Page 4632 - Week 12 - Thursday, 1 November 2018
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It is important to remember that we are seeking to reform the law here in the ACT, and we have to consider and act on the views of ACT stakeholders. Positively, the New South Wales election will be held in March next year, so I think we can be confident that the committee will meet the timetable of producing a final report in February next year. The way will be clear for the ACT to act on this.
Looking at the way forward, my aim, obviously, is to ensure that the Assembly has a new bill to consider as soon as practicable following the results of the New South Wales Law Reform Commission’s inquiry and any other considerations that we need to have. Usefully, the committee has put forward some suggestions about how this could happen. In recommendation 9 the committee said:
… recommends that the ACT Government establish a cross-government, cross-sector working group, which includes representations from women’s organisations, sexual assault and domestic violence services and the legal fraternity, or alternatively, that the ACT Government utilise an already existing group to provide advice on how the government can improve prosecution outcomes for victims of sexual assault, specifically with regards to consent.
I have been trying to talk to the Attorney-General’s office, without success as yet, more fully about what the Attorney-General had in mind regarding what was written in the committee’s media release yesterday, which reads:
The Committee has accepted an assurance from the Attorney-General that the bill’s proposals will be considered following the publication of the report on consent in relation to sexual offences currently the subject of a major inquiry and report by the New South Wales Law Reform Commission. The Committee supports this approach.
In summary, I thank the committee for their detailed consideration of this important matter. I thank all the people who contributed to that consideration for their work on this. I thank the members of the community who have been strongly pushing for change in this area, and I look forward to this Assembly progressing this important issue in the next year.
MR PETTERSSON (Yerrabi) (11.35): I rise to speak about a particular recommendation, recommendation 4: that the ACT Legislative Assembly consider legislating an affirmative consent model. Currently, the ACT is the only Australian jurisdiction that does not have a statutory definition of consent; rather, section 67 of the Crimes Act provides a non-exhaustive list of circumstances in which consent is negated. Included in this list are intoxication, mistaken identity, threats of violence or abuse of authority. Although a definition exists in the common law, the lack of legislative clarity does not meet community expectations.
The justice and community safety committee has heard from a number of submitters, stakeholders and activists, and I want to thank each and every one of them for the sincerity and the strength of their words. Their contributions were humbling in many ways. I also want to thank my fellow committee members. You could not ask for a better bunch of committee members, that is for sure.
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