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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1996 Week 13 Hansard (5 December) . . Page.. 4463 ..

MR HUMPHRIES (continuing):

Very often those who rob service stations and so on are people such as drug addicts who need money for a hit, who need money quickly and who do not mind if they clean up only $150, $200, or whatever, because it is enough to buy them a small amount of drugs. That is not always the distinction, but the fact is that the very large sums of money often available in banks are a reason for a high degree of professionalism.

It has concerned me in recent days that there have been armed robberies, including armed robberies of banks. I view that as a very concerning trend, but I think it is worth saying that it is very difficult for the Government to take preventative action in respect of those sorts of robberies. It is very hard to develop, for example, a community strategy to prevent an armed robbery of a bank. Unless you post an armed policeman at each bank entrance, there is very little else that it is possible to do to prevent the robbery of banks.

Mr Speaker, I think the real answer to turning the corner on bank robberies is to get the banks themselves to acknowledge a role in hardening the targets that they represent. It is my perception that if you go to Sydney, for example, most banks you visit will have very secure arrangements. Often you are not able to make physical contact with a teller. Sometimes there will be guards in the foyer of the bank, particularly in larger banks, and there will be a high degree of security for those institutions. I was told about a person visiting a bank in Italy where people entering the bank were required to have a digital encoding of their fingerprints. There were also metal detectors and armed guards. I do not think we need to go to that stage, but it points out that if the target itself is too soft people will be more tempted to take advantage of the money that is available there.

I think the banks need to harden the targets, particularly in this city. I have not made that point by correspondence to the banks, but I will take the suggestion which is inherent in Mr Osborne's question and I will take that issue up. Even if the banks do not care about the money they lose in robberies, I hope that they do care about the staff who are put at risk when a robbery takes place. Unfortunately, they have become more frequent in recent days. The hardening of the target is a very important element in this process. The hold-up at the Belconnen shopfront recently, which resulted in a large sum of money being stolen, has resulted in the Department of Urban Services spending something like $40,000 to upgrade security at all shopfronts in the ACT. I think that kind of an investment would be a wise investment by many banks in the city as well.

MR OSBORNE: I ask a supplementary question. I would like the Minister to answer the last part of my question in regard to the abolition of the Major Crime Squad. Would it be fair to say that the abolition of the Major Crime Squad has resulted in a lack of specially trained police who could have more successfully tackled this problem?

MR HUMPHRIES: I apologise for omitting to answer that part of Mr Osborne's question. I do not believe that the abolition of the Major Crime Squad has been a factor in those armed robberies. I do not think that those who carefully plan armed robberies think, "There is no Major Crime Squad. There is only a major crime team that will be formed if I rob this bank. Therefore I will rob the bank". That is extremely unlikely.

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