Page 437 - Week 02 - Wednesday, 24 February 1993
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Pornography
MS SZUTY: My question is directed to the Attorney-General, Mr Connolly. It arises from the response I recently received to part (5) of my question No. 484 on the notice paper regarding the Attorney-General taking up with his Federal, State and Territory counterparts the issue of unclassified material on sale interstate. In his answer the Attorney-General stated:
... ACT authorities will assist, where possible, other jurisdictions.
He further stated that on 4 December he himself offered to assist the Attorney-General for New South Wales, Mr John Hannaford, in a matter concerning sexually explicit advertising brochures. My question of the Attorney-General is: Would he be prepared to raise the issue of the sale of unclassified materials, including child pornography, at the next meeting of Attorneys-General?
MR CONNOLLY: Madam Speaker, the issue of the unclassifiable material, which is illegal pornography, has in fact been discussed not so much at meetings of Attorneys-General as at police Ministers meetings. A resolution of the police Ministers meeting last year - I think in July - was that jurisdictions should move to ban the possession of child pornography. This jurisdiction had already done that in the life of the First Assembly as a result of a private members Bill from Mr Collaery - to give him credit on a rare occasion. This Assembly unanimously passed a new law which made it an offence to possess child pornography. No other jurisdiction in Australia had done that.
It intrigues me that we regularly get petitions lodged here, from Chinchilla and such places, dealing with Mr Stevenson's X-video Bill and calling upon us to ban the possession of child pornography. In fact, we have done that. Other jurisdictions, as at July last year, when this was raised at the police Ministers conference, had not. I circulated the ACT law. I understand that similar laws have been passed in some jurisdictions and that in those jurisdictions where they have not been passed they soon will be passed.
Before the courts in the ACT at the moment is the first prosecution in Australia for possession of child pornography. This issue of dealing with the illegal end of the pornography market is one that we pursue with some vigour. Members may recall a report in the Community Times last year about the police conducting a fairly major raid on some premises in Fyshwick where they had reason to believe there was material at the unclassified end of the market.
Yes, we do raise the issue nationally. Other States and Territories are following this jurisdiction in introducing laws to ban the possession of child pornography. Where we have any reason to believe that people are in possession of unclassified material, particularly child pornography, which is a criminal offence, we move swiftly and vigorously to investigate the matter and, where appropriate, bring a prosecution.
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