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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2004 Week 09 Hansard (Wednesday, 18 August 2004) . . Page.. 3861 ..

community sector said to me that they do not want this important issue dealt with in a piecemeal fashion and that a lot of time has been invested in the government’s process.

However, the government’s process is not yet ready and, optimistically, it will not be ready in the near future—certainly not in the time of this Assembly. I do not want things like sentencing changes going unscrutinised, which is what could happen if we did nothing, or if we did not place some strong principles on the record as would occur as a result of this legislation. In the past the government’s approach to issues relating to corrections and sentencing was to lock up anybody who had anything to do with drugs and throw away the key, which left a lot to be desired. This issue is too important to go unscrutinised. That being said, as we are dealing with the in-detail stage of this legislation the Democrats are happy to progress debate on this issue and to support the amendment.

MS TUCKER (3.28): The Greens support the first four clauses of Mr Smyth’s bill which will set in place the objects required for an overarching approach to corrections. As I and other members said in debate in the in-principle stage, the preferred option would be to wait for the work set in train by the government via a large committee of practitioners, to review the corrections legislation in its entirety, and then to consider Mr Smyth’s proposals in that context. I understand Mr Smyth’s bill has been developed in consultation with a number of people, though the people on whose advice I rely prefer to consider it in that broader context.

Mr Smyth pointed out in discussions on this bill that the government has been slow in bringing back the results of that work. Last sitting week and again yesterday the government tabled two exposure drafts relating to sentencing legislation, which at least gives us the appearance that it is reacting to pressure. I am not sure yet why it has taken so long and I do not think we have been given any explanation. The question of whether or not to pass this legislation today does not depend on who has been bad or who has been slow; our decision about whether or not to support many of the sections in this bill is not based on some faith in the government per se.

It is not a matter of choosing who is the winner in a competition between the government and the opposition to be the first to develop an improved corrections system. People in the community, such as the ACTCOSS Corrections Coalition, have invested some faith in this process. They believe it is a worthwhile process and that it will ensure a good outcome. I do not think it is responsible to pass laws without doing this work. The government has been slow to get this work out, which is a separate issue, but it is irresponsible to pass legislation mainly on the basis of sending out a message. There has been some grumbling about the government’s bill picking up some of Mr Smyth’s proposals. I would have thought that was a positive step forward and I thought that was the idea of working together on two sets of legislation.

If we consider the good of the community as a whole, these proposals would be well done in the committee context. Assembly committees are usually places where we are beyond arguing about who is responsible for a piece of legislation. Having made those points, I support the enactment of the first part of this bill. It is important to have these principles in place before the prison proposal proceeds too much further. It is important to have these principles in law before the next Assembly debates consolidating the exposure draft sentencing laws that were tabled earlier. These principles incorporate

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