Page 2753 - Week 13 - Tuesday, 21 November 1989
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voting against this Bill. By giving status to the mailing of X-rated video films across our borders, first into New South Wales and in due course to the other States with the exception of the Northern Territory, we are, at the very least, violating the spirit of the laws of six States.
Yet we are the national city. We are, like it or not, the exemplar city of the nation. At the moment, it is under inherited Commonwealth laws that these things are done. The moment such a law as is proposed tonight is passed we would be, as a Legislative Assembly, saying to six other State governments, "We don't care what your legislation is, what your values are, what your standards are, what your public behaviour aims are; we are supporting an industry which, in essence, flouts or avoids or undermines your laws".
So I say to the Chief Minister that, in this first year of our Assembly, it is particularly unfortunate that we would ever contemplate giving this credence and status to this peculiar industry which is so much detested by our fellow legislatures throughout Australia. You will note that I have stressed the flouting of the spirit of the laws of our neighbours. I leave it to lawyers to debate whether or not those laws are being technically broken. In the case of Western Australia, in particular, a case can certainly be made that we are actually bringing about the breaking of the law. We do so by way of Australia Post - a Commonwealth, not an ACT, facility. I draw your attention to the Western Australian Act, No. 73 of 1987. Mr Speaker, I will not ask to have this Act tabled as it is very considerable, but I would ask that the chief law officer and his staff give advice to the Chief Minister and the ALP Government on whether or not the spirit of that Western Australian law has been undermined by what is happening here in the ACT.
I now turn, not to morality, not to an analysis of sexual mores, but to another aspect of the workings of other parliaments and legislatures. One could quote at great length from the final report of the United States Attorney-General's commission on pornography, 1986, which deals, in part, not with sexual morality as such but with the effect of hard-core pornography of many kinds on adults and children. I suspect that that is a discussion for another time. I ask that we obtain a copy of that report for our own library.
Much more important for us are the two volumes published in April 1988 of the report of the Commonwealth Parliament's Joint Select Committee on Video Material. There is no unanimity amongst the members of that committee but there is a majority report which raises disturbing, shocking questions about the likely effects of video material. Chapter 13 - pages 185-230 - is the most pertinent section for our purposes. These volumes are in our library.
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