Page 2392 - Week 09 - Thursday, 17 September 1992
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .
What the ancients knew as "eavesdropping" we now call "electronic surveillance"; but to equate the two is to treat man's first gunpowder on the same level as the nuclear bomb. Electronic surveillance is the greatest leveller of human privacy ever known.
In the light of that observation, it is important and appropriate that this Assembly take steps to protect the unwarranted use of listening devices by people in the ACT, whoever they may be.
The Attorney said in his presentation speech:
The clandestine use of listening devices should not be tolerated in any society, as it represents an interference with the ordinary citizen's right to privacy.
That statement is generally laudable, although it goes, I think, slightly too far. This Bill will not prevent the use of listening devices in toto. It will still be possible for the clandestine use of listening devices to go on in this community; but the circumstances in which that might occur are strictly limited, and the limitations are, in my opinion, quite appropriate.
The Bill contains, in clause 4, a very extensive ban on either the use of listening devices to listen to and record a private conversation to which the person is not a party, or the recording of a private conversation to which a person is a party. That is a very broad arrangement and I think, Madam Speaker, that the exceptions that are created to those broad provisions are in themselves appropriate. I looked, for example, for the appropriate protection of police in their presumably appropriate use of listening devices. It is not easy to discern, but I think that it is contained there.
Certainly, the use of a device in accordance with the law of the Commonwealth is protected. In those circumstances, we may assume that, for example, activities by certain organisations - the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation, to name one - will still go on, providing that it is appropriately covered by law of the Commonwealth. In this respect we look to our Commonwealth colleagues to ensure that the arrangements there for such listening devices are appropriate and that they protect the citizens of the community to the extent that that is possible, given the use of these devices and the fact that they are used clandestinely.
There are penalties contained in the Bill. In a sense, these penalties and these provisions are in many ways more important than clause 4, which contains the central prohibition in the Bill. They are, particularly, clause 5, which makes it illegal to communicate and publish records of private conversations by parties, and clause 7, which makes it illegal to possess records of privately recorded conversations. The point of that is quite obvious. If someone records a private conversation, the mere fact of that recording almost certainly is not going to come to the attention of the authorities. If someone plants a listening device, the intention is that it will be a secret. It is fairly likely that that device will not be detected, at least not until after it has been used, and as a result that person's privacy will have been breached. Even the origin of that listening device might not become known to the person who discovers it.
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .