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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1996 Week 8 Hansard (26 June) . . Page.. 2137 ..

MS TUCKER (continuing):

The Greens agree with the broad definition of stalking in Ms Follett's Bill. The underlying message is that it is a criminal offence to stalk or perform an intimidatory act against another person with the intent of causing apprehension or fear in the other person, or physical or mental harm. A number of specific acts are listed, ranging from interfering with property to telephoning or otherwise contacting another person. In this day and age of sophisticated communications technology, I think it is appropriate that we do not confine the intimidation only to telephone contact. Intimidation could occur through the Internet, for example; and, indeed, I have heard of cases of this occurring. While I am very pleased to support the legislation, I would like to say that this legislation alone is not enough and passing laws is not enough. The adequacy of police investigation is fundamental in terms of responding adequately to the victim and of the ultimate prosecution of any charge.

The Community Law Reform Committee report on domestic violence comments that a more focused police charging policy will increase the number of pleas of guilty and take the pressure off the victim. As I raised in question time a few months ago, the Government must seriously look at implementing the recommendations in this report. Here we have a complete package of measures to address domestic violence in the ACT, including an overall strategy. As the report points out, the ACT used to lead the way but is now behind developments in other Australian jurisdictions in terms of developing a multisystem response to domestic violence. The report highlights that policy initiatives and domestic violence programs are fragmented and that it is rare for one government agency to know what another is doing on the issue. This sort of comment makes one very wary about the outputs model being adopted by this Government, unless intersexual issues are explicitly recognised in that model. I am very pleased to announce that the Greens will be supporting this Bill, and I hope that this proactive stance is matched by commitment from the Government to ensure that resources will be put into making sure that any laws in this area work effectively to protect women from violence.

MS FOLLETT (11.12), in reply: I thank members for their support for what I regard as an essential measure to protect some members of our community from behaviour which ought to be criminal and under this Bill will now be criminal. Mr Speaker, I believe that stalking is not commonly understood throughout the broader community, but the many people who have come to me since I raised this issue have illustrated the real harm that stalking behaviour does to its victims. I have had perhaps a dozen or more people call on me, telephone me or write to me about their own individual experiences of stalking and their own powerlessness to change the behaviour of the stalker. Many of the people who have come to me are women, as you would expect, but not all of them. It is a fact, as Ms Tucker has said, that we cannot stereotype either the stalker or the victim.

The impact of stalking really can be quite brutal, quite horrendous, on the victim's life. I have had people come to me who have moved house, not just once, not just twice, but repeatedly to escape a stalker. It seems to me the supreme irony that a couple of those people have ended up in Canberra after a series of house moves only to find that there is not even legislation in Canberra that prohibits stalking. Some people, Mr Speaker, have virtually had their lives blighted by stalking. They are prisoners in their own homes. They are afraid to pick up the phone. They are afraid to go anywhere, including to their normal place of work, for fear of the behaviour of another person.

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