Page 1705 - Week 06 - Tuesday, 30 April 1991
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Let us now briefly look at some of the problems which may arise under section 556. Section 556 is capable of being used as a defence by an offender. If a victim institutes a civil action founded on the same facts for which the offender has already been convicted, the offender can use the section to stop those civil proceedings. It is unfair that persons should be limited in their capacity to pursue a civil action for compensation. No other State provides that a bar to further criminal proceedings will apply in summary jurisdiction.
Mr Speaker, I repeat that it is a reflection on the failure of previous Federal governments to drag law in the ACT kicking and screaming into the twentieth century - something that my colleague the Attorney-General, Mr Collaery, is fully committed to doing in the period that he is Attorney-General. I trust that after the next election he will continue with his program of reforming the law within the ACT to the continuing benefit of the people who live in this jurisdiction.
Mr Speaker, let me go back to other States in this area. Tasmania, Western Australia and Queensland all expressly provide that a person will have a civil remedy against a person who is convicted in criminal proceedings. This Bill will remove the bar to further civil proceedings and will effectively prevent any injustice from arising because of this provision in the ACT. The Department of Justice and Community Services released an issues paper on this topic which was widely circulated. The ACT Community Law Reform Committee, as we now know, has reported on this issue. As Mr Connolly has indicated, it also included the draft Bill, if you like, or the suggested Bill, so that the matter could be proceeded with quickly.
The committee considered that section 556 of the Crimes Act should be repealed to remove the possible injustice that I have already referred to. The committee points out that, if a person against whom an offence has been committed lays the information, then section 556 precludes the person from taking civil action in respect of the offence. The same situation, of course, applies if the person takes civil proceedings in respect of the offence. Then the person is not permitted to lay an information in respect of the offence and proceed with criminal proceedings against the alleged offender.
The committee goes on to recommend that section 552 of the Act should also be repealed. Section 552 of the Crimes Act provides that juvenile first offenders may be discharged by the magistrate if the magistrate thinks fit to do so. The committee considered in its deliberations that section 552 of that Act should be repealed, as it seems entirely out of place that a provision relating to a juvenile first offender should appear in the Crimes Act when young persons are adequately dealt with in the Children's Services Act 1986.
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