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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2003 Week 13 Hansard (27 November) . . Page.. 4863 ..

MR STEFANIAK (continuing):

retrieve it and electrocutes himself or herself. It was put to me-and it was probably right-that in that case it would be very difficult for the prosecution to sustain a charge of manslaughter against the owner or manager of the premises. As I said in my dissenting report, I would defy anyone to get up on a charge of manslaughter in the ACT courts in terms of that later case.

If that is the type of scenario we are looking at, we are talking two very different laws. That is inherently a significant problem because, if the standard met by the prosecution to sustain a manslaughter charge under this legislation is less than what it is under current section 15 of the Crimes Act, this legislation is bad law. We have taken a step that we have never taken as a jurisdiction and one that I do not believe any other Australian jurisdiction will have taken.

If people refer to my dissenting report, they will see how I suggest we can improve our occupational health and safety laws and how we can have tough laws, with deterrents, that are consistent with the law and will not needlessly terrify businesses in the ACT. I do not think that in my term in the Assembly I have seen businesses so genuinely worried about a piece of legislation-indeed, not just businesses but also big events.

I was speaking to someone today who did not ask to be named, but who will no doubt say this at some stage. He said that this legislation had dampened his enthusiasm and was breaking down his spirit. This fellow had talked to a number of people involved in Canberra who said that it had dampened their enthusiasm so much that they did not even feel like making a start in business. That is very sad, because a lot of workers who would otherwise have jobs, especially young people going into the work force, might well be deprived of jobs.

There are huge fears in the business community about this, and I do not think anything said by the government has really allayed those fears. If this legislation is exactly the same as normal manslaughter, why are we having it? There is absolutely no need for it. And if it is not the same, what is the real difference? If it is easier for someone to be convicted under this type of manslaughter than under the section 15 of the Crimes Act type of manslaughter, I think that is bad law.

The government needs to go away and look for a better way of achieving its aim, and its aim is shared by everyone in this Assembly. Unfortunately, the way it is trying to achieve the aim has so many bad effects on our community that this law is going to have a far worse effect than any possible good it may do. (Extension of time granted.) The government should go away, at the end of the in-principle stage perhaps, and have a big rethink about this, because there are some very significant problems with it.

I am not going to read this out; Mrs Dunne will. I will not waste any more of people's time. Very few people support this legislation. Various groups have concerns with it, and every other government is basically against it. Maybe Canada has some type of industrial manslaughter legislation, but I cannot think of any other jurisdiction that does. Surely that tells you something.

We are all for protecting the worker. In this party we are all for punishing people who commit crimes and for punishing them properly. Unlike the government, we are very much in favour of proper deterrence, as well as proper rehabilitation, for people who

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