Chris Hayes (Werriwa, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

It will probably not take many members in this House by surprise that I tend to speak a lot on law enforcement based legislation. That is partly because, prior to coming here, I had pretty extensive involvement with law enforcement through the Police Federation of Australia. And it probably has more than a little to do with the fact that my father was a police officer with the New South Wales police.

I have always been very passionate about ensuring that our police, those people who take on that brave role and protect our community, have the necessary tools and the necessary legislative support to ensure that they can do that role on our behalf. I acknowledge that many of the activities they participate in are often very dangerous. They experience things that we, thank God, never will, and they do that as part of their normal daily lives. They are prepared to take those risks on as part of their normal daily lives.

When it comes to the Crimes Legislation Amendment (Sexual Offences Against Children) Bill 2010 I have to say that I feel a bit perplexed about it. I say that—being a parent and now, happily, a grandparent of three—because this does not seem to reflect the society that we all grew up in. I know that is not quite the case; we all know that there were various issues in the deep past at various religious organisations and other happenings which occurred and which are now being reported. But I have to say that child sex offences are something that I just cannot understand. I cannot understand the motive and I cannot understand why this would be attractive for people to get involved with. However, I do understand from my police colleagues that this is something which is a scourge on our modern society.

It is something that is not dissipating and it is not something that police are able to detect in advance and protect children from at the moment—it is something that is highly reactive. I congratulate the member for Stirling and his recognition of the police, particularly the AFP and their High Tech Crime Centre, which I have had the opportunity to visit as a member of the parliamentary committee with oversight of the Australian Crime Commission. I see what those officers do, and I have to say that it is a job that I do not know how people do: to assume identities and to enter into conversations with such vile people. They do this to investigate to get convictions, obviously, but they do that very clearly with a view to try and protect children.

The Minister for Ageing, who is at the table, is a former Queensland police officer. It was only last year that the Queensland police were successful in conjunction with the Netherlands police, I think, in tracking down a very prolific child pornography gang. Not only did they do that, they were actually able to ensure the release of a little girl who was held by the perpetrators of those offences for about 18 months. That was a sterling bit of police work and it shows what happens when people of goodwill can get together. That is why we should actually support our police; it is not just what they do out on the roads and what they do in their more publicly recognised work, it is what they do in being able to achieve those sorts of results. It is something for which we are entirely indebted to them.

For those of us who are parents, there is nothing that we want more than to ensure that our kids are safe. It is not just for the younger members of parliament, who still have that pleasure ahead of them, but also for the people that we represent as members of parliament. When we talk about families we are actually talking about the nurturing qualities of a family that wants to bring their children up, go to their football matches, ensure that they get their proper education and go to university or go into the trades. From a grandparent’s point of view, and the relationship that I have with my kids, that it is a whole-of-life task. You never actually lose contact with your children and it continues in relation to your grandchildren.

We want the best for our young people coming up, and that is one of the reasons I find this such a difficult bill to speak on. It is a very easy bill to support, but we are reflecting on a society where we need these laws to deal with something in society now that strikes me as anathema to the society that I grew up in. Maybe we have been shielded from various things as we have grown up because of the love and care of our parents—that has had more impact on some more fortunate people in society than others—but one of the things that we just cannot do is simply allow society to take care of this itself. For far too long we have seen what we read in the history books, and what is occurring in some of those closeted religious areas.

One of the things that really brings this to a head for me is a 70-year-old bloke who is a member of the forgotten generation. He came down here for the Prime Minister’s apology not all that long ago. This bloke is from my electorate and he told me how he came here from England. He went to a facility in Perth and, regrettably for him, that is where he was first sexually assaulted. I suppose that these things have been in society for some time and have probably been kept in the back room and out of the public arena. But these are things that I think are so vile—that anybody exercising authority can actually use their standing over a child in such a way.

It is apparent to me that there is a growing sexualisation within society. Children are now exposed to more sexual imagery through advertising, mass media, television, magazines, gaming, the internet et cetera. In my opinion, with this increasingly sexualised culture comes a new danger for children and, clearly, challenges for parents. The sexual exploitation of children is distressing for the families involved and devastating for the victims, the children. It has such a far-reaching impact on those kids. That is why I mentioned my colleague from the electorate. He tells me that his stutter commenced when he was first assaulted in the orphanage in Perth when he was 17 years old, and he is still stuttering now. This man obviously has long-term issues as a result. That is an example of the dynamics of crimes of this nature perpetrated on children.

I was talking with the member for Hindmarsh, and one of the things that he and I are both involved in is White Ribbon Day—men standing up against violence against women and children. One of the things that we regularly quote is that one in three women will report domestic violence against them. Very importantly for this debate, one in five women over a generation is likely to be sexually assaulted. In my own situation—referring to my mother, my wife, my daughter and my two grand-daughters—that means that, within those three generations of women, one of them is likely to experience sexual assault. If everyone can personalise it in those terms, amongst our loved ones, they can see this is an extraordinary situation impacting on our society.

