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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1999 Week 13 Hansard (9 December) . . Page.. 4230 ..

MR STANHOPE (continuing):

It is only a little more than two weeks since the Government tabled its response to the report of the Standing Committee on Justice and Community Safety inquiry into the Bill. There was a widespread community expectation, one which I admit the Labor Party shared, that the Government would support many of the recommendations and introduce amendments to its Bill. That is not happening.

The Government supported six recommendations, supported in principle eight, supported with modification one, and refused to support the rest. However, even with those recommendations which received some form of support from the Government, the support was heavily qualified and the recommendations are unlikely to find their way into amendments to the Bill. This is because the Government believes - and I quote from the Government's response -"further implementation to be unnecessary" or "this recommendation can be implemented administratively" "drafting of the regulations has been deferred" or some other version of these weasel words. Many stakeholders who made submissions to the standing committee were not even aware that the response had been lodged and that the Government was going to force the Bill on so quickly. Thus the criticisms levelled by community organisations and the standing committee will, in effect, be ignored by the Government.

Criminal injuries compensation legislation is benevolent legislation, and without it many victims of crime are unable to obtain compensation. Perpetrators of crime can sometimes not be identified, and even if they can be identified the Attorney advised last week's annual report committee that claims against them are a waste of time as more often than not the perpetrator cannot afford to pay. I might add that there is some anecdotal evidence about at the moment - and I might pursue this with questions of the Attorney - that the total amount recovered this year from perpetrators under the scheme is the grand and princely sum of $500. Under the scheme in this Bill there is a shift in emphasis from a compensation scheme to one of assistance, and very little assistance at that.

Very few victims will be entitled to special assistance. Extremely serious injuries would obviously include serious brain damage, paraplegia, blindness and the like. In such cases the suffering would be immense and obviously permanent. However, the victim of a brutal assault who was hospitalised for months would not qualify for a special assistance payment if he or she recovered to any reasonable degree. Clearly, victims with broken limbs that heal or post-traumatic stress that resolves over some years will not qualify for a special assistance payment. The treatment costs and wage loss for these victims would more than likely take up the entirety of the maximum available sum of $50,000, so that the question of special assistance benefit would not even arise.

Further, under the old scheme family members of a victim could each obtain a payment of up to $50,000. Under the revised scheme family members - or, as they are called in the Bill, related victims - will share a maximum payment of $50,000, and that payment will be on a first in, best dressed basis; that is, if the court makes a final award to one related victim, no other related victim can make a claim.

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