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House of Assembly - Fifty-Second Parliament, Second Session (52-2)
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STATUTES AMENDMENT (SERIOUS FIREARM OFFENCES) BILL

Second Reading

Adjourned debate on second reading.

(Continued from 13 June 2012.)

Ms CHAPMAN (Bragg) (15:45): I rise to speak on the Statutes Amendment (Serious Firearm Offences) Bill 2012 and indicate that the opposition has foreshadowed an amendment. I note that the government has now tabled an amendment in almost the exact terms during the course of the morning, and I will have something to say about that shortly. However, in principle, the opposition is supporting this bill.

The government tabled this bill on 13 June 2012, and members will recall that this was shortly after there had been a very significant escalation of violence involving guns in metropolitan Adelaide. Having tabled the bill, the Attorney-General on that day made public his intention to progress this bill and that its effectiveness would be to combat firearm-related violence and disarm dangerous criminals, putting them behind bars. He also claimed, and I quote:

The bill also closes a legal gap that previously allowed offenders firing on an empty property to avoid a more serious penalty.

There was other rather flamboyant language by the Attorney-General as to how he was going to make sure that the reckless firing of shots into homes in the sort of drive-by reckless behaviour that had occurred in recent days would be dealt with, and again I will refer to that later. However, the Attorney-General was doing the whole Eliot Ness thing—'I'm going to get them'—to deal with the gun-toting people in the community as a result of those events.

The issue which becomes the substance of the amendment regarding the shooting of police officers, and in particular the proposal to make it an offence attracting a much higher maximum imprisonment penalty if convicted of attempting to shoot a police officer or even shooting at a police officer, is one which the government has, as I said, announced today.

What is interesting is that, if there is any consideration of where police are exposed to the risk of someone discharging a firearm that attracts this, one does wonder why it has taken over two years for the government to act, particularly when one of the most horrific cases of police officers being attacked occurred a couple of years ago. It does raise some very serious concerns. I am not sure who was the minister for police at the time. I know we have another Minister for Police now, and in all the time I have been here with her as minister I have not heard her mention this case at all.

Members will recall that when two Salisbury police officers, Nathan Mulholland and Tung Tran, were on patrol, they were shot when they attended at a dwelling in response to an alleged domestic violence event. A Mr Daniel Van Setten was under consideration for attempted murder charges but, as we know, they did not proceed. He never faced charges for attempted murder, and there was generally a public outcry, but certainly amongst the police community the fact that two of their own could be shot at and injured so appallingly in these circumstances, and not be able to have some appropriate redress, outraged them, not surprisingly. So, it does raise this question about why the government has taken so long to come to the realisation that police, in the course of their duties, should be properly protected.

The Hon. M.J. Atkinson: If we'd brought it in earlier you would have said we were rushing it, a knee-jerk reaction.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: The member for Croydon!

Ms CHAPMAN: Well, of course, I was not going to respond. The issue of gun violence was raised in the context of this announcement of the new bill. The government used a number of statistics to assert also that the courts were being lenient on firearm offences and many firearm offences were committed while the offender was on conditional liberty, that is, parole, bail, released on licence or subject to a suspended sentence. The figures used by the Attorney do not allow for the seriousness of the offence, nor do they detail firearm offences as a proportion of total offending. In any event, the government claims that this legislation will deal with the serious firearm offences with a view to protecting the public while not unreasonably interfering with the law abiding.

The opposition shadow attorney, the Hon. Stephen Wade, has outlined a number of aspects of this legislation which I wish to place on the record because they put in context what we have now, what we need and how effective this legislative answer is likely to be. First, on the question of conditional liberty, the Criminal Law Sentencing Act 1988 and other applicable legislation would be amended so that prohibition, parole, bail, release on licence and suspended sentences contained mandatory conditions prohibiting the possession of any firearm or ammunition and subjecting the person to random testing on gunshot residue.

