Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . .

Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2000 Week 8 Hansard (29 August) . . Page.. 2579 ..

Mr Humphries: All right. Sorry. Tell me about it, Mr Hargreaves. I draw Mr Hargreaves' attention to the wording of the insertion Mr Stanhope proposes to this clause: "if the authorised person has reasonable grounds for believing that the person possesses a prohibited item". And in clause 10 he proposes to insert: "if the authorised person has reasonable grounds for believing that the person possesses a prohibited item". It is not the police; it is the authorised person.

MR HARGREAVES: If the Minister wants to empower the police to do the same as they do at the airports and if he is concerned that it is not possible to do random searches, then amend it. The thing that concerns me is the possibility that a person unskilled in dealing with people in a search will be doing it. Our police are trained not only in doing it but also in talking to people before and after. Authorised people will not. I understand what Mr Humphries is saying in one of his points. We have to be careful and ensure that the police can do random searches. I understand that.

Mr Humphries: It is not about the police; it is about authorised people.

MR HARGREAVES: If it has nothing to do with the random one, Mr Speaker, I wonder what on earth the Attorney-General was babbling on about for the entirety of his speech. He said, "This stuff from Mr Stanhope is no good because it eliminates random searches." He went on and on about it. Well, fix it. I have to voice my concern that police officers may not be the only people conducting searches. I do not see any guarantee anywhere in this legislation from the Attorney-General that prevents that. I am not happy about that.

MS TUCKER (5.08): I will risk supporting the amendment from Labor. I am concerned about what the Attorney-General has just said, though. As I understand it, there is going to be a metal detector. That is normally what occurs at an airport. There is not a definition of search in the legislation. We have a definition of frisk search, which means a search of a person conducted by quickly running the hands over the person's outer garments, et cetera.

As I understand it, everybody will go through a metal detector. The legislation is unclear. Search of personal property is something other than using a metal detector. If Mr Humphries is talking about using a metal detector, that is a different issue. The legislation implies some other kind of personal property search. It does not mention a metal detector, so it is not very well drafted. If you go through a metal detector-this is what happens in an airport-and metal is detected, then there can be a random search of the person's property or body.

It seems to me that there are three ways in which you are trying to see what goes on to the venue. There is the metal detector, there is the possibility of a personal property search and there is the possibility of a frisk search. What Labor is saying, as I understand it, is that a personal property search and a frisk search should not happen unless there is reasonable grounds to think that they should occur. That seems a very reasonable response to the concerns about the draconian or more extreme elements of this legislation.

Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . .