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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2004 Week 01 Hansard (Tuesday, 10 February 2004) . . Page.. 80 ..

With the support and assistance of the Registrar of the Supreme Court, Mrs Jill Circosta, and Corrective Services, my prosecutors put additional effort into ensuring that this occurred. An analysis of breached prosecutions in the last year—

the year of this report—

has revealed, however, that in 67 per cent of cases, no action was taken on prosecuted breaches. Quite apart from disinhibiting the prosecution of breaches, this approach tends to devalue the importance of court orders and recognisances and sends the message that compliance with them is optional.

He said that there had been about 15 breaches and only about five had resulted in anything being done. That is very depressing for the police and the prosecutor involved. Effectively, it is almost a waste of time if nothing happens. It is disturbing. The director raised that in his report and it is certainly something that the government needs to take on board. It is essential that people have confidence in our system. If someone has committed a breach of their recognisance—it is a very serious matter when a court imposes a sentence; it is meant to be—I would think that there would have to be exceptional circumstances for no action to be taken upon that breach. In fact, the expected thing is for the sentence then to be served.

In the example I gave of a two-year sentence being suspended, the person concerned should serve the two-year sentence unless there are exceptional circumstances, otherwise that person is making a mockery of the situation. I think that the director was quite right in bringing forward that problem. I certainly hope that we will not see that again. A number of other issues arose out of the report of the Director of Public Prosecutions, which I think we all felt was a pretty good report.

The only other issue I want to highlight concerns the victims of crime support program. The Victims of Crime Coordinator stated on pages 8 and 9 of her report that she had made submissions in relation to the proposed ACT bill of rights and was concerned to see that the rights of victims and the recognition of a citizen’s right to safety and security were not mentioned. I do not think that the Chief Minister has indicated that he intends to make any amendments there. Certainly, there are lots of other rights there.

There is a whole plethora of sections in the bill before the Assembly which deal with the rights of persons charged with offences, et cetera, but there is nothing about the actual rights of victims, a right which appears, as the Victims of Crime Coordinator indicated, in a number of UN conventions, the Rome Statute and European Court of Human Rights rulings. That is a glaring omission from the Chief Minister’s bill of rights and that was a very interesting revelation. I note that when we have that debate the opposition will be trying to do something to rectify that situation if the government does not.

Having made those points in relation to this report, I thank my colleagues for their assistance and diligence, as well as the committee’s hard-working secretary and other Assembly staff.

Question resolved in the affirmative

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