Page 2425 - Week 08 - Wednesday, 18 August 1993
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MR HUMPHRIES: I thank members. These figures demonstrate that the powers have been used with regularity since they were first introduced. The number of situations in which they have been employed from 1989 until 30 June this year totals 199. The number of people involved in the 199 situations where the power has been exercised totals 2,620. The number of people involved in the situations has varied from year to year. There were only 180 people in respect of whom the power was exercised in 1992, for example, whereas there were 1,450 in 1990. Obviously different situations demand different uses. Perhaps there was some particular problem in 1990, perhaps relating to Aidex or something of that kind - I am not aware.
However, arising out of the 199 situations and 2,620 people affected by move-on directions, we have had only 27 arrests. In other words, in only approximately one per cent of the cases where a move-on direction has been issued has it been necessary for an arrest to be made because a person or persons have not complied with the direction that has been given. Madam Speaker, we can clearly see that the real strength of these move-on powers is not in the situation where one per cent of people have been arrested. It is in the situation where 99 per cent of people have evidently complied with these directions. That is where the move-on powers are providing the usefulness to this community.
This power is useful as a deterrent. It is not necessary for arrests to result for the power to be of value, for it to be an effective tool in the hands of our police. Its mere threat of use is a much more valuable deterrent. More importantly, apart from two cases in the very early period of the operation of move-on powers - that is, during the period that the Assembly was embroiled in controversy about these powers - I am not aware of any complaints having been received about the operation of the powers. I think it is fair to conclude that the test that Mr Moore imposed in 1991 - that there not be any abuse of the powers - has been met. It may be that there has been some abuse of which we have not heard. It is possible that someone has been abused with these powers and has not complained.
I suspect, Madam Speaker, that we are faced with a situation where in fact the police of this Territory are aware of the contentiousness of these powers, are particularly aware of the concern the Government has expressed about these powers, and have exercised great diligence in the way in which they have employed them. Certainly that would be an explanation for the very limited, indeed the almost complete lack of, adverse response on the part of the community to the actual exercise of these powers in these 2,600-odd cases.
Madam Speaker, we should see the relationship between the Assembly and our police force as a partnership. In this particular case, that partnership involves a pact on the move-on powers which the Assembly granted in 1989, albeit reluctantly and on the basis of a trial and on certain conditions. The police were told at that time, as part of this pact, that they would get these powers if they could demonstrate over a period of time that they were effective in the fight against crime, and indeed in deterring crime. They were told that the powers were not to be abused or to be misused and that they were not to constitute a threat to the civil liberties of Canberrans. The police were told, in effect, by the Assembly, "If these conditions are met, the powers will be retained. If they are not, the powers will go". Madam Speaker, obviously not all members of this Assembly put the agreement with our police in that way, but that is, I would argue, the net effect of the Assembly's earlier decisions.
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