Page 5098 - Week 13 - Thursday, 29 November 2018
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Crime—offences while on bail
MR HANSON: My question is to the Attorney-General. Attorney, recently Australia has witnessed yet another tragic attack where an innocent person was killed. The accused killer was free on bail at the time of the attack. In the ACT, there have been other incidents of crimes committed by people free on bail, yet the legal system here in the ACT and your government are still not capable of tracking that data. Attorney-General, will you now commit to a review of our bail system as a matter of urgency?
MR RAMSAY: I thank the shadow Attorney-General for the question and the actual gap in logic between the first part of his sentence and the second. In terms of the review, which actually is the question but not the premise of the question, I said before that we will continue to work with the directorate and across the government to look at the best ways of ensuring that our bail laws are serving the needs of our community. We believe that they do. We believe that the appropriate way of working—
Mr Hanson: Madam Speaker—
MADAM SPEAKER: Minister, resume your seat. Stop the clock.
Mr Hanson: There was a lot of waffle there, but in terms of being directly relevant, the question was about whether there will be a review of bail. I would ask the Attorney-General to be directly relevant and answer that question as to whether he will conduct a review into our bail system.
MADAM SPEAKER: I think he was talking about a review across government. Attorney-General.
MR RAMSAY: In fact, I was halfway through the sentence, saying that we believe the best way of going is continual improvement. I have answered that question many times in this place before, and it is the same answer today.
MR HANSON: Attorney-General, will you commit to delivering a system to track crimes committed by those on bail before a tragedy occurs in the ACT and, if so, when will this government be able to track what crimes are committed by people on bail?
MR RAMSAY: I thank the shadow attorney-general for his question in this area, which has been covered a number of times in annual reports hearings and estimates hearings. Again, the ongoing work in terms of the implementation for the ICMS and the court process is something that we are committed to and we will roll it out when it is ready.
MRS JONES: Minister, how can the community feel safe when the government has promised to address the problem for over six years but to date has not done so in their tracking system?
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