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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2002 Week 11 Hansard (26 September) . . Page.. 3343 ..

MS TUCKER (continuing):

This amendment changes the definition of "community organisation" from an entity to a corporation. While the notion of responsibility for group or community-based activity devolving from the individual to the group makes sense, particularly when the individual is engaged in group activity, there may well be unreasonable consequences if the members of the group themselves have no protection.

The argument is put that the purpose of this part is that volunteers are protected from personal liability and, if there were universal compensation schemes, that might be the end of the matter. But, given the present structure of public liability in Australia, if the organisation itself does not offer any limitation on the liability of its members, it would seem that, rather than being protected, individual volunteers would still be liable themselves, but, in addition, spread the liability wider. Every member of a fairly loose organisation could find themselves homeless and assetless if one of their members were careless in their acts.

I have it on emphatic advice from parliamentary counsel that, by replacing the term "entity" with "corporation", this amendment will ensure that the liability transfers to organisations such as incorporated associations or cooperatives where the liability is by definition limited, and public liability policies are more likely to be held, and that members of unincorporated associations would remain personally liable for their actions.

Amendment agreed to.

Clause 6, as amended, agreed to.

Clause 7 agreed to.

Clause 8.

MS DUNDAS (4.41): I move amendment No 4 circulated in my name [see schedule 1 at page 3369].

This amendment is also a minor one and, like my previous amendments, is just tinkering to ensure the finalised law does what the bill sets out to do. It is designed to make volunteers responsible for their own actions when acting outside the scope of an organisation. We are all familiar with the concept of a "frolic of one's own". Organisations should not be responsible for volunteers who do embark on such a frolic. This concept, I am told by parliamentary counsel, is best described as "outside the scope of", and that is how this amendment stands. However, I did like the idea of introducing the term "frolic" into the statute book.

An example of where this would be necessary is a peaceful protest rally where a lone participant becomes violent or even verbally abusive. Clearly, that would be outside the scope of an organised peaceful rally. Another example is a Meals on Wheels volunteer being asked by a client to help with a basic medical procedure, such as changing a dressing. Although not strictly contrary to Meals on Wheels instruction, it certainly would be outside the scope of the organisation and we would agree that the skills required to change a dressing are different from those on delivering a meal. My amendment broadens the definition that is there to cover the situations that I have briefly discussed.

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