Page 3676 - Week 10 - Tuesday, 18 September 2018
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later this year, when phase 3 is commenced by ministerial declaration. This will allow for referrals of family violence and sexual offences to be made to restorative justice.
In preparation for phase 3, the restorative justice unit has been building its capacity to manage complex offences, establishing service provision agreements with educational and therapeutic service providers, and consulting closely with stakeholders to finalise guidelines for the management of phase 3 offences. Provided that no significant issues arise during the finalisation of this consultation process, I anticipate that phase 3 of the restorative justice scheme will commence on 1 November this year.
Phase 3 commencement day will be a significant moment in the life of the ACT’s restorative justice scheme. It breaks down the final legislative barriers which prevented victims of crime from having access to restorative justice simply because they were the survivors of particular offence types. This will complete the rollout of the restorative justice scheme as it was envisaged by the restorative justice subcommittee in 2003.
Today’s bill is the result of ongoing consultation between the restorative justice unit and phase 2 referring entities about ways to improve access to the restorative justice scheme. The bill, once passed, will allow more victims of crime to access restorative justice at a time which is right for them. I would like to thank the referring entities who have provided input into these reforms.
I turn now to the amendments made by today’s bill. The bill removes a requirement for referring entities to conduct an assessment of an individual’s capability to agree to participate in restorative justice prior to referring an offence. This responds to concerns raised by the ACT Supreme Court in the 2016 case of the Queen and Forrest, where then Justice Refshauge identified that referring entities had to draw indirect inferences about a person when that person was not present before them.
Following passage of the bill, this assessment will only be required as a part of a suitability assessment conducted by delegated staff at the restorative justice unit. This simplifies referral processes for referring entities and ensures participants will be subject to a consistent assessment process conducted by officers with experience and training in the use of restorative justice practices.
The bill makes an additional amendment to the eligibility criteria for referral. Currently, for offences to be referred, the referring entity must be satisfied that the offender has accepted responsibility for the commission of the offence. This bill allows for young offenders who have been charged with a less serious offence to be referred to restorative justice where they do not deny responsibility for the commission of the offence.
In 2003 the restorative justice subcommittee of the ACT Sentencing Review Committee considered what accountability thresholds an offender would be required to meet prior to a referral to restorative justice being made. The subcommittee settled upon demonstrating acceptance of responsibility, which they saw as a middle ground between a requirement for an offender to make a formal admission of guilt to the offence and the “doesn’t deny” threshold which would allow for referrals where the offender did not deny responsibility for the commission of the offence.
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