Page 4091 - Week 13 - Thursday, 10 November 1994
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The report notes that many of these immediate measures have been implemented by the Government. I believe that it would be appropriate in the course of this debate for the Government to indicate to the Assembly which of these measures have been implemented at this time.
Madam Speaker, in turning to the recommendations of the report and the Government's response, it is appropriate to note that both the report and the Government's response were tabled in the Assembly nearly six months ago, on 17 May this year. The first three recommendations were intended as short-term strategies and, as such, could reasonably be expected to have been implemented by now or, at the very least, to be well on the way to implementation. I can see no evidence of this. It should have been easy to implement the first recommendation of the committee, for the placement of signs in Civic to make the community aware that Civic is an alcohol-free area. However, I must say that, so far, I am not aware of any such dry areas signage in Civic. Perhaps the Minister could inform the Assembly during this debate as to the progress which has been made on the committee's first three recommendations. The ACT Community Safety Committee also made five recommendations on medium- to long-term strategies to address the underlying causes, and I would appreciate gaining an understanding of the Government's progress on these recommendations as well.
Madam Speaker, the work done by the ACT Community Safety Committee in compiling its Civic by Night report in such a timely fashion is to be commended. The Government's support of the report's recommendations is also pleasing. However, the implementation of the recommendations seems to me to be characterised by a lack of urgency - a comment that Mr Humphries also made. I urge the Government to progress its implementation of the recommendations of the ACT Community Safety Committee so that Civic does become a safer place for all Canberrans as soon as possible.
MR CONNOLLY (Attorney-General and Minister for Health) (4.48), in reply: Madam Speaker, I thank members for their support for this strategy. The Civic by Night report emphasises only part of the Government's overall crime prevention strategy, which has gone from being something of a novel idea when it was first being mooted some years ago to now clearly occupying the middle ground of politics, where it has support from Opposition, Independents and Government. I must say that I find that very pleasing, because about four years ago, when I first started advocating these crime prevention strategies, they were seen as somewhat unusual and somewhat out of the mainstream of the law and order debates. It is pleasing to see that they are now so generally supported.
As we said at the Estimates Committee, we are confident that we will have the pubcard proposal up by the Christmas period. Obviously, I will have to get the legislation in by the next sitting period. I will try to get it to Mr Humphries even before that, as soon as I can, so that he and the Independents can have a little look at it before we sit again. I am not sure that I can courier a copy to Mr Moore, wherever he will be; but I will get one to his office as soon as I can. The issue of signage is well taken. I will pursue where the officers who are responsible for that have got to. Obviously, we would like to have that signage up for the summer period, when activity in Civic does tend to step up a little.
Question resolved in the affirmative.
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