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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1996 Week 4 Hansard (18 April) . . Page.. 1115 ..

MS FOLLETT (continuing):

entertainment media. I hope that Mr Humphries, in his continuing membership of the Attorney-Generals council, will continue to monitor this issue very closely and ensure that, as ever more examples of violence are portrayed and as ever more ingenious media are devised to portray violence, the principles that I outlined earlier are well and truly adhered to by all jurisdictions.

I think it is a sign of the coming of age of the Territory in many ways that we are able to have this debate now in a calm and rational manner, and without people shrieking, pointing the finger and calling us all sinners, which is what used to happen. We still have a way to go. I do not think for a moment we can be complacent that we have the best possible censorship scheme available or that we have the best possible product available in our community for people, whether they are adults or children, to see and hear. What we are talking about essentially is entertainment, and I think it would be very regrettable indeed if entertainment were to continue to portray ever more ingenious and despicable forms of violence.

MS TUCKER (4.34): The Greens also welcome this approach from the Liberal Government and from Mr Humphries in particular. We have had some discussions with him previously on the question of censorship and recategorising X-rated material. He was just informing me of the reclassification that is being proposed at the next conference of people concerned with censorship and what, hopefully, can develop from a clearer distinction between what is perceived to be violence and what is perceived to have very dangerous images where children are involved or women are denigrated in any way - or anybody else, for that matter. It is not really attracting artists to develop this genre further. I hope that out of this we will start to get much higher-quality material developing in these areas, particularly the erotica area. Throughout history there has been some magnificent artwork based on erotic images. I do not see that in this day and age we always have to accept that basically it is an extremely tacky form of artistic expression. I will not go on, because everyone has said basically what needs to be said. I support Mr Humphries in his initiatives here and I wish him the best of luck.

MR HUMPHRIES (Attorney-General) (4.36), in reply: Mr Speaker, I thank members for their support for this approach. We are a long way yet from being able to achieve a change in approach. I should warn members that my party has not exactly embraced X-rated videos with a new profound passion, to use an appropriate word. What we have proposed is that X-rated videos should be reclassified; that material that contains fetishist overtones and allusions to violence, bondage material, sadomasochist material and so on, which is still available in the X category, should be excised from that category and that material with a purely consensual notion about it should remain in that classification. That should be allowed to continue. Mr Speaker, I have to say that, if that classification process is not adopted, I am not sure that my party will necessarily embrace X-rated videos as they remain.

I also point out that the proposal we have put forward includes dealing with excessively violent videos, taking that very violent material out of the R category, which we all know is fairly easily available, particularly to young people, and putting it into a more restricted category where its access can be more carefully controlled. Mr Speaker, I have been

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