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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1996 Week 6 Hansard (21 May) . . Page.. 1532 ..

MR HUMPHRIES (continuing):

This group, as Mr Osborne indicated, consists of six police - male and female officers - who have been assigned to a tactical reactive/proactive policing role. What they have done, Mr Speaker, is, I think, different to what has generally been the case in the past with policing. When someone has called them to a place, say in Civic, to respond to a particular problem, they have tried to deal with that problem and have then left the site of that particular problem. They have identified that very often the particular people who have given rise to the problem have moved on by the time the police arrive to attend to a particular issue. They have now started to follow through the issue by developing a tactic which looks at where those problems have moved on to, and I think it has been very successful. It has allowed them, in fact, to trace some particular problems with connections all the way from Civic to places like the north of Belconnen and elsewhere where significant issues have been dealt with.

In the last eight weeks 63 offenders have been dealt with on drug matters - that is 93 offences all up - using a mixture of arrests, summonses and SCONs, simple cannabis offences notices. There have been 31 street offences recorded. Over 550 traffic and negligent driving matters have also been recorded, of which about 10 per cent were drink-driving related. The team has processed about 652 offenders in that period of time - a very significant workload for a team of just six police officers. As I said, they were also connected with activities tracing drug trafficking. This particular team has been responsible for seizing drugs with a street value of over $1m in that period of time.

Mr Berry: How many SCONs?

MR HUMPHRIES: They are not the sort you have with jam and cream, but they are very important devices. I am very pleased with the work that this special projects unit has been doing. I am also told that it has been within only the last week that two alleged heroin dealers have been arrested. One is allegedly a 17-year-old selling to other minors. Being able to apprehend people of that kind is very important in dealing with the network of drug trafficking in the Territory.

In terms of giving such officers awards or commendations, I had a letter the other day suggesting that police should be allowed to keep a proportion of the proceeds of crime that they happen to be responsible for clearing up.

Mr Osborne: They do anyway, do they not?

Mrs Carnell: I think they did that in New South Wales.

Mr De Domenico: You mean that they do not?

MR HUMPHRIES: No, Mr De Domenico, they do not at present. I think Mr Osborne would have some other form of reward or award in mind. There are police medals awarded, but they generally come after very long years of service. The concept is commendable, and I am happy to take it up with the Police Commissioner to see whether such an idea might be workable.

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