These conditions can be excluded or modified by the release authority if there are cogent reasons to do so. Cogent reasons have been described as reasons which are compelling, convincing and powerful. There are no examples given to illustrate what would amount to cogent reasons. I will be asking the Attorney during committee—as he will have an opportunity to provide this, at least overnight—that we have some particulars provided on that aspect.

The general sentencing reform: section 10 of the Criminal Law (Sentencing) Act 1988 would be amended by the bill to provide that, in sentencing for firearm offences, the primary aim is to emphasise public safety and specific and general deterrence. There is certainly an element in relation to that that is, I think, a reflection on the judges at present, with the implication that they are failing to adequately take that into account in their sentencing. I will come back to the particular statistics that are used in a moment.

Then there is the serious firearms offender. The bill proposes to amend the Criminal Law (Sentencing) Act 1988 to provide a new sentencing category of serious firearm offender. Bear in mind that it is the government's intention here with this legislation to insist that there be serious gaol time that applies to someone who is a serious gun offender. So, they are wanting to look at a particular class of offender which should attract the most serious penalty and, in this instance, to have an aspect of the penalty which would require that there be a period of imprisonment.

So, firstly, an offender will be deemed to be a serious firearms offender if they commit a serious firearms offence. One is the focus on the firearm—an offence against the Criminal Law Consolidation Act 1935 or the Firearms Act 1977. The offence involves the use or carriage of a firearm against those acts if that firearm is an automatic firearm, a prescribed firearm, a handgun when the user is unlicensed to use that handgun and/or the handgun is not registered to the user.

There is also the focus on organised crime. There is to be an offence against the Criminal Law Consolidation Act 1935 or the Firearms Act 1977 involving the use or possession of a firearm and committed while subject to a control order under the Serious and Organised Crime (Control) Act 2008, where an offence was committed for the benefit of or in association with a criminal organisation or while subject to a firearms prohibition order.

Then we have a focus on drug offences. There is to be an offence against the Criminal Law Consolidation Act 1935 or the Firearms Act 1977 involving the use or possession of a firearm if the use or possession occurred in the course of the commission of a serious drug offence.

Then there is the focus on conditional liberty. There is to be an offence against the Firearms Act 1977 while on conditional liberty if a condition of that liberty was not to possess a firearm. So, those are really the sort of parameters by which a serious firearms offender is identified and under which they would attract this higher penalty.

Certainly, from the stakeholders' point of view, including the Law Society in South Australia, it would be their preference that the status of being a serious firearms offender be more closely linked to the seriousness of the offence rather than the focus on the particular aspects of, as I have said, firearm, organised crime, drug offence or conditional liberty. Really, we should be looking at the seriousness of the behaviour and contravention rather than by a particular subject matter.

It is also important to note that there has been some national attempt to deal with firearms in Australia. I am sure every member in this house will remember the travesty that occurred in the early 1990s when a gunman let loose on members of the public down at Port Arthur in Tasmania and lives and families were ripped apart in one of Australia's worst massacres. One does not need to dwell on the particulars of that case. It shocked Australians that there would be such a level of violence indiscriminately perpetrated against women, children, families and so on. It was just incomprehensible. There was a public outcry and I think an outpouring of commitment—including from the then prime minister John Howard—that, as a result, there would be a reining in of guns and access to them, particularly automatic and semiautomatic weapons.

It was a very confronting period, I think, in Australian politics and in the community. There was public outcry in some of the regional parts of Australia, particularly targeted against the then prime minister because of his commitment to arrest the exposure of vulnerable people by implementing a national gun buyback, but he remained committed to it. I am one on the Liberal side of politics who not always agreed with the then prime minister, and I do not shy away from that, but on this issue I have before and I will again today commend him for his commitment to the safety of vulnerable people in our community, particularly women and children, by his absolute dedication to following this through in the face of hateful and quite vile reaction at public forums during the mid 1990s when he attempted to introduce this reform.

