Nigel Scullion (NT, Country Liberal Party, Minister for Community Services) Share this | Hansard source

Whilst giving an answer to the senator, specifically with regard to the way we use the material that is collected, I thought I would make another couple of comments to clear up our view on the amendments. Senator, the provisions of the original Northern Territory National Emergency Response Act were effectively for prescribed communities, and all the areas we are dealing with now are outside of the prescribed communities. You will be aware that it is clearly an offence under the new legislation to have alcohol anywhere. The assumption is that, upon discovery of a criminal offence or the intent to commit a criminal offence, the police will be able to call on information about similar levels of alcohol purchased, for example, because the amount of the purchase will be taken down as well as who the purchasers were. You can imagine the difficulty that police may have in circumstances where they have no ready reckoner saying, ‘We suddenly discovered this much alcohol in the community.’ With that, they can go to the place they suspect it has come from and they may find very similar areas that may narrow down their investigation. It is all about narrowing down. There is no magic wand with this, but the police have provided us with the information that this is a very useful tool, and to me as a practical person it does seem that that is very likely to be correct. So the clear answer is that the information collected will be held by the liquor Licensing Commission but will be available to police officers on request.

I refer to the first part of the other amendments you just spoke to. I think we would refer to this as the Siewert ‘thirsty Thursday’ amendment. I agree—there has been a long history of having particular days of the week that you can buy takeaway alcohol. In your good state, Senator Siewert, Kalgoorlie never had two-up on payday. It is a very sensible approach. ‘Thirsty Thursdays’, particularly in Tennant Creek, were much spoken about. As you have indicated, they were unsuccessful because of the choice and the flexibility that was provided through Centrelink income supplements. I was approached in Tennant Creek in 2003 to reverse that, and the minister agreed to do so on the basis that the community came forward and said that that was a good thing, rather than having the choice and balance that we would have ‘thirsty Thursdays’. It was unfortunate that the community at that time was unable to provide that support.

In terms of ‘thirsty Thursdays’, this is a non-prescribed area. The mechanisms that you are speaking of are available to the Northern Territory government at the moment. You may not be aware—I know a bit more about it because I live in the Northern Territory—that there are a number of initiatives from the Northern Territory government with regard to alcohol, not generally but regionally. There has been one in Alice Springs, which I spoke about in an earlier response, and they are considering Katherine and Tennant Creek as models of alcohol control and quite stringent measures. One would hope that they look at the suite of opportunities available to them in those considerations. But we would see that as fundamentally outside of the prescribed areas and not our responsibility. The reason that we have only talked about this legislation—saying ‘the recording of’ and those sorts of things—is that we know that it is to do with the traffickers and our responsibility for the prescribed areas. That is why there is that link.

Senator Siewert, I have not had your amendments for very long. I will speak generally to the last part in terms of the reporting to the police officer. I respect that you have put this together quite quickly; I will not take time pulling feathers off it, but there are some issues. I understand and respect the intent, but I do not think reporting specifically to the police force is useful. You can imagine that, in a place like Katherine, where there are a huge range of farms and those sorts of things around the place, people would simply come up and get a pallet of beer for the three months over the wet. I can assure you that the police officer in charge of the Katherine police station has better things to do than dealing with that. I respect the intent, but I feel that a lower amount being available to police should they have something is still a practical measure and meets the intent of your amendment in terms of whatever the police officers would have done with the information that would have been provided to them under your amendment.

I know, Senator Siewert, you have made the comment that it might be unpopular and it might not work, and that is true, but there is no point in it being unpopular and not working either. I can assure you these amendments come to this place as very simple amendments that have arisen from clear unintended consequences. A number of people have reflected here that already there are cracks appearing. This is emergency legislation, and I know you accept that. I can assure you these amendments are there because there have been unintended consequences. We have moved to ensure that those unintended consequences are removed, and if there are more unintended consequences in the future we will come back here and amend the legislation again.

This is a very practical amendment that I think will improve the situation. Whilst, as I said, I really respect the fact that you have not had much time—you are a small organisation but you have brought these amendments to us—I and the government do not believe they will improve the situation on the ground, and that is why we will not be supporting them.