Summary Offences (Drones) Amendment Bill

Second Reading

Adjourned debate on second reading.

(Continued from 19 November 2015.)

Mr PEDERICK (Hammond) (10:55): I rise today to speak on the Summary Offences (Drones) Amendment Bill. I note that we live in a very fast moving world, a world where technology overtakes most of us, especially those born before 1970. Technology is a fact of life and we need to embrace it, at least to a certain extent, or we will be left behind.

The member for Heysen had a discussion with us on our side of the house about being at a function where there was a drone hovering overhead filming the event and streaming the footage direct to another location. As the member for Heysen noted, it was all done at the invitation of the event organisers, and there is no problem with that, or indeed with children being able to play with small remote controlled helicopters which might have a camera attached. For want of promoting a brand name, GoPro cameras are all the rage, or similar ones you can buy in the market. I know my eldest son has a lot of fun recording his motorbike exploits on his GoPro camera. Sometimes it goes a bit sideways and every way, but that is when he falls off.

The issue around all this technology, especially the issue of drones, is when such technology is used to invade people's privacy. The issue, especially in light of what the member for Heysen is keen to express, is that it appears there is no law in this state which would prevent a media organisation, a neighbour, or any person, from flying a remote controlled drone up to the window of your home, or over your backyard, and filming whatever it can capture.

The little understanding I do have of drones is the simple fact that they can be flown out of sight. How you manage that I am not sure (whether you have a screen), and from what I understand some of them have a homing device. I am sure there are a few that get lost and they become the property of someone else by default. The issue is around privacy laws and the fact that there is no privacy law as such to protect anyone's basic right to privacy, nor is the Civil Aviation Authority going to seek to control these drones, as long as they do not venture into controlled air space.

I note the Attorney-General has indicated he would be generally supportive of some sort of privacy law, but has not moved to introduce any bill to that end. Certainly the proposal by the member for Heysen is that it would be unlawful to fly a drone with or without any camera or recording device attached over any private property without the owner's or the occupier's permission, and that sounds very reasonable to me. I suggest that the limit need only be, say, 100 feet above the property, or 30 metres in metric discussion.

I think that this is a good, middle-of-the road idea so that it does not cut the use of the technology but also it is giving individuals the right to privacy because I am sure that no-one would appreciate a drone flying up to their window, especially, and potentially filming what is going on in their private residence.

It is one of those things that, with the ongoing issue around them, drones are used far more widely by industry. I know that the real estate industry uses them for flyovers of properties. It is a great tool for them so that they can advertise the properties and give a unique perspective over what is going on on the ground. Obviously if they are selling the house I am sure they get the seller's permission to do so because I think that would be highly appropriate.

I think that we do need to manage this, and certainly I have noticed their use in regard to a little committee I am involved in, the River Murray Boating and Recreational Advisory Group, which is just doing the final edits on some safety videos for river use by all watercraft. I must say that Adam Bruce, our chairman—

The Hon. J.W. Weatherill: A great wakeboarder.

Mr PEDERICK: He is a great wakeboarder. He knows, obviously, a lot of people in the wakeboarding and skiing field, and he has made some great short videos that, before too long, will be released just as safety videos for users of the river because there is not enough compliance on the river. When the big, orange/yellow boat comes around the corner every one tidies up their act for a while until the boat disappears.

Just in saying that, as I have said in this place before, I will again thank the Minister for Transport for his department's contribution of $20,000 to help us do this project. However, in saying that I think that if this were a government project we would save many hundreds of thousands of dollars, but that is by the by. We have got the contacts through Adam and others on the committee, and the Boating Industry Association is on board as well as the houseboat hirers association.

I saw some of this raw footage and I thought that it was magnificent with respect to what you can do with drones to get those overhead shots, otherwise you would have to hire a helicopter at great cost to do the same thing. It does give fantastic real-time footage of what is going on, especially in this case in regard to filming watercraft on the River Murray. I commend everyone who was involved in the filming. They went down for a day and they filmed about 10 of these videos which, as I said, will be released over time. They are just going through the final edits.

I certainly understand the use of drones and I certainly understand why they have become popular. I note that there was some discussion that was had in the party room around remote-controlled helicopters. One of my boys got one for Christmas and I think it lasted about 12 minutes before it plummeted into the ground and screwed the main drive off. I may have been in control of it, or not.