It was the aspiration of the government of the day to have a low firearms community, and that is why in general with this bill the opposition is supportive of the measures that are to be implemented. Now, whether it actually achieves all that it aspires to do is yet to be seen, because introducing new offences and penalties does not necessarily deal with the broader picture. Given that a condition not to possess a firearm will become a mandatory condition of conditional liberty and the presence of such a condition does not suggest a history of firearms misuse, and whilst we have reservations as to making it an offence specifically under the Firearms Act 1997 while on conditional liberty, we otherwise support the intent of the bill.

I come to the use of the data that the government appears to rely on, I suppose, to try to satisfy the parliament that there seems to have been some statistical data to assert that the courts are lenient on firearm offenders. There is an interesting paper that was prepared by the Australian government's Australian Institute of Criminology entitled 'Court outcomes for firearm offences in Australia'. It appears to have been published in 2008 by the Australian Institute of Criminology.

The General Manager of Research at the Australian Institute of Criminology, Judy Putt, has apparently been the principal researcher in dealing with this information, which is a report that helps us understand what firearm offences we have, to some degree how effective they are when they are traced through and what actually happens with them. In short, although this data that they use for the purposes of identifying what happens with these offences is now six or seven years old, there is some interesting information that comes from it. I will read from what Ms Putt says. I do not mean to be disrespectful but I do not know whether she has any professorship or doctorate, so I will just refer to her as Ms Putt. She says:

Unauthorised or otherwise illegal possession, including carriage and use, was the most common offence prosecuted, followed by offences relating to improper safekeeping and storage of firearms.

When we come to the actual detail on page 18 of this report, on the type of firearms or weapons offences brought before the courts, over four in 10 (that is 44 per cent) of firearms offences charged in South Australia related to possession and almost one-third related to safety storage offences. The firearms usage offences such as carrying or discharging a firearm accounted for 18 per cent of all firearms charges. About a third of them, in fact, related to the question of storage.

Members would know—I am sure, particularly country members would know—that there are a whole lot of very important but detailed obligations in relation to storage of firearms for those who have a licence to have a firearm. They have very clear obligations as to how they are to be stored. You cannot just have a firearm and store it under the bed, or whatever. Usually it has to be in a locked facility. I am sure some members here in this house are very familiar with what these rules are.

I am not but, obviously, coming from a country upbringing, I can say from my own observations that the use and storage of this type of weaponry has very much changed over the years. A gun sitting behind the back door of the office is clearly no longer tolerated and, as I understand it, there are very clear rules about separating the ammunition from the weapon, and so on. There may even be some obligations as to where the bolt has to be kept. I do not know: I am not an expert on that. I am sure the member for Finniss will give us some information about that.

What I do know is that the rules have been tightened (and this is very important), not the least of which is not just the ready access to weaponry that might be accidentally found by a child who might discharge the firearm and cause a fatality or serious injury but, also, from the domestic protection laws that we have developed over the last few decades, it was very clear that weapons were sometimes used even in domestic circumstances to frighten people.

If a gun was readily accessible—behind the office door or under the bed—the presentation of a weapon, that is, the pulling out of this weapon and brandishing it, even without discharging it but just pointing it at somebody, was clearly enough to terrorise people. This was unacceptable conduct. I think (and I think in a good way) the obligation to secure a weapon meant limiting the opportunity to go and grab a weapon quickly and brandish it in some way to intimidate somebody into silence or submission or to comply with demands, and that is something that I certainly welcome and I think other members of the house would agree.

There is a fairly high threshold of obligation and lots of rules surrounding it, so it is important to understand that when we are talking about the government's assertion that there has been some leniency by the courts in relation to firearm offences, a third of them can relate to simple things such as storage. So, there may be no attempt to harm anybody or use them in any improper way, but simply having the bullets in the wrong place with a firearm in its vessel, which had not been properly secured—these are the sorts of things that have attracted a third of these offences.

