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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2003 Week 14 Hansard (9 December) . . Page.. 4998 ..

MR WOOD (continuing):

That committee stated that it would not be practicable for the ACT to depart from the national template, alter these provisions and risk jeopardising the effectiveness of the national scheme. This bill largely resembles model uniform state and territory legislation to ensure that the commission can conduct investigations and operations anywhere in Australia. The bill sets out the functions of the commission under ACT law. It also provides for the functions of the board of the commission and the chief executive officer.

The bill provides for the powers of investigation of the commission, including search powers under warrant and examination powers. There are safeguards relating to the exercise of powers under the bill. The determinations of the board that invoke the coercive powers of the bill will be subject to special requirements for the composition of the board, special voting requirements and a power for the intergovernmental committee of the commission to revoke such determinations. The bill provides for the commission's examination powers, such as summoning witnesses and taking evidence, to be exercised by examiners who will be independent statutory officers appointed under Commonwealth legislation. These requirements will ensure that the commission's special powers are used appropriately.

The bill creates offences for a failure to comply with the act to facilitate the operations of the commission. Those offences include: failing to attend an examination or to answer questions and failing to produce documents or things when required to do so by a summons. Offence provisions have also been restructured to comply with the requirements of the Criminal Code in line with new ACT legislation. Provisions now specify the requisite fault elements that are applicable to an offence, such as knowledge, intention and recklessness. The offences in the bill are based on similar offences in the Commonwealth legislation and existing National Crime Authority legislation.

The penalty levels in the bill strike a balance between maintaining consistency with the current ACT penalty code by conforming as closely as possible with the penalty levels in the Commonwealth and other jurisdictions. The penalties either closely match or are higher than Commonwealth penalties for similar offences. In no cases are penalties lower as it is imperative that in this respect also the ACT is not regarded by organised crime groups as a soft target. Under the Commonwealth act the chair of the board is required to prepare an annual report that includes descriptions of any special territory investigations conducted during the year. That report will be tabled in this Assembly.

Finally, the bill will repeal the National Crimes Authority (Territory Provisions) Act 1991, make consequential amendments to related legislation and contain necessary transitional provisions to ensure a smooth transition from the National Crime Authority to the Australian Crime Commission. The commencement of the bill has been delayed to enable regulations and related Commonwealth amendments to be prepared to ensure the validity of certain provisions. Consultation with the Commonwealth is continuing to ensure that this process is completed as quickly as possible. The government has moved quickly to prepare ACT crime commission legislation to ensure that state, territory and Commonwealth policing and intelligence gathering agencies are not impeded in preventing and combating serious and organised crime.

The bill will facilitate the national law enforcement effort, which has been marked by cooperation and coordination between law enforcement agencies throughout Australia.

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