Summary Offences and Sentencing Amendment Bill 2013 (VIC): Expanded Police Powers
Monday 17 February 2014 @ 9.33 a.m. | Crime
The Summary Offences and Sentencing Amendment Bill 2013 was introduced into the Legislative Assembly in Victoria on 11 December 2013, however, in the most recent sitting of Victorian Parliament, concerns have been raised by the Fitzroy Legal Centre about the impact of the Bill on personal rights to freedom of association.
The Purpose of the Bill
This Bill changes two areas of the law:
- It amends the Summary Offences Act 1966 to provide for additional circumstances in which police members and protective services officers (PSOs) may direct a person to move on from a public place and clarifies the operation of those powers. The Bill also creates a new move-on-related exclusion order scheme within the Summary Offences Act 1966. The scheme will permit police members to apply to a court for an exclusion order in circumstances where a person has repeatedly been directed to move on from a particular public place. The order would have the effect of banning that person from the specified public place for up to 12 months.
- The Bill also creates an alcohol exclusion order scheme within the Sentencing Act 1991. Under the scheme, a court must make an alcohol exclusion order where a person has been convicted of a relevant offence and the court is satisfied that the person was intoxicated at the time, and that the person's intoxication significantly contributed to the offending.
Reaction to the Bill
According to the Second Reading Speech,
"Move-on powers provide police and PSOs with a useful tool for safeguarding the peaceful enjoyment of public spaces by all, as well as defusing situations that threaten public order and safety. Police and PSOs are currently able to direct people to move on from public places for a range of reasons. These include where they reasonably suspect that a person is breaching or is likely to breach the peace, or is endangering or is likely to endanger the safety of another. The bill provides further grounds on which these powers may be used."
However, the briefing paper from the Fitzroy Legal Centre and related community organisations expresses concern that this is the "targeted removal of rights to engage in public assembly and political demonstration through the proposed laws."
In particular, the briefing paper outlined five criticisms of the new bill:
"1. These laws will lead to increased criminalisation and incarceration of drug users contrary to the central directives of the National Drug Strategy.
2. These laws will disproportionately affect marginalised young people, people experiencing homelessness, poverty, and mental health issues who occupy public spaces, both as a result of social choice and necessity
3. These laws erode fundamental premises of common law that protect the individual from arbitrary and unfettered exercises of power, and further, these laws purposively facilitate criminalisation of non-offenders/ by-pass the presumption of innocence to the point of incarceration.
4. These laws fail to support the police force of Victoria in maintaining internal accountability and external credibility in the exercise of power against individuals.
5. These laws will directly inhibit the work of community sector in supporting long term health, inclusion, social integration, and recovery objectives. In particular they will undermine harm reduction and community integration objectives of government funded health and community services."
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Sources:
Summary Offences and Sentencing Amendment Bill 2013 and associated secondary materials as published in TimeBase LawOne.