Before the government starts brandishing statistics, they should be much more disciplined and clear about the data that they are relying on so that they do not in any way mislead the public or leave them (even inadvertently) with the impression that there is a whole lot of these offences out there and the courts are not being tough enough on them. I think if it was inadvertent, it is still recklessly irresponsible, and if it was deliberate, it is unacceptable. The Attorney-General can indicate his views on that in due course.

If a person who is classified as a serious firearms offender is convicted of a serious firearms offence, including the one that gave them that status, the sentence must involve an immediate sentence of imprisonment. This can only be varied if the sentencing court is satisfied that exceptional circumstances exist and that they outweigh the primacy of public safety and personal and general deterrence. Here is where we start to unravel how effective this is going to be. Whilst the Attorney has been quite prescriptive in this bill to insist that there be certain obligations (that there have to be assessments identifying public and personal safety and general deterrence as the primary factors to be considered here now), there seems to be a complete failure to identify what that sentence of imprisonment is to be.

We all know that trying to be too prescriptive in mandatory sentencing sometimes raises all sorts of questions; for example, if you remove the discretion from the sentencing judge too much, you can end up with circumstances where people can be imprisoned. A common one that was used when mandatory sentencing was first touted was that people could have a shoplifting offence and, whilst that can carry up to an eight-year penalty (or it did at the time), somebody could be imprisoned for years under mandatory sentencing for stealing a loaf of bread. We have to ensure that we protect against the ridiculous and what would be clearly unacceptable.

What has happened here is that the tough mantra of the Attorney has demanded that there be imprisonment, there would have to be a serious gaol term, to use his description in his press release of 13 June, and yet it seems on the face of it that, as long as the person has been in gaol for a day, it actually qualifies in the legislation. We need some guidance from the Attorney-General as to how he expects this will operate and what real standard will be imposed as a result of it. It seems to me that he wants to look tough, but when it comes to the actual particulars the reality is that the period of imprisonment can be very short. It is more than likely to have been covered even by the time spent in the watch house, before coming out after arrest, which may qualify so that it would not translate into serious gaol time.

The courts have described 'exceptional circumstances' as being circumstances which form an exception, which is out of the ordinary course, or unusual, or special, or uncommon. It 'need not be unique, or unprecedented, or very rare; but it cannot be...regularly, or routinely, or normally encountered.' The shadow attorney has kindly provided me with a copy of R v Kelly (Edward) (2000 QB 198). Although this bill was scheduled to be debated tomorrow, I am happy to advance it as much as we can today. As a result, I have not had an opportunity to read that decision, but it may provide us with some extra guidance.

I think it is important that we have an understanding about what the exceptional circumstances are that we are talking about, and often the best way to do that is by example. Again, I would ask the Attorney to provide us with some clarity on that. From a layman's point of view, one's understanding of the definition of these words can be very diverse but, from a legal point of view, I think it is important that we as legislators give guidance in the legislation as clearly as possible to the judiciary; after all, we expect that they will be implementing it.

On the general debate on mandatory sentencing, whilst there are a lot of flaws in reducing the discretion of the sentencing judge, because there is no time limit on this I do not think that this bill can attract the same arguments against it as a mandatory sentencing bill because, as I say, the imprisonment here could just be a fleeting incarceration. The bill also creates a presumption against bail for those charged with a serious firearms offence. If bail is granted, conditions prohibit the person from possessing any firearm, part of a firearm or any ammunition, and random testing for gunshot residue will be imposed. The bail authority has the discretion to waive these conditions if it has cogent reasons to do so and if there is no undue risk to the safety of the public. This is another area where we need to have some understanding from the Attorney as to what would suffice as a cogent reason.

I am sure members who represent our country regions understand the importance of being able to use firearms; many of them have them for the purpose of managing livestock, vermin, feral pests and the like. I come from an area where I think the most dangerous thing is a blue-ringed octopus or a red-back spider, and you do not really need a gun to deal with those. We do not even have any foxes or rabbits. However, there are parts of South Australia that do have to protect themselves against certain animals and even birds.

