Page 1767 - Week 07 - Tuesday, 18 August 1992
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MR HUMPHRIES: I am reliably informed, Mr Berry, never having owned one. I must admit to having once travelled in a car which had one. I am sure that it has since been disposed of.
Mr Lamont: Was that in New South Wales and when was it?
MR HUMPHRIES: I forget, Mr Lamont.
Mr Stevenson: Many years ago.
MR HUMPHRIES: Probably, yes. We need to consider whether particular provisions are appropriate for the ACT. This provision is to provide us with our 30 pieces of silver, you might say charitably, but certainly with our $3m, or whatever it is, from the Commonwealth to satisfy its desire to do something about road trauma in Australia. It is not particularly relevant to the ACT, but it may have some marginal application to the ACT. It is not a bad provision in itself, although there are quite extensive powers for the police virtually to seize these sorts of devices. On the balance of probabilities, I think it is better to have these sorts of provisions in place than to be out of step with what the rest of Australia is doing.
MR STEVENSON (4.56): Mr Connolly mentioned that most people would ban speed police. I think we are looking at a different situation there. After all, when someone has a radar detector in the ACT they are not necessarily speeding and there is no suggestion that they have to be speeding to have a detector. Many people believe that it is their right when they have been pulled over to check their speed at that time. As I mentioned, there have been instances where trees have been clocked doing alarming speeds.
Mr Connolly: They tend to jump out in front of cars a lot.
MR STEVENSON: That is right. Other motorists believe that they were not speeding at the time. We have a situation where Mr Connolly says that the defence - - -
Mr Kaine: Every time I have been caught for speeding, it is a fact that I was not, I know.
MR STEVENSON: Mr Kaine, I think, just said that every time he has been caught for speeding it was a fact that he was not.
Mr Humphries: That was off the record.
MR STEVENSON: It was all alleged. If he had had a speed detector he could have checked his speedometer at the time and made sure. Mr Connolly said that there is a defence. Let us look at exactly what that does. After you have been pulled up by police and they have kept you for perhaps 20 minutes, you have to go to court and produce evidence - this will be the requirement - that the particular electronic instrument or electrical unit you had in the vehicle would cause such a signal to emanate. Very few places will be able to give you that sort of evidence. The cost would probably be around $80. Then you have to take that along to court to give your defence. It may be all right for the Minister to suggest that that is all covered, because people can be detained when they are not breaking the law and they also have the opportunity, after being charged, having not broken the law, to prove that they were not breaking the law. Most people in Canberra disagree.
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