The Hon. J.W. Weatherill interjecting:

Mr PEDERICK: Yes. They can be great things but you have to manage them. I saw one that the member for Stuart was showing me the other day. I think that the trade name is Lily, from memory, but it is something that will follow you or go in front of you for a period of time and film what you are doing from the air.

This technology is just getting better and better over time, but in saying that we, as legislators, as we do over time, have to keep up with modernising legislation and making sure that it is appropriate in regard to people being able to have their privacy and not have their privacy interfered with by these drones overhead.

Some people may want to use these drones for nefarious reasons but that is up to them, but they need to be controlled as well. I think this is a very legitimate piece of legislation. I think it is something that we need to proceed with because people's privacy is paramount, but also, as the member for Heysen indicated, we do not want to lose the ability to use this technology for their enjoyment. As I said, the aim is to not impinge on people's private lives and that is the main issue here. I commend the bill and I hope it has a speedy flow through the house.

Time expired.

Mr KNOLL (Schubert) (11:06): I rise today to support this very worthwhile bill brought before us by the member for Heysen. From the outset I want to say that I think that one of the greatest iconic films in Australian history is The Castle. It helps to underline to Australians that every man's home or woman's home is their castle. The 'vibe' of this bill is very much that we are protecting people's right to quietly enjoy their castle as they see fit, and I think that that is extremely worthy.

This is an issue that I am very passionate about. As someone of a younger generation who has engaged in modern technology, I understand pretty well how that modern technology has been used to break down the barriers of privacy that were otherwise innate in the limitations that technology had generations ago.

Previously, if your neighbour was doing something private in their own backyard and you looked over the fence you could see it, but that was about it, and when you gossiped to your other neighbours, your ability to spread what was happening was quite limited. Whereas now, you can peer over a fence and use your phone to take a recording that can end up being viewed by millions of people around the world.

Indeed, a drone is the same thing: somebody can now take a recording of what you are doing in the privacy of your own castle and broadcast it to millions of people. This is an area where we as legislators need to keep up with the pace of change as it happens around the world. This issue of privacy is very important. It is very important because it is fundamental to social cohesion. The reason that TV shows like—whatever the one is on Channel 10 with Shane Warne that I don't watch—

Mr Pederick:Survivor.

Mr KNOLL: That's right, or the other one where they are in the house together—Big Brother. The reason these shows become interesting is that when people spend 24 hours a day together in a confined area and have no private respite, their interactions with each other can become quite skewed and abnormal, and lead to emotional and social breakdown. I assume that that is where these shows get their voyeuristic pleasures from, because that is when things get interesting.

Certainly for the cohesion of the broader community, it is extremely important that people have a right to privacy; an ability to go back to their homes and to be able to vent to their loved ones about difficult conversations and difficult people that they have met throughout the day in the full knowledge that those conversations are private by their very nature. So when I go home tonight and talk about the difficulties that I have had with members opposite, I can be sure that the language I use will be confined to my own home. I think that is an extremely important and worthy measure and something that this bill seeks to enshrine because drones are a new technology.

The member for Heysen was talking about an incident in Melbourne when an unsuspecting real estate agent happened to drone upon an unsuspecting sunbaker in their backyard. They subsequently used those images when it came to trying to sell the neighbouring house, and certainly that person had, shall we say, some unwanted attention. There was also an instance where a woman was prosecuted because she flashed the Google car that came around—

Mr Pederick: In Port Pirie—in Frome.

Mr KNOLL: In Port Pirie, and those images were then broadcast to the world. They are exactly the types of things that this bill is seeking to address. We have already dealt with surveillance devices in this place—and I think that provides a series of protections that are extremely important—but it is topical that this bill has come before us now, and I want to highlight some news stories that have been happening over the past couple of days in reference to a pig farm in Hamley Bridge. It was on the news two nights ago, and I think there were some follow-up stories yesterday about this pig farm at Hamley Bridge and supposed breaches as they were uncovered by self-styled animal activists.

