Page 3129 - Week 08 - Thursday, 16 August 2018
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When we first came up with these warnings, you will recall, Madam Deputy Speaker—I think at that stage you were the shadow attorney-general—we were warned that it was scaremongering. There would be no extra violence. This would not increase the number of gangs here in the ACT. But that has now happened. As the ABC reported on 29 June this year:
Innocent people have again been caught up in an ongoing bikie feud, with a bullet from an alleged targeted shooting coming within a metre of a sleeping neighbour in Canberra's south.
A metre to someone being killed or very seriously wounded.
Other reports show the same. From 19 June this year, “Home invasion-shots fired in Ngunnawal”—a home invaded, shots fired, the house set on fire. A bikie formerly lived at the address, but the people affected were totally unrelated to bikie gangs. Another report, “Man shot in Fisher”, from October 2017. Two cars on the property were torched and man was treated for gunshot wounds to his groin and shoulder.
The Canberra Times wrote in an editorial at the time:
As matters stand Canberra is now viewed by some as a safe haven for these gun-wielding thugs who have fled across our border to avoid being persecuted elsewhere. Pity the terrified residents of Canberra suburbs listening to assault rifles being fired meters from their homes … That has to change and change now—these are not the signals we want to send to lawless individuals. This is not a problem the Barr government can leave in the “too hard” basket any longer.
The reality is irrefutable. There is evidence that has been provided by the Chief Police Officer and, indeed, by the police minister. There has been an influx of bikies into Canberra. The violence has increased. There is a greater number of bikie gangs that are engaged in a war, and it must be stopped. As members know, the Canberra Liberals tried to introduce laws to prevent and disrupt this very real and current danger to our citizens. As we know, those laws were not supported. We have seen a litany of false and frivolous objections to those laws.
I will talk about the laws as they stand. In New South Wales there are anti-consorting laws and there are criminal control orders. The government has said that they will not support anti-consorting laws because of the human rights compliance issues. We brought into this place criminal control orders, similar to those used in New South Wales. They are not used extensively in New South Wales because they have the anti-consorting laws. They do not need to use them.
In respect of those proposed laws, we worked with the Human Rights Commissioner. She said that they are better laws than those in other jurisdictions. She said herself that it is not a human right to belong to a criminal gang. Even though the proposed laws had that support, the government changed the goalposts and said, “They are not effective enough; they are not strong enough. We do not like them. They will not be effective enough in dealing with organised criminal gangs.”
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