Page 3964 - Week 09 - Thursday, 25 August 2011
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Our view is that the commissioner’s considered human rights perspective is always valuable in situations like this. I have written to the commissioner to ask for an analysis of the issues I have raised.
The position of the Greens is that we need a separate process to deal with this new law enforcement power. We are happy to return to this issue once there has been further work and consideration. This involves scrutiny by the ACT human rights commissioner. It should involve an assessment of the Human Rights Act, section 28 in particular.
Before any of these extended uses are sanctioned, the Greens would like to see clear guidelines for the use of information and the powers of the police. These should be legislative instruments.
In discussions with the department, we have been advised that there are guidelines being developed. I have asked the minister to seek advice from the department on making these a disallowable instrument. I recognise that this is not a typical practice; however, they are likely to be significant enough in this instance, and to have a bearing on how the legislation operates, to mean that we should consider this action with this legislation. I note that this is also being considered with another piece of legislation, the working with vulnerable people checks.
I will also mention that the Greens have proposed amendments to the bill to address the issues I have raised. I understand that the amendments are under consideration from the government and the technical experts in the department. This is a sensible approach to take: we want the amendments we have proposed to address the human rights and privacy concerns, but not to thwart the operation of the cameras because of a technicality.
The Greens’ key amendment would ensure that there is no storage of images of non-offending vehicles. All images of vehicles that are not immediately detected as committing an offence would not be stored. The effect will be to make this a bill that permits point-to-point cameras for speed enforcement and road safety. Our key amendment would excise from this debate the issue of storing data and using it for other purposes.
We have additional amendments which are designed to further strengthen privacy matters. One is the creation of an offence for misusing collected data. I point out that this is a recommendation from the Victorian privacy commission. A further amendment ensures that the cameras photograph the rear of vehicles whenever possible.
As I have indicated, the Greens will support this point-to-point legislation in principle. We are not willing to finalise the detail stage at this point until further work is undertaken to address the issues raised.
MR CORBELL (Molonglo—Attorney-General, Minister for the Environment and Sustainable Development, Minister for Territory and Municipal Services and Minister for Police and Emergency Services) (5.35), in reply: I thank members for their contributions to the debate this afternoon. The Road Transport (Safety and Traffic
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