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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1996 Week 3 Hansard (28 March) . . Page.. 801 ..

MR HUMPHRIES: The question that was asked of me by Mr Whitecross yesterday concerned the Australian Federal Police, and I think he was talking about police in the context of the ACT. That is the impression which I had.

Mr Moore: This situation I mentioned related to Australian Federal Police and ACT police officers.

MR HUMPHRIES: Mr Moore is talking about the Australian Federal Police across the board.

Mr Moore: Except that the example I used from the Ombudsman is of an ACT police officer.

MR HUMPHRIES: I will come to that. There are clearly serious allegations at the moment being levelled against officers of the Australian Federal Police concerning corruption of a very serious order, which any government responsible for such officers would be very concerned about. I repeat my statement of the other day that if there were such allegations made against officers serving in the ACT, for whom the ACT was responsible, I would certainly be concerned and would certainly want to put in place measures to both address those particular complaints and deal with the root causes of such complaints.

But what Mr Moore has done, I think, has been to confuse the issue of the Ombudsman's investigation of a complaint against, presumably, an ACT serving policeman, or policewoman, with the wider question of corruption. It is certainly the case that the Ombudsman makes investigations of ACT police quite frequently. It is also the case that from time to time she finds that allegations have been proved or that there has not been enough evidence to make a decision either way and the allegations, in a sense, are left open. From what Mr Moore quoted of this particular case, it appears that there have been some allegations that documents seized presumably in the ACT - - -

Mr Moore: No; goods.

MR HUMPHRIES: I am sorry; goods - - -

Mr Moore: Worth significant sums of money.

MR HUMPHRIES: Yes; that goods seized by police in the ACT were not properly documented. I do not know the rest of the circumstances of that matter. Mr Moore, I think, just said that it was money. Money was apparently seized by AFP officers on behalf of the New South Wales police. I am flying in the dark here. I assume that there is some allegation that there may have been money kept to one side by these AFP officers and not passed on. To be quite frank, I really do not know what the allegation is. I want to see what the allegation is.

I repeat the assertion I made the other day that if I see allegations which suggest problems in the Australian Federal Police I will act upon them. The worst allegations that I have seen about the Australian Federal Police, in this context, range from allegations that "the officer was curt and rude to me when he pulled me over to book me for speeding",

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