I notice that in the National Parks and Wildlife Act magpies and snakes are protected species. In fact, there is a specific provision in the National Parks and Wildlife Act that you are not allowed to shoot, kill or even harm a snake or a magpie unless you are under threat. I have never asked a snake whether he or she considers that I should be fearful of them and that they are likely to strike. Their very presence is enough to make me think that my life is in danger.

The DEPUTY SPEAKER: The snake may think the same thing.

Ms CHAPMAN: Indeed it might, and it might be more frightened of me. Snakes and magpies have a very special area of protection—unlike crows I might mention, which are not a protected species. A crow is a common bird that has absolutely no protection whatsoever, but I am getting a little distracted.

My point is that in some regions in South Australia it is important to be able to use a firearm to humanely dispose of a predator. From my own experience, I think it is more likely that creatures sometimes get into trouble. For example, stock, animals, cats or dogs might get caught in a fence, stuck in a creek or be in a very desperate circumstance and it is important, as quickly as possible, to humanely kill them. In that instance, I think it is important that someone who might be a local farmer or a person who is a Parks and Wildlife officer, or someone who might be committed to ensuring that an animal is put out of its suffering and misery that a firearm and shooting that animal is the most humane thing to do—and as quickly as possible.

So, there would be circumstances, clearly, where a judge may need to consider that the use of a firearm in general livestock management or vermin control would be used. I do not know whether it should apply or whether it is the intention of the Attorney that it should apply. A cogent reason is to enable someone who might be otherwise caught by this who is on bail who should still be able to use a firearm for shooting in a rifle range. They might be someone who is caught up in this type of circumstance—it is a serious offence. They may be a serious gun offender or they may be on bail. They may well be training for a squad in the Olympics. I simply make the point that there needs to be some guidance from the Attorney as to how this is going to apply.

One aspect, though, that does concern us—and it is consistent with lots of things the government seems to bring to this parliament—is that the new Attorney seems to be following the same pattern as the old one, and that is that it seems they always want to make a law for which there is no appeal or review. I do not know what kind of planet of justice they have existed on, but I do know that one of the best ways in which you can protect people against the abuse of a person or persons who is in power, whether they are a legislator, police officer or judge, is to ensure that the decisions that people have made, whether it is at executive level or judicial level, is reviewable—that people know that they have a process where they can seek relief, review or appeal. They may have to pay costly expenses if they fail in doing that, but at least they have a remedy available to them which they can pursue.

It is a very important instrument in ensuring that the mischief that a person in power may be attracted to is minimised and therefore the risk to the member of the public is reduced. The bail authority's direction to the alleged offender to surrender their firearms not being reviewable is a concern of the opposition. The Hon. Stephen Wade has taken advice from the Law Society on this matter as well.

In relation to serious repeat offenders, under the Criminal Law Sentencing Act 1988, a sentence of a serious repeat offender need not be proportional and any nonparole period needs to be four-fifths the length of the sentence. A person can be a serious repeat offender only by discretionary declaration of a court after two or three relevant offences.

On the other hand, the bill increases the scope of relevant offences (for example, home invasion and firearms offences) and removes the discretion of the court in the declaration. The bill allows the court not to sentence the offender as a serious repeat offender if it is satisfied by evidence on oath that the personal circumstance of the offender is sufficiently exceptional to outweigh considerations of public safety and it is not appropriate in all the circumstances the offender be sentenced on the basis of a declaration.

This also raises the question of what has been the experience in respect of declarations of serious repeat offenders under the current act. I do not know how many there have been. I think the Attorney should (and I will ask him to do so) advise the house as to any declarations that have already been made and in what circumstances and, if not, why not. The changes in this bill perhaps reflect a hope by the government that allowing judges to opt out of sentencing a declared person in a prescribed way is more likely to have an impact than expecting them to opt in. I do not know what the intention of the government is there, but I think it needs to tell us.

