BIRTHS, DEATHS AND MARRIAGES (CHANGE OF NAME) AMENDMENT BILL

Introduction and First Reading

The Hon. R.L. BROKENSHIRE (17:11): Obtained leave and introduced a bill for an act to amend the Births, Deaths and Marriages Registration Act 1996. Read a first time.

Second Reading

The Hon. R.L. BROKENSHIRE (17:11): I move:

That this bill be now read a second time.

Knowing that there is a full Notice Paper, I will be very brief and will not seek leave to conclude my remarks as this is a relatively simple reform. The bill is designed to ensure that where persons seek to change their name to avoid detection by the law, or if they are paedophiles or fraudsters who are trying to reinvent themselves for a new set of unsuspecting victims, it will be harder for them to do so.

Applicants for name change will need to declare that they have no previous serious criminal history and it will be an offence to make a false declaration. The police commissioner can also notify the Registrar of Births, Deaths and Marriages of any persons about whom he wants to be notified should they wish to change their name. Family First believes that this is a very workable measure in the present information age of data matching and sharing.

Concern about this issue has been around for a while worldwide with a paedophile in the United Kingdom evading police supervision via the sex offenders' register by changing his name via deed poll. I appreciate that, here in South Australia, we have a register that arguably covers this scenario, but we thought it would be a complementary measure to have provisions under the Births, Deaths and Marriages Act to support the register.

New South Wales police in July this year formed a memorandum of understanding with their office of births, deaths and marriages for this kind of arrangement, and I believe there might be moves afoot for a federal uniform regime to this effect. I do not think that is an excuse to wait. We often hear the Premier saying, 'We will just wait until it becomes national.' In the meantime, there are young people who could be at risk from paedophiles and other people who could be at risk from serious criminal offenders.

We have seen with payday lending how that process goes nowhere even though you have the same party in government from the Pacific to the Indian Ocean. They say they will look at that nationally and nothing happens. At the time of announcing this claim 'Australian first', New South Wales Premier (Hon. Nathan Rees) said:

The New South Wales Government has acted to ensure that criminals who try to change their name to escape their criminal past and evade police detection will not get away with it…The reforms mean that Police will have real-time access to the registry and will be instantly alerted whenever a convicted criminal or person of interest changes their name.

I add in conclusion that, in May, before the July New South Wales announcement, Family First senator Steve Fielding raised concern about this issue, and I believe that he is trying to do what he can from a federal level to close this name change loophole. I believe that this bill is a necessary and complementary measure to interstate—

Members interjecting:

The ACTING PRESIDENT (Hon. J.S.L. Dawkins): I remind members that the Hon. Mr Brokenshire has the floor. The level of conversation is getting a bit high.

The Hon. R.L. BROKENSHIRE: I believe this bill is a necessary and complementary measure to interstate and commonwealth moves to close a loophole in our legal system that favours criminals preying on the vulnerable. With those brief comments, I commend the bill to members and open it up to their scrutiny in coming months.

Debate adjourned on motion of Hon. J M. Gazzola.