Page 2766 - Week 07 - Wednesday, 6 June 2012
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what Mr Seselja has done is show leadership in this area and show to the community the way that the Canberra Liberals stand up for our police whilst what we see, disappointingly, from the Greens and from Labor is that they will not.
In their speeches both Mr Rattenbury and Mr Corbell raised the issue of: “Well, why police? Why not others? Why not ambulance drivers or paramedics?” I make this distinction: whilst other public servants like paramedics, nurses and perhaps teachers will occasionally be confronted by criminality and will be subject to assault, it is not the core nature of their duties to go out and, in essence, seek trouble, to take on the criminals, to go into Civic by night and deal with the people who are causing disturbances, to deal with the drunks, to deal with the gangs that are out there. So there is a difference; there is a distinction. Mr Seselja has sought to make that distinction to make sure we provide protection to the people putting themselves at risk on a daily basis.
If Mr Rattenbury or Mr Corbell felt seriously about this matter—it is quite clear they do not—I am sure we would consider any amendment that expanded the intent of Mr Seselja’s bill so that aggravated assault and other offences were included for paramedics, ambulance drivers or other members of the public service. But there has been no mention of that, because they are not genuine. They are just trying to find an excuse not to support this bill.
What they are saying is, essentially, that this bill does not go far enough, “So we’re not going to support it.” It is a ridiculous argument. The point is that this bill will provide a level of protection to our police. It will send a very clear message, both to the judiciary and to the community, that assaulting police and the other offences included are unacceptable. But what we have from the Greens and from Labor today is a rejection of that proposition. I think that is extraordinarily disappointing.
The Attorney-General also said that he philosophically disagrees with the principle of creating a category or a class of person different to another category or class of person. But my understanding—I would certainly review this—is that there is already an aggravated offence, and that aggravated offence is assault on a pregnant woman. The Attorney-General already has as part of his legislative framework an aggravated offence, but he stood up here today and said, “I don’t support aggravated offences.” If that is his other excuse—because he has only come up with two reasons not to support this bill—then I will be expecting to see a bill from Mr Corbell to remove the aggravated offence against pregnant women unless, again, he does not understand his own legislation, he does not know his own legislation and he is just using it as a further excuse.
There was a committee inquiry into this piece of legislation and various views were put forward by various people. But the view that is most relevant to this debate is that of the police themselves as represented by the Australian Federal Police Association. It is quite clear that the Australian Federal Police Association support this legislation. That is clear if you go out onto the street, if you go down into Civic on the weekend and you speak to police officers, or if you bump into them in the Woden shopping centre, down in Tuggeranong or up at Belconnen or Gungahlin, as we do on a regular
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