Page 5331 - Week 12 - Thursday, 28 October 2010
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MR CORBELL (Molonglo—Attorney-General, Minister for the Environment, Climate Change and Water, Minister for Energy and Minister for Police and Emergency Services) (4.46): I think we are arguing at cross-purposes here. There are two distinct elements. The issue of anonymity and protection of the identity of people who seize documents is a separate question from the process that we are debating in this particular amendment.
This particular amendment relates to record keeping. That is what it relates to. What Mrs Dunne is proposing to do is to say that the record now becomes something that must be recorded in the incident register. When bar staff or security controllers confiscate an ID, they are doing the right thing. It is not an incident. The incident register is meant to be for something that is an adverse activity—an adverse incident, a problem, something that happens on the premises which is a problem.
The fact that a security controller or a member of the bar staff seizes an ID means that they are complying with the law, not that they are recording something that has occurred that is contrary to the law or is in some other way illegal. They are actually complying with the law. They have seized the document because it is false. So it should not be in the incident register. This duplicates the provision that already exists in terms of record keeping, and we believe that that is sufficient and satisfactory.
The other issues that Mrs Dunne raises are legitimate, and the government has itself got an amendment to deal with that. Because we are having the debate now, I might as well deal with it even though that is not the question before the chair. Because other members have dealt with it, I will ask the chair for some leniency to deal with it.
The other elements that we are talking about in Mrs Dunne’s package relate to the issue of ensuring that staff are not identified. The government is proposing mechanisms to deal with that—to make sure that staff are not identified. Obviously, security controllers already have a number that they can use, so that is not an issue there. They are a regulated industry; they have a number and they can use that number.
The government is proposing to address the issue by including the option for the staff member to provide identification other than their name on the receipt, to protect the privacy of the employee. And there is no requirement under the law to sign the receipt. So there is no chance of the young person working in the establishment being identified as a result of doing the right thing and seizing a false ID. That is how that issue can be addressed, and that is the way the government believes it should be addressed.
That is a separate question from the amendment that is currently before the chair. The amendment before the chair is a record-keeping obligation and it is making it an incident that has to be recorded in the incident register. The incident register is for serious notes; it is not for instances where licensees are doing the right thing and confiscating false ID. This provision duplicates and misunderstands the purpose of the register; for that reason the government does not support it.
MR RATTENBURY (Molonglo) (4.50): The minister suggested that we are debating at cross-purposes. I am not quite sure if that is correct, but let me clarify my understanding of events and we will see how we go from there.
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