The government also cites an increase in drive-by shootings and the difficulty for SA Police to prosecute shooters appropriately for such reckless and dangerous behaviour if no-one was home at the time of that drive-by shooting. SA Police has argued that it cannot prosecute an offender for endangering life if no-one was at home or if no life was, in fact, endangered. The only other serious charge available is the use of firearms under section 51 of the Summary Offences Act 1953, which has a maximum penalty of only two years' imprisonment or a $10,000 fine.

The government asserts that a maximum term of two years' imprisonment is not serious enough for an offence involving firearms. To overcome this deficiency, as the government suggests, it has created two new categories of offence. One deals with missiles and remains in the Summary Offences Act 1953, and then the Criminal Law Consolidation Act 1935 as amended, to deal with the discharge of firearms without lawful excuse. The new offences distinguish between intentional and reckless discharges aimed at persons and property.

I think that, generally, with the drive-by shootings that have been experienced only a short time ago, my recollection is that in the drive past bullet holes had careered into the front wall of the house. Apparently no-one had been in the property at the time, but there is the fear invoked as result of this behaviour. Let us assume there are several options here. One is that the offender had presumed someone they wanted to frighten or harm was in the property and they discharged the firearm to try to hurt them; another alternative is that they thought they might be there and it was a risk they were prepared to take.

The third alternative is that they did not think they were in the property, or that there was anyone who would be at risk in the property at the time, but the whole exercise in setting off the firearm and bullet holes through someone's house was to warn the occupiers of that property, when they found out there been a shooting into the premises, that they would in some way be terrified by that and would, presumably, comply with whatever the whole exercise was about.

Another group of people who are in the area of risk, and I think the public understands this; are the neighbours and other people in the precinct. They are terrified. They hear what they believe to be gunshots, cars squealing their wheels leaving a property, etc., and of course this is highly disruptive and intimidating to those who live in the precinct. Even for those who do not hear it or observe it but who learn later that one of their neighbour's houses has been shot up, it is obviously enough to instil considerable fear. In all those circumstances, the public says it is not acceptable.

There are probably some in the community who would say that a two-year term of imprisonment for doing that recklessly, even though they do not hurt anyone, is possibly enough. I am in a group that suggests it probably should be higher than that, although there would be some in the community who think is enough. In any event, the government is acting on this and we are supporting it.

Next there is this issue of what happened two years ago in May 2010, when two Salisbury police officers responded to a domestic violence complaint early one morning. When they arrived—this was published at the time, and subsequently there was a rather grotesque description of events in the Police Journal of October 2011 under the title 'Lured, shot and left with the scars'—it was a case of Nathan Mulholland, aged 25, and Tung Tran, 22 years of age, being, as was clearly identified by the person discharging the firearm, set up.

In fact, it is claimed that Daniel Van Setten had said to the two officers when they arrived, 'You've been set up', and then shot them through the screen of the front door with a semiautomatic rifle. Mr Mulholland received shrapnel wounds to the head and hand which required surgery. Mr Tran endured multiple shrapnel wounds to his right cornea, right forearm, left upper arm and chest and apparently still has the legacy of two metal fragments remaining in his eye.

The outrage at the time came as the result of Van Setten's charge, which had originally been that of attempted murder, being downgraded by the DPP, and the offender Mr Van Setten pleading guilty to lesser charges of aggravated acts to endanger life, aggravated recklessly causing harm and possession of a prescribed firearm, and he was sentenced to nine years gaol. There was, again, a general concern about the two extremes of what would be an adequate penalty in such a circumstance.

The Police Association which, as we know, is the police union and representative of a very large number of police officers, considered that there should be an intermediate offence between the acts of endangering life (which is the basic 15 years, or aggravated, 18 years) and the life sentence which can apply across to attempted murder convictions.

