Page 4444 - Week 12 - Wednesday, 14 October 2009
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board. The government will also provide in the legislation provision for the application of lockouts at licensed premises. The government believe that this provision should be built into our legislation, although we do not believe at this time that the exercise of those provisions would be appropriate. There is a range of views occurring as to the efficacy of lockouts at this period of time and we would like to see the outcome of those reviews before deciding whether or not they should be applied here in the ACT.
These provisions I believe are very important reforms. They will help improve community safety, they will help give licensees and our regulatory authorities the capacity they need to deal with breaches of liquor licensing and they will also give the community a greater say on where licensed premises occur, opportunities for objection and opportunities for refusal of licences where the concentration of licensed premises becomes too high.
MR SPEAKER: Ms Porter, a supplementary question?
MS PORTER: Thank you, Mr Speaker. Minister, are there any other measures that the Labor government is pursuing to improve public safety in the ACT?
MR CORBELL: I thank Ms Porter for the question. Yes, there are other measures. Last week I announced another very important budget initiative that has now been implemented, which is the rollout of our expanded closed-circuit television network across the city, with a significant expansion in cameras in the city, and for the first time cameras in Manuka and Kingston. This very important reform gives us the capacity to provide better support to our police, better support to property owners, to licensed premises, to other premises in these precincts, when it comes to improving public safety.
For the first time, this $8 million initiative will ensure that this CCTV network is monitored at the peak times when the city and our other entertainment precincts are busy. So we have provided the capacity for police to monitor the CCTV network on Thursday, Friday and Saturday nights and into the early hours of the following morning, to make sure that they are able to see what is going on and to proactively respond to problems as they occur, and indeed potentially before they become serious, rather than simply reacting after the event.
The camera network is of a very high quality—high-quality digital cameras, with strong privacy protections in place in terms of the data, and monitored from a central monitoring point in the Winchester Police Centre. This, combined with the reforms that the government is putting in place around our alcohol laws, will help to significantly improve public safety in the city, Manuka and Kingston.
The government are committed to these reforms. We want to deliver a safer city centre and a safer Manuka and Kingston for all Canberrans, and this reform will help to achieve that.
MR SPEAKER: Mr Hanson, a supplementary?
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