Page 1708 - Week 07 - Tuesday, 29 May 1990
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .
Mr Moore: 1957?
MR COLLAERY: That is probably the year during which we were unfortunately inflicted with the member for Reid. If you say that Mr Duby compromised his portfolio duty with his offence, let me say for the record, because Mr Connolly did not make that clear on a radio program - he said the opposite the other day - that I administer the legislation under which Mr Duby was convicted, and the record should show that. As for the semantics about whether Mr Duby has been - - -
Mr Moore: Then why did he go to Perth?
MR COLLAERY: Mr Speaker, I believe it most inappropriate for Mr Moore to behave in this way in front of members of the community. He is putting the Assembly down again.
MR SPEAKER: Please proceed. Mr Moore, please desist.
MR COLLAERY: As for the semantics about whether Mr Duby is convicted of a criminal offence, let me remind you again of what Mr Justice Kitto said and let me remind you, Mr Speaker, and through you, Mr Connolly, of the common practice of our courts, which I have mentioned on numerous occasions. They are not to regard these convictions as serious criminal convictions in the accepted realm of the word "criminal". I will come back to that.
When I referred to the realm of matters on the Pru Goward show I said clearly that we were concerned and dealing with the distinction between motor traffic and alcohol convictions and true criminal convictions. Mr Speaker, any lawyer knows that in the common law a person does not incur criminal liability unless his behaviour discloses both that prescribed act and a guilty state of mind.
You well know, Mr Speaker, that some new crimes, as it were, have been created in recent years by statute. One of them is failing or refusing to provide a breath sample. There is a whole range of what are called "offences of omission" in the law. I will give you some examples - failing to report taxable income, wilful neglect of a child, and failure to report prescribed diseases in stock to a stock inspector. They are sins of omission. They are offences certainly and, if you want to confuse the public, you can call them criminal offences, but they are known by all of us who practise in the law to be in a different category.
I believe that Mr Connolly should take great care if he does get to the bar and does practise, if he ever gets to defend a person on a drink-driving charge, because the words will haunt him when he describes the offence as a serious criminal offence. Certainly it is serious, Mr Speaker, but those of us in the profession have long understood drinking to be a social problem and the
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .