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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1999 Week 2 Hansard (10 March) . . Page.. 470 ..

MR KAINE

That this Bill be agreed to in principle.

This is a fairly straightforward matter. It is not one that I imagine would cause too much concern within the Assembly. It is simply to correct an anomaly in the Casino Control Act which makes it inconsistent with virtually all other legislation that has been enacted by this place in that it allows the Chief Minister, simply by gazettal, to change the use of the piece of ground allocated to the casino. There is no other case to date that I know of where this can be done simply by gazettal. All other determinations, as far as I am aware, are subject to review by this place through the disallowance process. I merely seek to amend the Casino Control Act to make the same conditions apply to it as apply to all other Acts.

Debate (on motion by Mr Humphries ) adjourned.

Debate resumed from 18 November 1998, on motion by Mr Hargreaves:

MR KAINE (10.41): Mr Speaker, I just want to indicate to the Assembly that I support this Bill. I cannot recall why in the distant past I adjourned the debate on this Bill. It may well have been because there was no government member present, so I moved the adjournment. But, Mr Speaker, I do support this Bill because it seems to me to be an eminently sensible approach that Mr Hargreaves is making. I know that it is a Bill which has the support of the Australian Federal Police Association.

They have pointed out to me that in their view this Bill will remove what they regard as a pointless section of an important piece of legislation yet retain the high standards of police accountability to the community. They have pointed out to me that the section 10A certificate achieves absolutely nothing of value or substance in the prosecution of alcohol-impaired drivers. Indeed, it only serves to tie the police up in red tape by duplicating other, quite extensive, paperwork. They have pointed out to me that the sort of information that has to appear in a section 10A statement appears in innumerable other places.

I would just note some of the places where this information is required to be stated in addition to this section 10A certificate. The information appears in such places as the Australian Federal Police notebook, the alcotest print-out, the summons, the statement of the informant, an AFP computer report, statements of facts to the court, and the AFP RBT statistics sheet. It is merely a duplication of the recording of information that requires the police to fill out yet another form which in their view serves no use whatsoever. It merely takes time to duplicate information that is available to the court

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