Page 795 - Week 03 - Tuesday, 8 March 2016
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MR RATTENBURY (Molonglo—Minister for Corrections, Minister for Education, Minister for Justice and Consumer Affairs and Minister for Road Safety) (4.37), in reply: I thank members for their comments and support of the Road Transport Legislation Amendment Bill 2016. I am very pleased that we are passing this legislation in the Assembly today.
As I discussed when tabling the bill, this is a significant milestone for road safety in the ACT. The amendments made by this bill, in conjunction with ACT Policing’s implementation of a revised limited pursuit policy, will deliver significant road safety benefits for all road users in the territory. The changes are a crucial road safety initiative intended to reduce the trauma, injury or death that can occur from a police pursuit.
As members know, the ACT’s Chief Police Officer has committed to commencing this revised policy once this bill has passed the Assembly. I take this opportunity again to thank the Chief Police Officer, Rudi Lammers, for his commitment and cooperation on this issue. My thanks go also to ACT Policing, who will implement the policy, and who are of course committed every day to serving and protecting the community. Like the attorney, I would also like to thank you, Madam Deputy Speaker, for your work on this when you were responsible for the police portfolio in the ACT.
Under the new policy, police will no longer pursue drivers unless it is necessary to prevent a serious risk to public health or safety, or an offence has been committed, or is about to be committed, which involves serious injury to or death of a person. This new policy reflects both the government’s and ACT Policing’s commitment to harm minimisation and public safety. Pursuits will only occur where the harm caused by failing to stop the vehicle outweighs the harm that all too often is the result of a pursuit.
Police pursuits unfortunately do pose significant risk to the community. While ACT Policing officers receive significant training and are highly skilled, the same cannot be said of those drivers seeking to evade police. Statistics show that these drivers are often young and inexperienced. In many instances they are also likely to be affected by alcohol, drugs or both. This combination has all too often led to tragic consequences. In the ACT since 2004 there have been nine people killed in crashes related to police pursuits. Nationally, between 2000 and 2011 there have been an average of 15 crashes and 18 deaths each year related to police pursuits, with 218 deaths in total.
While any death arising from a pursuit is a tragedy, it is particularly distressing that 82 out of these 218 deaths were of innocent parties—either occupants of other cars or bystanders or other road users. These figures include six police officers who lost their lives while seeking to uphold the law and protect their community. Just this weekend we saw another New South Wales police officer lose his life in the course of his traffic duties.
Victorian road safety expert John Lambert has reported that the fatality rate when police vehicles are involved in an accident is about 3,500 times the average. The per
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