Page 2519 - Week 06 - Thursday, 23 June 2011
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respond? Yes, I did respond. I responded on Monday of this week, two working days after the receipt of that submission. I responded to the Law Society’s concerns and I indicated the government’s view in relation to them.
The Law Society did not put on the table any new matters that they had not previously raised in the 2008 consultation. They restated their views as a result of the 2008 consultation. So there have been years of discussion in relation to this matter, and any suggestion about consultation is just wrong.
Let us talk about the model scheme proposed by Mrs Dunne in her amendments. She is proposing the judicial discretion model where the court decides whether or not a person should be permitted to have a jury trial. Of course, New South Wales has just adopted this model, after having for many years the Crown veto model where the DPP is able to veto whether or not a person’s application for a jury trial should be agreed to.
The new model is causing serious problems in New South Wales. It has seen a dramatic increase in the number of judge-alone trials. Indeed, it has been of such serious concern that the Acting DPP in New South Wales, Mr Ian Temby, has indicated his concern at the sudden increase in judge-alone trials and has advocated a return to the Crown veto model.
Furthermore, he has specifically alluded to the ACT experience and has suggested that the large number of judge-alone trials in the ACT has led to a loss of confidence in the criminal justice system in the territory as a result. That is the New South Wales Acting Director of Public Prosecutions’ position in relation to the model proposed by Mrs Dunne.
It is for that reason that the government will not be supporting it. It will, at best, maintain the current rate of election for judge-alone trial. It will not reduce it. It will entrench it. It will entrench the status quo. So for the Liberal Party to claim that they are interested in the prospect of increasing the role of juries in our criminal justice system and then to propose those amendments simply highlights that they are not in any way being sincere.
The government’s proposal is to provide for juries to be the central finders of fact when it comes to serious matters such as murder, manslaughter, other offences involving the death of a person and sexual offences. These are matters which are overwhelmingly about findings of fact. And there is no doubt that juries can and do perform this function extremely well. The evidence provided by the ANU in a submission to the scrutiny of bills committee confirms this point.
Mr Seselja has criticised the government for not including other offences such as terrorism. Prosecutions in Australia in relation to terrorism-related offences have overwhelmingly been conducted under commonwealth law. And what is the requirement for trial in relation to offences under commonwealth law? It is a jury trial. Indeed, the trials that have been conducted in Melbourne and Sydney have been jury trials under commonwealth law.
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