Page 173 - Week 01 - Wednesday, 17 February 1993
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My favourite practice is to juggle it about a bit and sometimes say "he or she" and sometimes say "she or he". If members pay attention to the presentation speeches which I read, particularly in mammoth sessions where we have five or six Bills being introduced, I tend to juggle the "he" or "she", whether or not it appears within the text. So it does require a bit of attention to get this gender neutral attitude right, Mr Humphries; but I am sure that, if you keep trying and you are instructed properly, you will get there in the end.
Mr Deputy Speaker, there is an amendment that I foreshadow; I will be moving it when we get to the detail stage. It is purely a matter of picking up a point that was picked up by the Scrutiny of Bills Committee in relation to the way the pleas by post scheme operates. It makes sure that it covers that system under a range of Acts. I will get into that in detail later on.
The other point I will just briefly address is this: Mr Humphries commented that the VATAC scheme, which is locked in under this amendment, is a very useful scheme. It certainly is, and the New South Wales Government is looking very closely at the way we operate VATAC with a view to using it under their police arrangements. The point Mr Humphries made about police hanging around court to give evidence is one that is very much before the Government. We are currently working with the Chief Magistrate to effect a range of changes to court rules and procedures to reduce significantly the number of occasions on which a police officer is required to attend court in a wide range of non-contested matters - that is, matters where a defendant is pleading guilty, even to minor indictable offences.
At the moment the police officer is required to attend and give uncontested evidence, and we will be looking at ways to reduce that requirement for the police officer to attend. Mr Humphries says that it is wasteful at the moment because the police officer could be out doing other duties. It is also very expensive, because in most cases the police officer is on penalties and overtime. With the police officer working an ordinary shift arrangement which tends to break a 24-hour period up into three eight-hour shifts, more or less, the chances are that they are on day shift when they apprehend the person. When that person comes up for court they may be working a night shift, which will mean that they will have to work their shift and then come back into court to give evidence. This clocks up a quite substantial cost to the community by way of additional penalties and overtime for coming into court. So those measures are very much being addressed by the Government and I am very confident that we will, within a matter of a week or so, be able to announce quite significant changes, reducing that need for unnecessary police attendance. I thank the Opposition for their support for the Bill.
Question resolved in the affirmative.
Bill agreed to in principle.
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