Page 3267 - Week 11 - Thursday, 12 September 1991
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .
to this Territory. The licensing inspectors are actively going out and cautioning licensees that they may potentially be dealt with in order to put pressure on them to address the problem.
One of the significant reforms introduced by Mr Collaery, which we welcomed, was to have more flexible penalties. Previously, the only penalty was a little rap over the knuckles or abolition of the licence. Mr Collaery said, and we agreed, that that was an obvious problem, because the board was disinclined to totally take away the livelihood of a licensee. The ability to suspend a licence, which was introduced by those amendments and welcomed by the Opposition at the time, provides a great deal more flexibility. So, the inspectors can go out and caution and, as they give cautions - which record, in fact, infringements by licensees - they can move to that sanction against the licensee. The structure of the law in the ACT is directed to moving against the licensee, rather than necessarily just police action against individuals.
The suggestion was made by GALA that we should move to on-the-spot fines; and, of course, this is seized upon by members of the Residents Rally. There is an obvious problem with that, which the Government is aware of but the Residents Rally is not. It is a bit like the proposal that occasionally comes up that we should have on-the-spot fines for bicycle offences. The problem is identification. Mr Stefaniak said a lot on this matter when the Alliance was in power. Unfortunately, the Government did not take up many of his suggestions, but we are moving in this direction.
To have an effective system of on-the-spot fines you must first of all have identification - and the big problem with under-age drinking is that there is no effective method of identification. The so-called pub card proposal, which was first introduced by the Northern Territory some years ago and was picked up recently in New South Wales, is an effective measure to provide effective identification.
Once you have that, you could potentially look at on-the-spot fines. But how do you give an on-the-spot fine to a person who is illegally under-age drinking? Of course, the tendency at the moment is that you have a - - -
Mr Duby: Are you going to bring in pub cards?
MR CONNOLLY: We are; just wait. The problem at the moment is that under-age drinkers tend to have forged birth certificates or, in fact, a mate's birth certificate. As we know, you can get a birth certificate for $10. If your mate is 18 and you are 17, you wave it around. How do you enforce on-the-spot fines? On-the-spot fines make sense only in the context of driving offences, where the person has a rigorously enforceable form of identification so that you can give them an on-the-spot fine.
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .