Page 3245 - Week 11 - Thursday, 12 September 1991
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My somewhat agonised answers are:
No, it is not blasphemous ...
Yes of course it should have been allowed to enter Australia ...
Yes of course it should be given public showing. I commend the courage of the management of Electric Shadows for bringing it to Canberra, despite the risk of unpleasant demonstrations.
I added that it was reasonable to restrict the film to those who are legally able to make decisions about their own freedom of choice about that matter. So, I welcome this Bill, which will support Australia's commitment to an international and wide-ranging film culture, and I assure members that it is not some backdoor method of spreading sleaze pornography.
MR CONNOLLY (Attorney-General, Minister for Housing and Community Services and Minister for Urban Services) (11.55), in reply: I am amazed at the absence of other speakers on film classification matters, which seem to agitate the imagination of certain members of this Assembly no end. Indeed, the issue predominates, apart from abolishing self-government. But, as that chance appears to have been missed and as the principal proponent of matters filmic does not want to speak, I will wrap up briefly.
This Bill, as was indicated in the introduction speech and by Dr Kinloch, does make only fairly minor procedural amendments to allow the provisions that applied before self-government to continue to operate in the ACT so that cultural films and film society screenings can operate within the ACT by virtue of approval given through New South Wales. It would be extraordinarily expensive and wasteful to have to go through that procedure twice for the comparatively small number of occasions and institutions that occur here.
In practice, the process of exemption will be carried out under delegation by the Commonwealth Chief Censor at the same time that exemptions are granted for the State of New South Wales. It will be a quick and streamlined way of getting these films before audiences in the ACT. No doubt, occasionally these films will provoke some healthy controversy; but that is a feature of an open and democratic society. I commend the Bill to the house.
Question resolved in the affirmative.
Bill agreed to in principle.
Leave granted to dispense with the detail stage.
Bill agreed to.
Sitting suspended from 11.57 am to 2.30 pm
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