Page 1338 - Week 05 - Tuesday, 9 April 2013
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descending into or being trapped in the poverty cycle. These community groups work every day with Canberra’s most vulnerable people, and they provide many case studies of people who had suffered unreasonably under the existing infringement system.
These were people who may have been suffering from issues such as unemployment, illness, homelessness, disability or other disadvantage. For some people in Canberra, the reality is that paying a fine within a short time frame would prevent them from being able to afford basic essentials, such as food or rent. Not paying the fine in time would result in suspension of their licence, a punishment which was often disproportionate and could severely compound their disadvantage.
The changes introduced by the Greens’ legislation amended the traffic fine payment system so that the administering authority could allow flexible payment options for traffic infringement penalties in certain circumstances. The options include the ability to pay fines by instalments, to pay fines by participating in community work or social development programs and the possibility of having a fine waived in special circumstances. Importantly, the legislation also allowed for reinstatement of a person’s drivers licence that had been suspended for non-payment of fines provided this person was approved for one of the flexible payment options.
In addition to the social justice benefits, the new system is expected to reduce the number of people who drive while their licence is suspended. I also expect it will increase the number of people who engage with the fine payment system, ultimately increasing the amount of fines recovered.
The changes in the original Greens bill were significant and required considerable changes to government systems and processes. This has caused a level of detail it is not practical to specify in a private members’ bill, and typically not in any statute. It was appropriate to make these changes administratively and through guidelines and regulation. The legislation therefore delayed the commencement date for one year to allow the government to implement the changes needed. The new infringement system is now set to commence at the end of May.
During the last 11 months the government has developed the necessary administrative support for the new system. From the briefing provided to my office by officers of JACS I understand that the changes required quite a bit of work. I thank the directorate for its efforts over the last year. In completing this work the directorate identified various minor amendments that were necessary to support the administration of the scheme, and these are presented in the bill before the Assembly today.
I will briefly respond to the rather unfair criticisms the Liberal Party have raised in relation to this legislation. Mr Coe criticised the Greens’ original legislation for apparently being too light on detail. This complaint last year, and again today, was that it was irresponsible to pass legislation which does not clearly articulate how the scheme will be carried out. This was simply a convenient excuse for the Liberal Party to not support the original legislation. The reality is that this is how this type of legislation must work. Just like hundreds of pieces of legislation, the framework for
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