This bill is really about looking after kids and looking after their welfare. As I said earlier, it aims to strengthen the existing offence regime to reflect more appropriately the changed and ever-changing circumstances of sexual violence that we now see being perpetrated against children. Effectively what we are doing is ensuring that our laws keep pace with the rapidly changing technology.

I would like to take a little time now to speak about some of the details of the bill which I consider go a long way to providing additional protection for our children. Presently, the Commonwealth offences regime criminalises child sexual exploitation committed by Australians overseas—more commonly known as child sex tourism—and offences occurring through a carriage service such as the internet or mobile phones. This bill seeks to strengthen the existing child sex tourism offences regime by simplifying the structure of the existing offences, raising penalties and introducing several new offences, including one I believe is very important—that being a new aggravated offence where the offender is in a position of trust or where the child victim has a mental impairment.

The bill will also introduce new offences criminalising dealings in child pornography and child abuse material overseas, ensuring that Australians engaging in such behaviour outside Australia can be prosecuted in this country. I believe that these improvements will bring our approach to people committing these offences overseas in line with the way we approach those offences domestically in this country and ensure that Australians are subject to consistent sanctions whether those vile acts are perpetrated on children outside the country or within the bounds of our jurisdiction.

These proposed reforms are very much supported and advocated by the child protection agencies and organisations that work for the protection of children. As the minister indicated in his second reading speech, child protection organisations such as Save the Children and Child Wise, when consulted about these proposed reforms last year, both indicated that these changes would definitely strengthen our capacity to prosecute child sex offenders. Child Wise said that this would ‘see Australia again being a leader in international best practice in relation to legislation and policing of child sex tourism’. That is something we probably should not just hang our hat on, because we will be making more and more changes to this style of legislation as technology changes.

As I said, the intent of this legislation is to ensure that we can keep pace with changing technology and to ensure that people who are using technologies—for example, the internet—to perpetrate crimes against children not only can be policed but also can be brought to justice. Clearly, the internet is a wonderful instrument. It is a great way for kids to learn. In fact, we are in the process of a very significant rollout of computers across the nation. It is something that can impact on the learning skills of all our kids. However, whilst the internet is a great learning tool and it is fun, it also has the capacity to be used by others with less-than-good intentions.

Children learn from an early age how to use a computer. My grandson, Nathaniel, at age eight has far more computer skills now than I am ever likely to acquire. When I need things downloaded, he can certainly find his way around the net to get what I need. But he is eight years old, and the trouble with being so skilful at eight years old is that when their curiosity kicks in they can do just about everything. Unfortunately, there will always be somebody out there on the internet waiting to prey on children. That is what parents really have to guard against.

I have acknowledged the good role of the police in this regard. Having spent a bit of time with the police, particularly with the high tech crime operations unit in Canberra, and having seen how they work in conjunction with their state and territory colleagues, I applaud their work. I think their job is very difficult. Being a police officer is one of the few occupations where you get to see the best and the very, very worst aspects of society, and police need to take it all in their stride. Once again, I congratulate and applaud police officers for what they do in a raft of things, particularly for the way they are aggressively pursuing perpetrators of these crimes against children.

To combat these emerging opportunities presented by technological advances, the bill will introduce two new internet offences: raising penalties for internet child pornography and child abuse material offences, including through the introduction of a new aggravated offence directed at online child pornography networks; and new network offences of exposing children to indecent material and engaging in sexual activity with a child over the internet—in other words, actually using the internet as the vehicle for perpetrating the offence on the child. These necessary reforms will ensure that the regime is sufficiently strengthened to assist in prosecuting this modern day offending.

I encourage parents to remember the dangers of the internet. Through Minister Conroy’s portfolio, we have looked at internet filters. These are things that should not be left on the shelf until something occurs, after which parents make proper use of them. These are things that have been introduced for a very good reason. For parents, and people like me who are less than skilled on the computer, there is no excuse not to ensure a child—in our case, our grandson—only does on the computer what they have been allowed to do.

The bill introduces a suite of new offences directed at the use of the post service for child sex related activity such as the distribution of child pornography or grooming or procuring a child. Whilst we have concentrated on internet offences, regrettably snail mail is still being used as a vehicle for these crimes. These new offences will mirror the online offences and ensure that consistent treatment of offenders occurs whether the offence is by internet or the postal service. The bill also makes minor consequential amendments to several acts, including the Australian Crime Commission Act 2002 and the Crimes Act 1914, and will ensure that existing law enforcement powers are available to combat Commonwealth child sex offences, including new offences inserted by the bill.

Finally, the bill will introduce a new scheme to allow for forfeiture of pornography or child abuse material, or articles containing such material derived from or used in the commission of a Commonwealth child sex offence. Regrettably, whilst these offences take some time to proceed through the courts, it is only if there is a successful prosecution that the actual offending material is removed. Given the length of court time to secure convictions, I find it incredible that this material stays out there until a successful prosecution is obtained. The whole object of this bill is to protect children and prevent child abuse. This must always be a national priority. This piece of legislation is timely. It follows some horrific events of the last week in respect of young children. (Time expired)

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