Page 2472 - Week 06 - Thursday, 24 June 2010
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The amendment is an important one, as I have outlined, and I hope that other members of the Assembly can see fit to support this today in order to make an adjustment to this section of the law to address some of the concerns that the Greens have addressed today.
MR CORBELL (Molonglo—Attorney-General, Minister for the Environment, Climate Change and Water, Minister for Energy and Minister for Police and Emergency Services) (5.00): The government will be supporting this amendment. The mental elements of “ought to have known” and “recklessness” are very similar. The use of “ought to have known” was raised by the scrutiny committee in scrutiny report No 20 and consequently the government issued a revised explanatory statement to clarify the matter.
The proposed amendment would replace “ought to have known” with “recklessness”. The use of “recklessness” is consistent with the provisions of the Criminal Code 2002 and therefore, in order to provide further certainty around the threshold required in this offence, the government is happy to support the amendment.
MRS DUNNE (Ginninderra) (5.01): The Canberra Liberals, on reflection, will support this amendment. I was racked with indecision for a while, but on reflection I think that it probably is appropriate.
One of the points that was made to my staff by Mr Rattenbury’s staff was that it would bring us into line with the measures not only that are elsewhere in this legislation but those that are in section 93T of the New South Wales Crimes Act. I did suggest to my staff that they should suggest to Mr Rattenbury’s office that, if he supported my amendment, which also brings the provisions into line with section 93T, we would support his. But that would be churlish and not in the scope of good law making. I did think about it, and I was, I have to say, a little miffed that Mr Rattenbury would not come to the party with our amendment.
But I think, on reflection, that this is the right way to go. It does bring consistency into other parts of the legislation. It is interesting that the attorney seems to be having a bet each way in saying that he really did intend for it to do this but has changed his mind, so I think changing our mind is in the air today, and we will support this amendment as well.
Amendment agreed to.
MRS DUNNE (Ginninderra) (5.03): I move amendment No 1 circulated in my name [see schedule 4 at page 2486].
The government’s report Serious organised crime groups and activities acknowledges the inclusion in the New South Wales law of the offence of assault on a law enforcement officer as one of the three aggravated offences associated with the participation in a criminal group. Indeed, the report calls these “key New South Wales provisions”. However, the bill we are debating today, whilst picking up two of the aggravated offence provisions, fails to provide the same protection to law enforcement officers as is afforded in New South Wales.
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