Page 801 - Week 03 - Thursday, 2 April 2020
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . . Video
I encourage members who have an interest in these matters to read that letter. In short and in summary, the issues of concern that have been raised with us, and that I share, are as follows: firstly, there are the very important underlying legal principles of the right to a trial by jury. They date back a long time and we must, wherever possible, conform to those. What this bill does, as well, is create inconsistency with New South Wales. They have taken another approach, whereby they retain that right to jury trials where the accused makes that application.
There are fundamental human rights principles at stake. There are concerns that have been raised about the constitutional validity of removing trial by jury. Indeed, that goes to my last point, and that is: the real risk that this will not actually have the effect that it seeks. We have heard from those in the profession who have stated to me, “Any decision under these provisions will be appealed. They will be appealed.”
What that means is that potentially there will be a judge-only trial that will then be subject to appeal, potentially to much higher courts, given the constitutional arguments at stake here, which will actually cause much more significant delays than awaiting a jury trial. I will go into some of these in more detail in the detail stage.
We understand that these are extraordinary times that require changes to the way that we do things. However, we should not be discarding long-held and important legal rights if there is an alternative. We believe, and indeed the legal profession and the legal community believe, that the New South Wales model has struck the right balance and provides that alternative.
That is why I foreshadow that we will be moving an amendment to this section which is modelled on the New South Wales provision. I will speak more about it in the detail stage, but I reiterate that that way forward is the one that is supported by the Human Rights Commission and the broader legal community.
MRS KIKKERT (Ginninderra) (4.16): I wish to speak briefly to three separate parts of this bill. First, this bill proposes to amend the Working with Vulnerable People (Background Checking) Act to make sure that workers and volunteers can remain lawful during the COVID-19 emergency period. Registration for those whose certification will expire during the emergency or in the six months thereafter will be automatically extended until six months after the emergency period ends. Those whose registrations have expired in the past 12 months may be eligible to have their credentials renewed by the commissioner if this is deemed appropriate. These are reasonable responses in the current situation.
This bill proposes similarly reasonable amendments to the Family Violence Act and the Personal Violence Act. These changes include allowing the court to extend interim orders for a period of not more than six months. In addition, when parties are required to be present in court this can now be done by telephone or other electronic audiovisual means. Consent may be given in the same way and undertakings may be given in writing. These are excellent amendments and, when this crisis ends, making these changes permanent probably should be explored.
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . . Video