Mark Dreyfus (Isaacs, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Attorney General) Share this | Hansard source

I need to make clear to the Minister for Justice, who has been having difficulty listening to anything that Labor has said in this debate, that not supporting mandatory sentencing on this bill does not mean support for gun traffickers; not supporting mandatory sentencing on this bill does not mean supporting the status quo; and not supporting mandatory sentences on this bill does not mean support for lighter sentences. To explain that a bit further, Labor stands in this parliament having moved amendments in the Senate, where this bill commenced its passage, to increase sentences. So it is not possible for this minister or any other representative of this government to suggest that Labor, in not supporting mandatory sentencing, in some way is supporting lighter sentences. I repeat: Labor does not support lighter sentences.

The reason for increasing the maximum sentences in any criminal offence bill is so that this parliament can send the clearest possible message to every court in Australia administering those criminal statutes that what this parliament is indicating is that sentences should be increased. That's what happens in the sentencing process—just for the benefit of the Minister for Justice. When this parliament increases maximum sentences, courts take notice. That's the way the sentencing process works. Every court in Australia, from the High Court down, takes notice when this parliament increases maximum sentences. I'm pleased to see that the minister's taking notes. Not supporting mandatory sentencing on this bill does not mean supporting the status quo. Again, Labor has moved amendments so that the bill now comes before us in a form which has increased maximum sentences, which will lead, over time—because, again, this is the way the sentencing process works in Australian sentencing law—to increased sentences being imposed on people who are convicted of these offences.

As for the laughable and offensive suggestion that the minister seems to like to keep making—that not supporting mandatory sentences on this bill means that in some way those opposing mandatory sentences support gun trafficking in any way—that is such a laughable suggestion I need say no more about it.

We've also heard from this failure of a Minister for Justice that opposing mandatory sentencing is somehow left-wing ideology. The member for Kennedy might well take issue with the suggestion that opposing mandatory sentencing is left-wing ideology. But I'd invite this minister to put that same proposition to the judges of this country, from the High Court down, who have for decades patiently explained, to anybody in the community who cares to listen and anybody in the community who, like the Minister for Justice, should be listening, that proper and just sentencing requires attention to all of the circumstances of the particular case—to the circumstances of the victim, to the circumstances of the offender and to the circumstances of the crime, the nature of the crime and the seriousness of the crime—and, as part of that process, to what tariff has been set by this parliament in passing legislation.

Most importantly, it's about making the punishment fit the crime. As judges have tried to explain, as legal professional bodies have tried to explain, as the Australian Human Rights Commission has tried to explain, as the Judicial Conference of Australia has tried to explain: making the punishment fit the crime is not something that this parliament can do in advance. This parliament does not know the circumstances of the crime for which a future offender is going to be convicted. This parliament does not know the circumstances of the offender, of the victim, of the nature of the crime, of the seriousness of the crime compared to other crimes of a similar nature. And it's because this parliament does not know, and cannot know, those circumstances that this parliament should never seek to impose a mandatory minimum sentence in respect of a crime yet to be committed about which this parliament knows nothing.

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