The opposition felt very strongly that police officers are in a very special and unique situation. The papers and media outlets frequently tell us of occasions when people, in the course of their duty, are exposed to violence and risk to life or limb. We hear about nurses and people in hospitals who are, in the course of their duty, trying to assist people, especially in emergency departments, people who might be under the influence of drugs or alcohol who lash out and may cause very considerable harm either to people working in the industry and trying to help them, or other patients, children and other vulnerable people around them.

We hear about ambulance drivers who, similarly, might attend somebody at the scene of an accident, dealing with people who are injured, dealing with people who are sick, dealing with people who have a mental health problem, dealing with the distraught relatives at the scene, all those types of circumstances where there can be an escalation of activity that results in an ambulance officer being wounded, assaulted or worse.

So we have that situation. We also have under aggravated offences people who not by profession but by their age or frailty are much more vulnerable to being at risk. Previous to the aggravated offences being introduced, there was always the capacity for a sentencing judge under the legislation, I suppose, to deal more harshly with an offender if the victim was someone who was in a much more vulnerable capacity, usually someone who was very young, very old or suffered some disability. It was more heinous to use, abuse, offend or in some way attempt to harm someone in those circumstances than an able-bodied person—a bit like 'pick on someone your own size'.

There is also the matter of a position of trust (for example, teacher and student, etc.) where there is a higher level of obligation not just to protect but, obviously, to abstain from hurting the victim, and that the sentence should reflect that. However, when this parliament looked at aggravation it set down, in a statutory way, a number of different categories that should attract a higher penalty. So we have the aggravated system as it is, but while all these people may be more vulnerable than the ordinary person in the street who might go to work—I have to say that as a member of parliament in Australia I have certainly never been assaulted by a constituent or another party in any political environment, and that is something we enjoy, as long as we can speak freely and we have parliamentary privilege in this house. We are fortunate in Australia to have the capacity to be able to be legislators without guards and so on. Quite often we see our own Premier and Prime Minister without the security guards we see in every other country in the world.

I make the point that there are many of us in the community who are not actually exposed to that same risk, but the two groups in the community which I think have a very special consideration are those in our armed forces, who obviously are paid for and instructed to go into a circumstance in the knowledge that there is every likelihood that they will be wounded or, worse, killed—and they have a job to do, they do it on our behalf, and we recognise them for that.

The second group is police officers, the men and women who do not have a choice when it comes to their responsibility to attend a scene where somebody may be a victim, particularly in domestic violence situations where people's behaviour may well be out of character but highly volatile which can place the police officers in a very precarious situation. Also, police officers are called upon to attend scenes where someone has a mental ill health issue and where ambulance officers and health professionals who are not trained are simply not able to manage the patient; therefore, police officers are brought in. In the circumstance where police officers are sent to the front line, which is an obligation they have, then it is the opposition's view that they are a special category above all other citizens and should have protection.

One way of doing that is to send a message that to shoot at a law enforcement officer, a police officer, should attract an even higher penalty. Today the shadow minister, the Hon. Stephen Wade, announced that the opposition would be moving to increase protection for South Australian police to make it an offence to shoot at a law enforcement officer with a basic penalty of 25 years for intending to injure and 10 years for intending to harm. I had been puzzled as to why, two years after the police had clearly publicly called upon the government to give some extra protection in these circumstances, particularly post the Mulholland and Tran case, there had not been any action by the government (and certainly no action coming into this chamber) to provide any extra protection and, in this instance, to increase the penalty.

I cannot think of any possible offence that has not come under eye of the government where their answer to a criminal behaviour has been to increase sentencing and where they have not gone ahead and done it, and they have done it very promptly. Sometimes it has been without any dent as a result on the incidence of the offence. They have been quick to act, but in this instance where two police officers were gunned down at a home they were called out to, there has been no action taken. I find that extraordinary.

