Phillip Thompson (Herbert, Liberal National Party, Shadow Assistant Minister for Defence) Share this | Hansard source

I move:

That this House:

(1) notes with great distress that:

(a) there were 18,925 victim-survivors of child sexual assault reported in Australia in 2021;

(b) this accounts for almost two-thirds (61 per cent) of reported victim-survivors of all ages that year; and

(c) 67 per cent of sexual assaults occurred at residential locations;

(2) applauds the work of the former Government to implement mandatory minimum sentencing and other measures for child sex offenders through the passing of the Crimes Legislation Amendment (Sexual Crimes Against Children and Community Protection Measures) Bill 2019; and

(3) calls on the Government to implement, in conjunction with state and territory governments, a National Child Sex Offender Register to be a single point of truth to make public the identities, offences and postcodes of convicted child sex offenders for the purpose of keeping Australian children safe.

Some of the most disgusting, heinous crimes are committed against our children. Young boys and girls, who are growing up and who have their whole lives ahead of them, are innocent victims of crimes that rob them of their innocence. Child sex offenders are the lowest of the low. They are vile scum. They are putrid. They are despicable. They deserve nothing more than to be removed from our society. They should be stripped of the privileges and freedoms that law-abiding citizens of Australia enjoy and they should be kept as far away from our children as possible.

While some of us might like to see child sex offenders locked up and the key thrown away, we know that some are released back into our community. In some states they live largely anonymously among us. Sometimes they're monitored, but no-one can be watched 24/7. That's why we and our communities deserve to have the information we need to be able to stay aware—not to be vigilantes but to be vigilant. That is why we need to have a national child sex offender register. This register must be a single point of truth—no matter what the state or territory—that makes public the identity, offences and postcodes of convicted child sex offenders to keep our kids safe.

In Townsville we have a large number of child sex offenders living in our community. It was revealed in 2020 that 180 of them live at large across the Townsville police district—a number that is constantly on the increase. At the same time it was revealed that there were only 22 police officers across Queensland with the task of monitoring 3,000 offenders.

We can't afford to let more innocent children fall victim to these predators. Too many of these offenders get out of jail and reoffend, which is why we need to know where they are. You have to have a sign on your fence if you have a dangerous dog, but these people who've snatched the innocence away from young children get to walk freely among the community.

In this age of the internet, we have too many stories of mothers on dating apps meeting men who are interested not in them but in getting to their children. A recent Australian Institute of Criminology report found that more than one in 10 on these apps had received a request to facilitate child sexual exploitation. That is absolutely disgusting. Another study by the AIC found that recidivist child sexual assault offenders comprise a small group of motivated persistent offenders who are willing to adapt their offending to target new and different victims in different contexts. To that end, we need to apply situational prevention strategies which aim to restrict the opportunity to effect.

There are other statistics mentioned in this motion before us today which demonstrate how tragic the situation has become. There were 18,925 victim-survivors of child sexual assault reported in 2021. This is almost two-thirds of reported victim-survivors of all ages that year. That means the majority of victims of sexual assault in our communities are children.

A national child sex offender register is not a new idea. This is something the former coalition government did a lot of work on. In fact, it was the coalition that implemented mandatory minimum sentences for child sex offenders. We created the world's first eSafety Commissioner to tackle child exploitation online and we launched the National Strategy to Prevent and Respond to Child Sexual Abuse, a 10-year whole-of-nation framework targeting child sex abuse in all settings, with the funding to implement it. We also began the important work to implement a register for the Council of Attorneys-General and the Ministerial Council for Police and Emergency Management. This work must be progressed and followed through, and I urge the government to take it up.

We must always do everything we can to protect the most vulnerable members of our community. A child sex offender register is not just something we should do; it is something we must do for the safety of our children.

See this speech in context