Page 252 - Week 01 - Thursday, 29 November 2012
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Under the framework agencies review and if necessary amend their performance criteria. An example of when agencies amend their performance criteria is as a consequence of administrative arrangement changes. Currently, under section 19D of the FMA, when an agency amends its criteria the responsible minister is authorised to approve the amendment.
This bill will strengthen the processes by amending the FMA to include the Treasurer in the approval process for instruments that amend performance criteria. This bill will work in concert with the comprehensive guidelines which have been issued by Treasury on the requirements of section 19D instruments.
Including the Treasurer in subsection (2) means the notifiable instrument under section 19D(5) is only made if signed by both the responsible minister and the Treasurer. Further changes have been made to section 19D(3) as a consequence of the change in subsection (2). I commend this bill to the Assembly.
Debate (on motion by Mr Smyth) adjourned to the next sitting.
Crimes Legislation Amendment Bill 2012 (No 2)
Mr Corbell, pursuant to notice, presented the bill, its explanatory statement and a Human Rights Act compatibility statement.
Title read by Clerk.
MR CORBELL (Molonglo—Attorney-General, Minister for Police and Emergency Services, Minister for Workplace Safety and Industrial Relations and Minister for the Environment and Sustainable Development) (10.05): I move:
That this bill be agreed to in principle.
The Crimes Legislation Amendment Bill 2012 was introduced into the previous Assembly on 10 May. However, as the government moved into the caretaker period and the Assembly adjourned, this bill was not debated and consequently lapsed. I now re-present the bill as the Crimes Legislation Amendment Bill 2012 (No 2). The bill will improve the operation of the criminal justice system in the ACT. The bill is the result of a number of concerns that key justice stakeholders, in particular the Director of Public Prosecutions, ACT Policing and the ACT Supreme Court, have brought to my attention.
The bill will make important amendments in a number of key areas of criminal justice. I provided a full outline of the amendments when I introduced the bill in May this year. In summary, the bill provides two new sexual offences of sexual intercourse and act of indecency with a 16 or 17-year-old in special care. The bill continues the important work of the government’s sexual assault reform program. It does this by extending the class of people for whom pre-recorded police interviews can be admitted as evidence and allows the audiovisual evidence of victims in sexual offences to be recorded and played at any related hearing, such as a retrial, to provide greater protections for vulnerable witnesses in sexual and violent offence matters.
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