Page 1166 - Week 04 - Wednesday, 9 April 2008
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All of the evidence that was presented to the government in 2005 about the growing trend of drug-affected driving was ignored by them then and, in fact, has been ignored since. The government apparently undertook to conduct a working study on the subject of drug-affected driving some two years ago. Despite what Mr Hargreaves said in this place yesterday in an interjection, that working study was announced two years ago. I have searched Hansard since yesterday afternoon and Hansard proves that that is what he said.
Whether or not a working study group did effectively mobilise two years ago remains a moot point, but that is what the minister stated then. He said that that was the government’s intention—to study the issue of drug-affected driving. They said they would undertake this working study into the issues surrounding random drug testing. However, no recommendations have been made and meanwhile the body of knowledge surrounding the issue continues to grow in favour of introducing such testing. So whilst Minister Hargreaves has not, either in this place or publicly, talked about the progress of such a working study, and has continued to ignore the issue, the evidence about the need to introduce random drug testing has grown and grown over those two years. And what is alarming is that the evidence has indicated that the trend of drug-affected driving has increased over the last two years. I will come back to that point in a little while.
All that the bill we are tabling here today really does is to enforce a law that, in many respects, already exists. I will say that again, Mr Speaker: this is not some stage-right or stage-left attempt to introduce some radical piece of law; we are simply introducing legislation which takes existing law and flexes it to allow for a more random approach to drug testing of drivers who may or may not have been taking drugs. We are simply seeking to give police the powers to enforce the existing law properly and then to flex that law in order to empower the police to try and interdict and therefore deter the habit of drug-affected driving.
It is irresponsible for the minister to say that he needs to consult or to further consult on this matter. More to the point, it is irresponsible for the minister to say that the opposition has no right to be tabling this legislation here today because, as he would say, the opposition needs to be consulting further before we dare to come back to this place and table this legislation. It is responsible for the opposition, with the resources that it has available to it, to come into this place and recommend good law, and we do that in the best way we possibly can. I can assure you, Mr Speaker, that the opposition have, in the last 3½ years, consulted widely. To the best of our capacity, we have researched this need to test for drug-affected driving and we have consulted with important bodies in the ACT community.
Minister Hargreaves stood up yesterday and carried out a stunt. He panicked and got frightened when he saw on the notice paper that the opposition intended to table this legislation today. It was absolutely irresponsible for him to say yesterday that we have no right to table legislation without having two or three years of consultation—the same sort of time frame that he might have been thinking about.
We have spoken to the NRMA in the last three years many more times than I care to count. The NRMA are a very resourceful body. They represent a very large
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