Page 1707 - Week 06 - Tuesday, 30 April 1991
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .
As a private solicitor I have acted in a number of private prosecutions and, indeed, a number of defences as well. In my days as a prosecutor, I brought a large number of prosecutions on behalf of the state. But it is quite different in a civil action for damages. I think it was quite wrong that there was this anomaly in the law whereby someone who brought a private information for a criminal prosecution would be precluded from pursuing a civil remedy as well.
This is a very timely and appropriate amendment. It is a very relevant amendment for Mr Collaery's committee. I commend its members for it. It seems that this will receive the unanimous support it deserves from this Assembly.
MR COLLAERY (Attorney-General) (9.20), in reply: With the presentation and debate of these first two law reform Bills today we pass an historic event. I thank members for their comments, particularly Mr Connolly's from the opposite side, and I am very pleased to say that tonight the chair of the Law Reform Committee, Mr John Kelly, of queen's counsel, is present in the chamber with the staff from the law reform unit who so ably support him.
One of the hallmarks of modern Western democracies has been the willingness of governments of all complexions to consider sensible law reform initiatives proposed by local law reform commissions or committees. The law is not a set of static rules which are chiselled into rock and left unchanged for centuries. The law must be dynamic. It must change as society changes, and it is a fortunate community which is served by a sensible and innovative law reform commission or committee.
These Bills before the Assembly are the first of what we hope will be a successful and productive era of reform by our own ACT Community Law Reform Committee. Already the committee has a number of important references before it. By way of background for consideration of these Bills, I would like to spend a moment of the Assembly's time talking about law reform in the ACT, the ACT Law Reform Committee and the other references of the committee.
From 1972 to 1976 the Commonwealth relied on an ACT Law Reform Commission under the chairmanship of the late Mr Justice Blackburn. That commission prepared eight reports in its five years of operation. Regrettably, and notwithstanding the careful work of the Blackburn commission, in the absence of self-government, the Commonwealth was able to ignore the reports. Reports languished unimplemented for years. Reports dealing with the repeal of hundreds of old imperial and New South Wales Acts in force in the Territory were belatedly adopted 10 years after the report was made. Reports on landlord and tenancy and the management of the property and affairs of mentally infirm persons were ignored by the Commonwealth right up to self-government day.
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .