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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1997 Week 14 Hansard (11 December) . . Page.. 5022 ..

MR WHITECROSS (continuing):

The New South Wales Government thump the law and order drum and Mr Humphries says, "Gee, that sounds like a good idea. I am always into thumping the law and order drum. I will jump on the back of this one and I will thump it a bit myself". That is what has happened. It has nothing to do with safety on our roads. It is about Ministers in the Liberal Party wanting to thump the law and order drum just like Ministers in the New South Wales Government. That is the reality.

The Motor Traffic Regulations already prescribe a punishment. If we believe that a particular offence deserves a particular punishment and we want to change the existing penalty, we can change the Motor Traffic Regulations, but we should not at the whim of the Minister increase the penalty on a particular day of the year. Again and again this year this parliament has voted on Government legislation proposing an approach which is about thumping the law and order drum, whether it is saying that people should get a longer sentence because of some perception by the magistrate that an offence is particularly prevalent or whether it is saying that people should not be able to go back to court and apply for a probationary licence if it is their second offence. These are the provisions we have seen again and again from this Government. Are we going to give in to the law and order tub-thumpers or are we going to say that we are going to have a rule of law under which punishments are appropriate to the crimes and applied equally, without fear or favour, regardless of what day of the year it is and regardless of the mood of the Minister? That is what it is about.

There are a couple of other things that I want to touch on briefly. One of them was touched on by Mr Moore. Mr Kaine, in his remarks, went on at great length about drink-driving but this is not about drink-driving. These laws relate principally to speeding. It is speeding which earns double demerit points, not drink-driving. For all that Mr Kaine has talked about double demerits, his own regulation gives out double demerits only for speeding offences. What about negligent driving? Should driving without due care and attention when there are so many cars on the road earn double demerits? According to the Minister, it should not. According to the Minister it is not serious. According to the Minister that should not earn double demerits but speeding should.

When you look at the road toll in holiday periods and at the number of occasions when fatigue has played a part in road accidents, you would have thought negligent driving, an offence to do with driving without due care and attention, would have attracted double demerits if the Minister was serious about road safety, but that is not his concern on this occasion. I am not saying that he is not concerned about road safety, but on this occasion his motivation is thumping the law and order drum, jumping on the back of a New South Wales law and order tub-thumping initiative, not making good law in the ACT.

The Government and Mr Osborne have said that the Labor Party does not take road safety seriously and that the Labor Party does not take law and order seriously. That is just nonsense.

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