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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2000 Week 2 Hansard (1 March) . . Page.. 424 ..

MS TUCKER (continuing):

What does this mean for the role of the judiciary in this country? While case law supports that mandatory sentencing is legally permissible, Hon. Justice Michael Adams put it well:

The ACT Government's submission ignores this. Please, members who support this submission, explain your position on this to us - Mr Moore in particular, who explained the importance of the separation of powers to me in my early days here.

It will also be interesting to hear what the men of faith in this place say, considering church leaders have spoken out on this and called for intervention from the Federal Government. The church sees it as a moral issue. Members here were happy to put their moral view in this place when we debated abortion. Let us hear them address the morality of imprisoning children for minor property offences, children who are mostly Aboriginal.

We are all interested to hear whether each member of this place does support the statement by the Chief Minister that this is not of such national moment as to take away the democratic rights of the Northern Territory. If they do, we would like to hear what, in their view, would be of such national moment. While we are at it, they could tell us whether they think it was wrong for the Federal Government to override the Tasmanian gay laws or the Franklin Dam decision. They could tell us what circumstances they think would be extreme and compelling enough if this is not.

There is one other area of this debate that is very important and that I think everyone would agree on - that crime in the community is a problem and that victims of crime suffer. However, the debate is about how we address that problem. It is nonsensical to say that these laws will solve the crime problem. The evidence does not suggest it works. It seems the only thing it achieves is political gain for a few politicians who shamefully promote greater division in the community through the politics of blame instead of engaging in the serious policy discussion which has at its centre the desire to promote wellbeing for all the people of their community.

We must as a nation focus on understanding the causes and finding ways to prevent the social problems which have as their base despair and alienation. Mr Speaker, in the national debate on this issue, I have heard Mr Burke talk about do-gooders from down south intervening. I have lived in Darwin, and I know there are do-gooders there too. They are the people who are working to support the indigenous communities to find solutions to the problems they face. They are the people who are working with communities in their country in ways which do not force them to deny their aboriginality, supporting them to work with health issues, respecting the need for community control. They are people who are working with education to make it relevant and appropriate. They are people who are working against the mandatory sentencing laws. In fact, they are people who working on all the things that do-gooders do here. I find it bizarre that suddenly doing good is seen to be a problem.

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