Page 2479 - Week 09 - Wednesday, 7 August 1991
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breaking and entering houses. That tends to be a crime committed by younger people. There are natural reasons for that. But, when we are talking about young people, I think it is very important to look at the third concern of the police, and that is that where young people are involved they would quite often prefer not to lay charges, but rather to break up the misbehaving group - and for very good reason.
I had a debate with Mr Connolly a couple of weeks ago and he was saying, quite fallaciously, that the move-on power causes young people to come into conflict with the police. Well, Mr Speaker, I would much rather, as a young person, come into conflict with the police very briefly and be told to move on and stop misbehaving, and not end up in court, than be charged with a more substantive offence such as assault or offensive behaviour, go to the police station, be charged, spend a brief period of time in custody until I was bailed, and then have further confrontation with the law, perhaps the next morning or at some later stage, before the local magistrate. It is not a terribly pleasant experience, especially when one gets a criminal conviction on one's record, and that does not help young people going for jobs.
One of the greatest strengths of this legislation is that it does prevent a lot of people, especially a lot of young people, from coming into conflict with the law and having criminal convictions recorded, as might otherwise happen had the substantive behaviour continued and the police been forced to lay a substantive charge.
Mr Berry: You have not read the report, Bill.
MR STEFANIAK: I have read the report very well, Wayne. Perhaps you should read it too. It is a pity it has not got pictures. There has been a decrease in the number of reported offences against good order, such as offensive behaviour, since the introduction of the legislation.
Mr Berry: You did not understand it then.
MR STEFANIAK: On page 2, Wayne, the fourth paragraph from the bottom states:
From 1 September 1988 to 31 August 1989, the 12 months before Section 35 of the Act came into effect, there were 159 reported offences against good order. These included 48 incidents of offensive behaviour. In the following 12 month period, from 1 September to 31 August 1990, there were 102 reported offences against good order, including 19 incidents of offensive behaviour.
That particular crime dropped by about two-and-a-half times as a result of this power. That just shows how effective it is. That probably is why, Mr Berry, most young people in Canberra are in support of this power, and I will come to that later.
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