Page 789 - Week 02 - Thursday, 23 February 2012
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The important element of this is that the Greens do not accept violence against any public official acting on behalf of the community, whether it be police, nurses, teachers, paramedics, bus drivers or those in any other similar job. That is certainly something that has come to my mind in looking at Mr Seselja’s bill. I think there are questions to be explored there, such as why we are just nominating police officers. Obviously police have a particularly difficult job, but certainly those in some of the other professions I have just mentioned are performing a public duty and they are facing assaults in the context of performing that public duty. So the question is whether we need to act simply for police or whether we need to act more broadly.
There has been quite some discussion on an issue where I think the committee approach can really assist us. One of the issues of concern that Mr Seselja has raised is a lack of success, having regard to some of the problems that the DPP has encountered, in seeking charges against those who assault police. There is certainly a question in my mind as to whether the issue is one of needing to increase the penalties. There is certainly evidence to suggest that there are definitional problems in that legislation.
I am not sure whether it is simply about increasing penalties or whether it is in fact saying that if we adjust the definition, the courts and the DPP will more readily be able to look at these offences and address them in a more effective way.
I also note that Mr Seselja’s bill, which increases the penalty to seven years, would lift the offence out of the Magistrates Court and into the Supreme Court, and I am not clear whether that was the intention. I have not managed to ask Mr Seselja that question yet, but, in light of the reforms this Assembly has sought to make to the various jurisdictional limits in the ACT, do we in fact now want to be moving matters back into the Supreme Court, having endeavoured to limit the range of matters that can be heard in the Supreme Court? Would we in fact prefer to keep this offence in the Magistrates Court? These are matters that the committee can usefully draw out.
Mrs Dunne has referred to the issue in the government’s bill around the question of self-defence, and I have certainly received considerable feedback on that bill already. I think that there are interesting arguments both ways on whether that bill should be passed or not, and I do not think there is a clear answer. Again, I think the Assembly would benefit from the justice and community safety committee examining this closely.
I thank Mrs Dunne for bringing this motion forward, and I move the amendment circulated in my name:
Omit all words after “That this Assembly”, substitute: “refers the Crimes Legislation Amendment Bill 2011 and the Crimes (Offences Against Police) Amendment Bill 2012 to the Standing Committee on Justice and Community Safety for inquiry and report by 1 May 2012.”.
MR CORBELL (Molonglo—Attorney-General, Minister for Police and Emergency Services and Minister for the Environment and Sustainable Development) (4.33): The government will be supporting both this amendment and the substantive motion today.
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