Page 2726 - Week 09 - Thursday, 26 August 1993
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BOXING CONTROL (AMENDMENT) BILL 1993
MR BERRY (Minister for Health, Minister for Industrial Relations and Minister for Sport) (10.34): Madam Speaker, I present the Boxing Control (Amendment) Bill 1993.
Title read by Clerk.
MR BERRY: I move:
That this Bill be agreed to in principle.
When introduced into the Assembly earlier this year, the Boxing Control Bill contained a provision that would have banned kick boxing contests in the Territory. This provision reflected the Government's view that, whilst fist boxing enjoyed the sanction and controls of being an Olympic and Commonwealth Games sport, kick boxing was an unnecessarily violent activity unashamedly targeted at the younger sections of the community. The Bill also prohibited a person from participating as a boxer or an official in an amateur boxing contest unless that person was a member of the Amateur Boxing Union of Australia or of an affiliated body.
During debate on the Bill, amendments were proposed by Ms Szuty which would remove the provision relating to the banning of kick boxing and would amend the definition of boxing to include kick boxing. In their eagerness to impose this activity on the ACT community, the Liberal members of the Assembly, together with Mr Moore and Mr Stevenson, gave Ms Szuty the support needed to carry the amendments. The actual effect of these amendments was that kick boxing became a form of boxing for which it was necessary for my approval to be obtained to conduct a contest. Importantly, the prohibition on a person participating in an amateur boxing contest unless a member of the Amateur Boxing Union of Australia remained. As the union does not regulate or in any other way control kick boxing and no kick boxing organisation is affiliated with the union, it would not have been possible for me to issue an approval to conduct an amateur kick boxing contest.
What I am saying to you is that the amendments were inadequate to achieve the aims which were desired by those members who supported kick boxing in the ACT. As most kick boxing contests are club based amateur fixtures, it was patently obvious that the amendments passed in the Assembly did not work. When the discrepancies resulting from the amendments were realised, I instructed that a regulation be prepared under the terms of the Act to ensure that the will of the Assembly would be carried out.
In a recent Supreme Court hearing Justice Higgins also commented on the definition in the Act of the word "boxing" and the provision relating to the requirement to obtain ministerial approval before conducting a boxing contest. Apparently His Honour perceived a difficulty in ascertaining whether a particular contest came within the definition of a boxing contest. The court was not required to reach a conclusion regarding the particular issue. However, I consider that it is best now to amend the Act to clear up doubts as to the provisions relating to kick boxing contests, as well as possible doubts perceived by Justice Higgins.
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