Page 4393 - Week 14 - Tuesday, 22 November 2005
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most serious offences, courts reflect, as far as they can, community expectations. As I indicated before, as applies in New South Wales, there are ample areas where courts can deviate from this. They do in New South Wales and they do here.
DR FOSKEY (Molonglo) (11.22): Mr Stefaniak is trying to grapple with a problem that the ACT confronts all the time. We are a small jurisdiction surrounded by a much larger one. But I do not agree with his proposal to gap the level of standardisation there, because standardising non-parole periods is essentially about imposing longer sentences and taking away the discretion of courts and parole boards. It also takes away a prisoner’s incentive to demonstrate rehabilitation and good behaviour while in jail, in the hope of getting early parole.
The Greens do not believe that longer non-parole periods will have any great impact on an offender’s consideration as to whether or not to commit a crime. The Greens would rather see much greater emphasis placed on addressing the reasons for crime and on crime prevention measures.
Contrary to Mr Pratt’s statements the other day that the Greens would like to throw open the jails and absolve everyone from accepting the consequences of their own actions, I put on the record, again, that the Greens have supported the ACT government’s new prison project, with provisos, and will do all that we can to ensure that it is best practice and human rights compliant. The opposition has consistently opposed it.
It is the case that the Greens believe that criminal behaviours are often the result of social and economic forces beyond the control of the individual. And the statistics on the number of prisoners who have severe mental health, drug and childhood abuse histories bear witness to the wisdom of the Greens’ approach. The Greens’ approach is an evidence-based approach. The correlation between these pre-existing problems in criminal behaviours is so strong that I am disappointed and sad but not surprised that the level of debate in this chamber has been such that I am accused of wanting to throw open the jails.
We need to acknowledge that there are a disproportionate number of women prisoners who are in jail solely for the reason that they are addicted to the use of illicit drugs and are living testimony to the failure of the war on drugs. We need to get rid of that image of the offender always being a particular stereotype that, I believe, is perpetuated in these kinds of debates.
Regardless of the reasons for criminal behaviours, the Greens believe that adult individuals must show some responsibility for their own actions where they are capable of taking responsibility. The Greens also believe that the punishment should fit the crime as well as the offender. I do not believe that these amendments are designed to achieve this purpose.
MR STANHOPE (Ginninderra—Chief Minister, Attorney-General, Minister for the Environment and Minister for Arts, Heritage and Indigenous Affairs) (11.25): The government will not support these amendments. Mr Stefaniak proposes, as he has explained, to introduce statutory non-parole periods, again to be in line with New South Wales.
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