne, Australia. The sculpture was commissioned by the State Government of Victoria and the City of Melbourne, designed by artists Susan Hewitt and Penelope Lee, and constructed by brecknock Consulting.The sculpture refers to the "Monster Petition" calling for women to be granted the right to vote, which was signed by 30,000 Victorian women over a period of six weeks in 1891. The original petition, which consists of sheets of paper glued onto lengths of calico fabric, is 260 metres long and is held by the state's Public Record Office. The petition was tabled in Parliament in September 1891 but the ensuing Women's Franchise Bill was rejected by the Upper House. It was another 19 years before the Adult Suffrage Bill was passed by the Victorian government, however the petition is considered an important point in the state's suffrage campaign.The sculpture is a 20-metre-long scroll which folds onto itself and appears to submerge itself underground before reappearing again on the other side of a pathway.It was unveiled on 3 December 2008 to commemorate the centenary of women's suffrage in Victoria.

The East Melbourne Hebrew Congregation (Hebrew: ק"ק מקוה ישראל, romanized: Mickva Yisrael), also known as East Melbourne Shule, East Melbourne Synagogue, Melbourne City Synagogue or City of Melbourne Synagogue is a historically significant Jewish congregation in East Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. The synagogue, consecrated in 1877, is the oldest in Melbourne.

Alcaston House, located on the corner of Melbourne's Collins and Spring St, rises seven levels over a basement, and is one Melbourne's first mixed-use Art Deco buildings. It was designed by the firm of architects, A. and K. Henderson and erected by T Donald and Co. in 1929-30. The Renaissance Revival complex was erected for the trustees of Dr EM James, whose home previously occupied the land. Located at 2 Collins St, Melbourne; it is amongst is an early example of multi-storey residential accommodation in the city at a time when the post-war preference for flat living in Europe and the USA was becoming manifest in Australia. The art deco building is directly opposite the Old Treasury Building and Victoria's Parliament Building.

Orica House (formerly ICI House) is a 19-storey office building in Nicholson Street, East Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. Begun in 1955 to house the headquarters of the Australian subsidiary of Imperial Chemical Industries (since spun off as an independent public company and renamed Orica), it was the tallest building in Australia upon completion in 1958. It broke Melbourne's longstanding 132 ft height limit and was the first International Style skyscraper in the country. It symbolised progress, modernity, efficiency and corporate power in postwar Melbourne, and heralded the construction of the high-rise office buildings, changing the shape of Australia's major urban centres forever. The building's design, by Osborn McCutcheon (of Bates Smart McCutcheon) was closely modelled on the best of corporate design being pioneered in the United States with all-glass high-rise such as the United Nations headquarters. Detail and documentation of the building's design was managed by Douglas Gardiner who was a partner of BSM.The building made headlines soon after construction as panes of the coloured glass shattered and fell to the street below due to impurities and the heat of Melbourne's summers.It is one of the few post-war office buildings to be found on the Victorian Heritage Register, and the first to be added.