Page 3166 - Week 09 - Tuesday, 18 August 2009
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .
harsh on organisations that are not for profit. One submission emphasised the need for more legal posting facilities to facilitate community advertising and discourage illegal bill posting. One submission highlighted a particular concern about posting activities that used adhesive paste because of the high cost of removal and the damage it causes to building surfaces.
Regarding the right to freedom of expression, the scrutiny of bills committee found that the bill did not unreasonably limit the right to freedom of expression, and acknowledged that the explanatory statement highlighted that there would be locations provided by the government for lawful bill posting. The committee also noted that, as the bill posters include not-for-profit organisations, community groups and private individuals attempting to notify residents in their immediate area of events, garage sales, lost pet notices et cetera, local and group shopping centres should be key locations for the placement of bill posting facilities.
The first recommendation made by the committee was that the ACT government facilitate adequate legal bill posting space in all local, group and town centres. The committee noted that the extended provisions in the bill can only be workable if adequate legal bill posting facilities are available, and noted that the ACT government needs to make the community aware of the implications of the bill. It also needs to inform the community about legal bill posting and noticeboard facilities that are available around Canberra, and other permissible signage mechanisms and advertising. All of this information needs to be made readily available in one place, particularly as section 121 imposes a duty of clean promotion on event promoters, subcontracted bill posters and other employees or volunteers.
The committee notes that the list of current bill posting silos is available on the TAMS website. However, as noted above, very little information is available on the location of community noticeboards. The committee considers that these noticeboards need to be better publicised in order to increase the availability of information on legal bill poster facilities and to assist the community to do the right thing. The committee believes that information on local community noticeboards should be available online.
The second recommendation that the committee made was that the Department of Territory and Municipal Services include information on its website about the location of these noticeboards. On its website, TAMS also highlights good poster etiquette, requesting that individuals “not post over other posters unless they are out of date or there is more than one copy of the poster on view”.
The committee noted, from its own experience of pasting up posters on the available silos in Canberra city, that the limited number of silos currently available makes it very valuable advertising “real estate” and, as a result, posters are often covered with more posters within a matter of days—or, in some cases, a matter of hours. While additional poster silos would help to reduce the competition for legal bill posting space around Canberra, increasing the awareness and an acknowledgement of poster etiquette suggested by TAMS may assist all groups to negotiate a reasonable period of display time.
Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . . PDF . . . .