There was footage of a woman, an animal activist—and I do not know her name—who stood up and said that it is important that the public get to see what their farming really looks like. I agree with that statement, except that everything that was done in uncovering that footage did not do that. Indeed, I think the proper process, when animal cruelty is occurring or where substandard practices are being undertaken, is for the appropriate body—in this case, the RSPCA—to investigate that footage.

Our entire legal system works under the presumption of innocent until proven guilty, and I think that is something that should be afforded to anybody undertaking an operation. In this instance, breaches of animal welfare standards need to be reported to the appropriate authority. Once that authority has had the chance to investigate those breaches, they can then go off through a more formal legal process, and attention can be drawn to the farm at that stage.

The difficulty I have is when people with a hidden agenda and who want to turn our country into a nation of vegetarians decide to take footage, sensationalise that footage—and in previous examples I know that footage has been doctored and sensationalised—which is then picked up by the media and broadcast as fact. I have extreme difficulty with that process because it is not giving a fair assessment of what is happening.

The difficulty is that it is very hard to find the people who took the original footage and prosecute them for defamation or prosecute them for trespass because you have to find out who they are first. We are lucky now, through surveillance devices, that we have some protections in that regard because I am not here—and rural MPs are not here—to defend animal cruelty in any shape or form. We are here to defend the ability of people to conduct their business free from interference, free from people who are not unbiased observers and who are not otherwise experts trained in this field but people who have a political agenda, and through that political agenda try to prosecute a case against anybody who disagrees with that agenda.

If it turns out that this farm in Hamley Bridge, through the RSPCA investigation, gets prosecuted for breaches of animal welfare standards then that is all well and good, but for them to be prematurely lambasted in the court of public opinion and the media, I think, is unfair, especially when the veracity of the footage that was taken cannot be verified. This piece of legislation will put another protection in place in that instance.

It will put another protection in place for people to have privacy in their own homes and in their own backyards; and it will ensure that proper process is followed. I know there has been a lot of discussion of late about suppression orders within courts and judges deciding that it is more important for proper judicial process to be observed, overriding the public's right to know up until a matter has been prosecuted when, I am sure, suppression orders can be varied.

The point is that, in this area where there is so much proliferation of media, judges are taking steps to ensure the proper process is observed and, when it comes to people taking footage and trying to prosecute their own case, the same sorts of protections should be in place. This is not about secrecy; this is not about a lack of transparency. This is about proper process and ensuring that the people who are best equipped to make the decision are able to make that decision before somebody's reputation is completely ruined.

Make no mistake: we hear from the government—and, certainly, we members of the opposition agree—that our food industry is one of the key fundamental drivers of how this state is going to recover and that is incongruous with those who would seek to shut down parts of that industry for their own political purposes. I am very happy to support this bill. I am very happy that it is here and I look forward to its speedy passage through this place and the other place, so that we can all be afforded the protection to be able to sunbake in whatever fashion we feel like in the privacy of our own homes and backyards.

Mr WHETSTONE (Chaffey) (11:16): I, too, rise to support the member for Heysen's summary offences amendment bill, put forward by a good local member who has concerns about regulations around drones. The technology of this new device really has put a new dimension on the way we view, use and monitor all aspects of recreation, business or science and how we use it for that competitive edge. I think it is critically important that drones and the technology move along, particularly in this modern-day society.

I note that across Australia there have been challenges in dealing with the laws surrounding the use of drones and the privacy issues they have created. In my electorate of Chaffey, covering the Riverland and Mallee, the use of drones in farming businesses is becoming more and more common. The new generation of farmworker is known as an unmanned aerial vehicle or drone. It is able to follow instructions precisely and I think that describes exactly where farming is going—precision farming, precision agriculture, precision use of technology.

Drones are a great tool for monitoring and keeping an eye on outcomes. They are being used particularly in broadacre crops where they can pick up salinity areas or areas that have been affected, particularly with trials. In today's modern world of food production, farmers are always looking for a competitive edge and they can use drones. Drones can cover significant distances, monitor and have significant input into better farm practice and, just as importantly, how farmers can actually make a dollar.

