Page 799 - Week 03 - Tuesday, 8 March 2016
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One of the difficulties that police have encountered in the past when investigating police pursuits is that registered owners of the vehicle are not fulfilling their obligation to provide information about the identity of the driver at the time the offence was allegedly committed. The maximum penalty for failing to provide information about who was driving the vehicle is 20 penalty units.
This relatively low maximum penalty creates an incentive for registered operators of vehicles to refuse to provide information about who was driving the vehicle, recognising that often the driver will be the registered operator themselves. The registered operator who knows that there is a very low value maximum penalty for not disclosing the identity of the driver has no incentive to identify the driver, thereby exposing the driver to the penalty for a more serious offence potentially punishable by imprisonment. This is particularly the case where the registered operator or a member of their family or a friend was the driver of the vehicle.
This bill removes that incentive. The registered operator of a vehicle that fails to stop for police who does not provide information about the identity of the driver at the time of the offence will be subject to the same penalty that would apply to a driver convicted of failing to stop for police, namely, 100 penalty units, 12 months imprisonment or both, or, for a repeat offender, 300 penalty units, three years imprisonment or both.
The registered operator who fails to provide information about the driver will also see their licence suspended and on conviction they will be disqualified. Their vehicle will also be seized. This change is crucial to the success of these reforms. In the vast majority of cases where police might consider a pursuit, police have identified the vehicle used to evade them, if not the driver themselves. Police will no longer have any reason to pursue the vast majority of vehicles as these amendments give them strong new laws that will greatly enhance their ability to identify the driver.
To conclude, these changes will make our roads safer. Police pursuits have been repeatedly shown to be one of the highest risk driving practices occurring on our roads. This bill and the associated policy changes introduced by ACT Policing will significantly reduce the number of pursuits on our roads. Let no-one be under any illusion that these changes will mean that drivers will get away with evading police. Both ACT Policing and the government are confident that the changes provide both a suitable deterrent against trying to avoid police and will help ensure that any fleeing drivers are more likely to be identified than they are currently. Drivers who fail to stop for police will face a swift and effective punishment. It may be hours or days later, but it will happen.
I now take this opportunity to present a revised explanatory statement to the bill, which addresses comments made by the scrutiny committee.
Question resolved in the affirmative.
Bill agreed to in principle.
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