Page 3743 - Week 12 - Wednesday, 29 October 2014

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He goes on:

I have no doubt that the incorporation of tasers into the suite of tools available to front-line police provides an additional use-of-force option to assist police when facing such situations as these.

I will say that again, Madam Assistant Speaker. This is from the minister:

He goes on making the case for tasers and the need for them to be with front-line officers.

We know that this government is essentially blocking the police from having them issued further down the line. In answer to a question from Ms Bresnan, Mr Corbell said:

Officers of ACT Policing are sworn members of the Australian Federal Police and they are subject to the direction and orders of the Commissioner of the Australian Federal Police. However, given the significant public interest in this matter, and indeed the broader community interest in this matter, the government has made clear, and the Australian Federal Police have indicated, that this is a matter that will need to be discussed between the government, as the purchaser of the service, and the commissioner, as the provider of the service. So this would be a joint decision between me and the commissioner …

So Simon Corbell has injected himself into this and said: “I am going to be the man with the red card. I am going to be the one that says whether this occurs or not. I am going to be part of that discussion.” He is going to be the man that stops it.

This is the point. The case has been made. The case has been made for tasers. We have seen them rolled out successfully in other jurisdictions. We know the consequence. I have got a range of FOI examples here showing where tasers have been drawn or firearms have been used. If I get the chance in closing or later in the debate, I will read from some of those.

We know that our police down on the ground have got to be given the suite of tools available, as argued by Mr Corbell, so that they can apply the right use of force measure and make sure that they have all the options available to them below lethal force. We know—we have seen it historically both in the ACT and across Australia—that there will be occasions where police are required to use force to stop somebody who is a threat to police, a threat to themselves or a threat to the community, a person who is behaving violently, who is armed, who has a knife, who is affected by ice or methamphetamines.

We know that police in those circumstances have to respond quickly. At the moment there are police out on our streets at night confronted by these circumstances. Their

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