In today's world, it is becoming harder and harder, tougher and tougher, with seasonal variation—some might say climate change—and what we are hearing and seeing is that seasonal variation is having a huge bearing on seasonal outcomes, particularly in annual crops, which needs to be dealt with on a day-to-day basis. Some of these drones are capable of taking almost 3,000 photographs in a 90-minute flight. They are then processed, and that information and technology can be used in assessing all sorts of aspects, particularly improving efficiencies. That is the benefit of putting drones into dryland and other forms of farming.

Other examples that have been effectively used, particularly in my electorate, are from a professor at Adelaide University who is involved in an organisation using drones to monitor animals and forest activity. The group Conservation Drones have previously assessed orangutan population in illegally logged Asian forests and monitored national parks in other parts of the world. They are also conducting small trial projects, looking at vegetation of Mallee scrub following bushfires at Calperum Station just a few years ago.

They are also looking at some of the impacts that these bushfires are having, particularly on native fauna and flora. We have seen a couple of the Mallee fires as of late that have almost wiped out bird species, and these drones are a very cheap and effective way of going into those areas which have had bushfires and monitoring, because they are not intrusive when it comes to flying through these parks and forests, but they do have a very keen eye as a result of modern technology, cameras and the like.

I know that the Civil Aviation Safety Authority requires permission and certification for flying drones in a good, professional manner, so the professor said, but what it means is that the work that is conducted on this small scale really can overtake the technology that is being used, particularly in helicopters. Powerline inspection and fire monitoring are very expensive to do and to monitor. I know that obviously powerline or power pole insulator inspection is becoming more of a focus, particularly with insurance companies, because they have been responsible for starting many fires around the state.

For drones to be able to do the work that helicopters were doing is incredibly cost effective. It is saving money for insurance companies and the organisations that are responsible for that monitoring and, in turn, I would like to think that potentially those cost savings would be passed on to consumers: the power users and the landowners who obviously are footing the bill at the end of the line.

Obviously, we know that drones are being used for wild dog monitoring. Another example of the benefits of using drones was in the recent Riverland Dinghy Derby, which was a great event in the Riverland. The Dinghy Derby has now become a world-class event. It is of course dinghies, whether they are a standard format or modified format, that have a set route through the creeks and the water networks up above Renmark and the Riverland. It is now sponsored by Red Bull.

It is viewed right around the world by millions of people. This drone technology is widely used throughout that race because it is very hard to access and to have helicopters everywhere. They did bring up a number of helicopters, planes and huge infrastructure to promote the race. I think it is great for the Riverland, but it is also great for South Australia, giving it exposure to the world.

The purpose of the amendments to this bill is not intended to interfere with any of these examples I have just outlined, because there are also positive and beneficial uses for drones. These amendments do not target, for example, children being able to play with small remote-controlled helicopters which may have cameras attached.

At present, it seems there is no law in the state which prevents anyone from flying a remote-controlled drone up to the window of your home or over your backyard, filming whatever it can capture. We all know about the infamous nude sunbaker in the real estate advertisement. I think most people have viewed that with interest, but it was just something that does intrude on the privacy—

Members interjecting:

Mr WHETSTONE: It was a very nice piece of real estate. If these amendments are successful, it will be unlawful to fly a drone, with or without a camera or recording device attached, over any private property without the owner or occupier's permission. I note that a 2014 report was undertaken by the House of Representatives Standing Committee on Social Policy and Legal Affairs, entitled 'Eyes in the sky: Inquiry into drones and the regulation of air safety and privacy'.

The report highlighted the benefits of using the RPAs for agriculture and mining surveying, aerial photography, bushfire spotting, beach patrolling, sports webcam deployment, and search and rescue assistance to name a few. However, privacy concerns were raised, and obviously that is one of the issues that we are dealing with.

How many of us would want our neighbours deploying an RPA over our backyard while we are attending a family barbecue? There is nothing like having a drone keeping an eye on you while you are having a chop in the privacy of your own backyard. How many of us would like to see the team from our local newspaper or television station trying to get closer to the family during a private moment, particularly if it is a grieving process?

Obviously, there are many issues with drones in today's world. In particular, I think the privacy issue is the number one concern. We do need to move with the times and we do need to embrace modern technology, but there does need to be some form of compliance around a drone, the technology and the intrusion that it could pose to any individual. I support the bill.

Debate adjourned on motion of Hon. T.R. Kenyon.