Only today, after the opposition indicated that it would be seeking this legislative reform and that this new offence was to be announced—only then did we have tabled in this house an amendment of the Attorney-General indicating that he will be doing exactly as the opposition had called for and had foreshadowed in its own amendment. We are not complaining that the government is agreeing to do this. It seems rather churlish that it should do it two years after a very serious event. It is not as though the government had not had regular communication with the Police Association and the police commissioner.

I can recall coming in here more recently on amendments to the Correctional Services Act in which the Minister for Police and Minister for Correctional Services, minister Rankine, had outlined how she had had regular consultations with the police commissioner and that there were various amendments requested by him and that this was going to be necessary for the proper protection of the community in dealing with parolees and blah, blah, blah, blah. You would think that they were joined at the hip and that there was a direct line of communication between minister Rankine and the police commissioner which she was implementing.

When that was supported by the Police Association as well—as something that was a necessary reform for the advancement or protection or proper resourcing, for example, or preparation for the police officers—they were in here like a flash. I still do not understand why she is suddenly completely absent from this and the Attorney-General just seems to have gone along for the last two years without any action at all.

Interestingly, our shadow attorney has, of course, in consulting with stakeholders, sought the advice of the Police Association. They had apparently raised this issue and it was something we thought had merit and should be followed through, but only when finally we do it does the Attorney-General suddenly jump into gear and decide that he is going to do it.

I suppose he can come back to the house and tell us why he and/or his colleague the Minister for Police have done nothing about this for two years, but it does seem to be very odd, given the preparedness to comply with police officers' requests on many other pieces of legislation which I have personally dealt with and which I know other members have spoken on. I look forward to hearing that explanation.

I will say this, and I mention it because I recently wrote to the then deputy commissioner, now police commissioner, Mr Gary Burns to recognise his appointment and to congratulate him and of course wish him every good wish, if you can do that, as a police commissioner—it is a very hard job. We certainly, I think, need to support each arm of law enforcement in this state, and the police commissioner and his army of men and women are a very important part of that.

We have some other areas of law enforcement. Obviously part of it is our role as legislators; we have the judiciary; we have the DPP, which is independent of these other agencies; and we all have our job to do. Of course you have the legal profession, and they have their job to do. We all really need to live in respectful harmony, so I make the point that, although the opposition strongly endorses the Police Association's request for some proper recognition of shootings of officers, which has now transpired in this amendment tabled by the government, we do not always agree with everything the Police Association says.

I can remember a month or so ago when I wrote to the new commissioner, I alerted him to a concern I had about a statement by Mr Mark Carroll of the Police Association in which he was openly critical of the decision of the DPP to proceed with a charge against a police officer in respect to an alleged assault against someone else. As I have said to the new police commissioner, it is not for me to have any say or view on whether the police officer was guilty or not, or should or should not have been charged. The reality is though, that each of these agencies have an important role. I think it is very important that the agencies have respect for the different roles that each play.

I hasten to add, as I did in the correspondence, that the police commissioner is not responsible for the Police Association, they are two different organisations. I simply make the point that it is important that mutual respect is maintained. When any agency presents with a legal reform that would benefit the community of South Australia then I am very happy to urge my party to support that reform, but when they go too far or they act in a manner which is inconsistent with that respectful, mutual recognition of other agencies, then they will incur my wrath.

Mr Carroll knows that. He and I had correspondence when there was an occasion of a totally inappropriate police search of a female person held in interim custody. I made it quite clear that if it happened again I would make a public statement condemning that sort of behaviour. I am pleased to see that the police have now exercised some new protocols to make sure that, hopefully, that sort of behaviour (the stripping down and leaving naked of somebody who is in custody) does not happen again. It is important that that be maintained. With those words, I look forward to having some of those questions answered by the Attorney and I will listen with interest to other members' contributions to the debate.

Debate adjourned on motion of Hon. G. Portolesi.

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