Page 746 - Week 03 - Tuesday, 8 April 2014
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Detail stage
Clauses 1 to 18, by leave, taken together and agreed to.
Clause 19.
MR COE (Ginninderra) (11.55), by leave: I move amendments Nos 1 and 2 circulated in my name together [see schedule 2 at page 792].
I thank members for granting leave. I had thought that the amendments were distributed in the last sitting week, so I apologise for that not being the case. As I have already highlighted, the opposition is extremely concerned with the government potentially tarnishing the reputation of Canberra builders for any finding by ACAT. If we pass this bill into law today unamended, we will be giving the government the ability to publish on a public register the simple fact that the registrar is taking a licensee to ACAT or that a licensee is appealing to ACAT. Regardless of whether the charges are upheld by ACAT, the blemish will be next to the licensee’s name, and we believe that is unacceptable.
The reason the registrar has to go to ACAT is to ensure that justice is carried out properly. This bill will, in effect, allow for a punishment before that justice is completed. Madam Deputy Speaker, for you and I this may seem like a minor issue but if a person sees a blemish next to a builder’s name on this register that could be enough to deter them from using that licensee. In the event of an ACAT listing which may turn out to be unfounded, this would be a great shame.
The government have advised that they are not putting demerit points on the register because they feel that they are not necessarily an admission of guilt by the licensee, yet the government is putting, in effect, a court-like listing on the register which may get thrown out by the tribunal.
If we were to use Minister Corbell’s lines which he just said regarding public concern—“consumers are able to look to the past”, “consumer protection”, “appropriate protection”, “consumer’s right to know”—then why do we not have demerit points listed on the register? I think it is a reasonable question, yet the minister is selectively using an argument about a consumer’s right to know about the issue of an ACAT listing but not regarding demerit points. There may well be a stronger case to include demerit points but not to include those which are still before ACAT.
The ACT opposition is extremely concerned that the government’s bill allows an application to ACAT to be included on the public register. We are concerned that the fact an application has been made does not necessarily mean that the application will be upheld and placing this information on the public register could be very detrimental to the reputation of a licensee. We are not opposed to concluded matters being included on the register but believe it is preferable not to include matters where the licensee may still be proven innocent, or at least where the view of the authority is not upheld.
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