Jason Wood (La Trobe, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I am speaking in continuation on the Crimes Legislation Amendment (Powers Offences and Other Measures) Bill 2015.

I was cut off before when I was talking about the government looking at undertaking a study of automatic number-plate-recognition systems at airports and wharfs. As a law enforcement tool, this is exceptionally valuable. In the days when I was with the counterterrorism squad we looked at what the UK were doing, and automatic number plate recognition was exceptionally effective at giving a very quick time response to police with regard to car registration. Obviously, cars are registered, so within a quick time the police, if they were looking at a vehicle or the whereabouts—as it used to be called—of a vehicle, could be alerted and immediately they could dispatch someone to go and intercept the vehicle.

It is the same for basic traffic offences. It allows the police to know, for example, whether the person may have had their licence suspended or if the owner of that vehicle may have warrants out for their arrest. It is amazing how many times police get information from this—especially when we look at the area of counterterrorism and organised crime groups. Obviously, around airports and wharfs the customs officers are the gatekeepers to Australia.

As discussed before, fighting organised crime redirected $64 million to the anti-gangs squad. As I said before, the partnerships between state, territory and law enforcement agencies are so vital. I think it is important to highlight that not only are we working on trafficking and organised crime but we are also addressing the issue often at the forefront of the community's focus—that is, the safety of our streets. That is the commitment we took to implement tougher penalties on gun-related crime. I very much thank Victoria Police and Inspector Ian Campbell from the Echo Taskforce, who invited me to a national anti-gangs task force forum earlier this year. It had representation from not only Victoria Police and state and territory police from all around the country but also they had experts flown in from Canada and America. They even had a former Hell's Angel there, a colourful character.

What was interesting about the forum was twofold. First of all, it was brought to my attention that firearms are a huge issue. At the moment Victoria Police, basically every night, are intercepting cars and finding firearms in those cars. So the laws at the moment are not working. We need to make much tougher laws. Interestingly, most of the firearms they are finding are coming from abandoned farmhouses. Obviously, farmers have a legitimate reason for a licence. The problem is that organised crime have realised that, if the farmers are not there, those farm properties, those households, are easy targets. So we might need to look at tightening up the laws in regard to that.

The second issue of interest when I was talking to Victoria Police who work in the area of outlaw motorcycle gangs is that—and, as I said, I was heavily involved in putting the policy together for the National Anti-Gangs Squad—in Victoria we are finding that outlaw motorcycle gangs are growing. One of the reasons for this, even though we see arrests on TV every night or read reports about that, those gangs are still, sadly, attracting a lot of people, who think, 'This is what I want to get involved in.' Bikies go to gyms and they target what we used to call the gym junkies there. Sadly, they are also targeting service members who have returned from Iraq and Afghanistan, trying to lure them into organised crime. I will talk a bit later on about what Queensland is doing, because I really believe that the state of Queensland and its police force are now leading the way in how to deal with outlaw motorcycle gang members.

According to ABS data released on 26 June 2014, the statistics for firearms related crime are that, in 2013, New South Wales had 533 offences; Victoria, 138; Tassie, 17; South Australia, 44; Western Australia, 100; the Northern Territory, three; Queensland, 195; and the ACT, four. Nationally, that is a total of 1,034 firearms related offences in one year alone, and I would say those would have increased. Of those, 54 were murders, or homicides; 56 were attempted homicides; 23 involved sexual assault crimes; 43 were kidnappings, or abductions—and there has been a huge increase when it comes to kidnapping. During my time in the police force, there was rarely a kidnapping, but these days, I know from Victoria Police, there is some sort of kidnapping occurring almost every night. Lastly, of those firearm related offences, 886 were robberies.

Clearly, this is a problem for our nation that current legislation is not addressing, and it only seems to be getting worse. We just have to look at our TV screens every night to know that. We need to address the scourge that firearms have brought to our streets. The rash of thefts, kidnappings, sexual assaults and murders or attempted murders by those with access to firearms cannot continue in this way, and we need to come down heavily on those involved.

This bill will introduce mandatory minimum sentences of five years imprisonment for offenders charged with trafficking of firearms or firearm parts, under the Criminal Code Acts 1995—and it is sad that the opposition are not supporting this. These mandatory minimum sentences demonstrate how serious a threat guns are to the safety of all Australians and also sends a strong message that gun related crime and violence will not be tolerated in our society.

Having a history in policing I understand that it can also be dangerous to implement legislation without proper consideration of the safeguards that may be required in different circumstances. To ensure we take those into consideration, this legislation does not include specified nonparole periods, it does not apply to minors and it provides courts with the discretion to set custodial periods consistent with the particular circumstances of the offender and the offence for minors.

As I was saying before, the situation with outlaw motorcycle groups is that they are pretty much going south. They are leaving Queensland and coming to Victoria. Even though there have been record numbers of arrests and drug seizures, sadly, we are seeing more bikie clubhouses opening up. Something else needs to occur for us to, basically, win in this space. That is where I believe the Queensland law enforcement agencies have got this right.

I had the great pleasure of meeting a number of police in Queensland when I visited there recently, including Senior Sergeant Mark Morrish and Inspector Shane Holmes. At a different level, to talk about counter-terrorism, I also met Assistant Commissioner Peter Crawford, head of Intelligence, Counter-Terrorism and Major Events; Detective Superintendent Darryl Johnson, head of security operations; and other law enforcement members.

In Queensland—for anyone who has been tracking outlaw motorcycle gangs—the Gold Coast is where they were hanging out the most. They basically set up shop there and took control of the nightclubs and the drugs. They were bad for business and they destroyed young lives. The former LNP state government had the position that they were really going to take on the outlaw motorcycle gangs with their criminal law amendment act.

The Criminal Law (Criminal Organisations Disruption) Amendment Act 2013 contains a range of amendments targeting criminal gangs, including the creation of new offences, increased penalties for existing offences and increased police powers. The new offences include three or more members of a criminal gang, including those listed by regulation, being together in a public place, meaning that bikies can no longer sit around in their colours or leathers and intimidate other people—because that is what the colours are about: intimidation. Another new offence is a member of a criminal gang being at a banned location, such as a criminal bikie gang clubhouse, or at a banned event. From speaking to members of the police, I hear people no longer go to the clubhouses. Why? Because they will be arrested. Another new offence is a member of a criminal gang recruiting, or attempting to recruit, another person to the gang. What they do is target young people, particularly those in street gangs, and they get them involved with ice and—I was speaking to [inaudible] recently, from Victoria—it does not matter what sort of penalty they get; they basically continue to push them to keep trafficking.

It is this kind of approach to closing gaps in legislation which we really need to take seriously. I have spoken to Minister Michael Keenan about it and he has obviously made no decision on this, apart from listening to what I have said. But there is a very stark difference between what is happening in Queensland and what is happening in Victoria. From what I have seen—and I have spoken about law enforcement internationally—it is pretty much the way the Americans took on organised crime over there. They took on the bikies and they took on the mafia with the RICO laws. The RICO laws are very similar to these Queensland laws, and I believe that is where they are based.

Especially now with the ice scourge, I really believe we have to go to the next level and look at tougher measures to disrupt organised crime. If you can stop the outlaw motorcycle gangs meeting together and if you can stop the organised crime groups having meetings and basically pushing drugs and pushing firearms, it can only be good for all Australians, especially young people because bikies do not care if they sell drugs to a young person and they do not care if they sell a firearm to a young person. This is the danger that we face.

I strongly support this legislation. My next push will be to look at stronger legislation, such as the Queensland legislation, going national.

See this speech in context