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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2004 Week 02 Hansard (Thursday, 4 March 2004) . . Page.. 787 ..

must be informed about the things that they are not allowed to do while the notice is operating.

Amendment agreed to.

Clause 112, as amended, agreed to.

Clauses 113 to 118, by leave, taken together and agreed to.

Clause 119.

MS GALLAGHER (Minister for Education, Youth and Family Services, Minister for Women and Minister for Industrial Relations) (5.24): I move amendment No 10 circulated in my name [see schedule1 at page 816].

This amendment makes a minor wording change substituting the words “is given” with the word “relates”. The effect of this amendment is that all people who are required not to do particular things by a prohibition notice issued by an inspector must comply with the notice, not just the person to whom the notice was given by the inspector.

Amendment agreed to.

MS DUNDAS (5.24): I move amendment No 4 circulated in my name [see schedule 3 at page 817].

This is a very simple amendment. It changes the penalty units for clause 119 from 200 penalty units to 100 penalty units. I believe that 200 penalty units are overly harsh in this situation and inconsistent with the rest of the act. I think 100 penalty units is a more appropriate penalty and consistent with the rest of the act before us.

MRS CROSS (5.25): Mr Speaker, I will be opposing this amendment. The penalties need to be stiff in order to act as a deterrent and should reduce breaches of prohibition notices.

MS GALLAGHER (Minister for Education, Youth and Family Services, Minister for Women and Minister for Industrial Relations) (5.25): The government will be opposing this amendment. Ms Dundas proposes to halve the penalty that attaches to a person who breaches a prohibition notice issued by an inspector under the act. A prohibition notice would be issued where an inspector is satisfied that something is so dangerous that it needs to be stopped immediately. For instance, if an inspector finds that a piece of machinery used to process dangerous chemicals is broken or malfunctioning and is placing workers or the public at risk, a prohibition notice could be issued. This would stop anyone from operating the machinery until it has been repaired. Again, because of the risk of significant injuries where someone disregards a prohibition notice, there needs to be a high penalty attached to the offence or there is less incentive to comply with the notices.

Ms Dundas’s proposed amendment would see the same penalty for a contravention of a prohibition notice as for an improvement notice under clause 107 of the bill. This would be most unfortunate as breaching a prohibition notice is a significantly more serious

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