Page 5336 - Week 12 - Thursday, 28 October 2010
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possible for ordinary citizens to go about their daily business. The government bill would create an occupational discipline trigger if a licensee or permit holder contravenes or is contravening any provision in any one or more of a wide range of laws. This includes the Building Code, the Building Act, the Food Act and a whole range of other provisions.
If the government wants to link occupational discipline triggers to laws other than the law under which the licensee or permit holder operates primarily, it should identify the specific provisions that would trigger that process. To make a global provision, particularly across such a wide range of acts, shows, firstly, that the government has taken a high-handed attitude and, secondly, that the government has taken a high-level view of the issues. Its provision lacks detail and it lacks evidence of thought, consideration or consultation.
Each of the acts carries its own penalty provisions. It should be sufficient for those provisions to apply in the normal course. To apply them also as a trigger to occupational disciplinary action exposes licensees and permit holders not only to penalties under those acts but also to the potential or loss of their licence or permit.
The Canberra Liberals cannot support and will not support such wide-ranging and draconian measures, and I encourage members of the Assembly to support this amendment.
MR CORBELL (Molonglo—Attorney-General, Minister for the Environment, Climate Change and Water, Minister for Energy and Minister for Police and Emergency Services) (5.06): The government will not support this amendment. Amendment 1.38, which the opposition is seeking to omit, makes contraventions of certain acts grounds for occupational discipline. The acts referred to are acts related to the safety of the public.
By making contraventions of the acts grounds for occupational discipline, the government is providing a more effective and immediate method of protecting the public. The opposition is seeking to remove these provisions and saying instead that the commissioner should rely on prosecutions alone. It should be a material consideration for the commissioner to have regard to contraventions of other acts. And that is what this provision allows for.
By seeking to omit it, this means that the commissioner cannot have regard to other unlawful behaviour in a licensed premise. It just does not make sense. It does not make sense for the commissioner to ignore the fact that the licensee may have broken other laws, potentially quite serious laws. And, apparently, Mrs Dunne believes those are not material considerations the commissioner can have regard to in determining the suitability of an applicant for a licence. The government does not support the amendment.
MR RATTENBURY (Molonglo) (5.08): The Greens will be supporting Mrs Dunne’s amendment. We do form the view that it is inappropriate for a liquor licence to be potentially revoked because of an offence under another act—for example, the Food Act. An offence under one of the acts the government lists would have its own
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