Stirling Griff (SA, Nick Xenophon Team) Share this | Hansard source

The Nick Xenophon Team agrees with the need to strengthen our firearms laws to reduce gun violence. Indeed, we could have had stronger gun laws last year when the government's Criminal Code Amendment (Firearms Trafficking) Bill 2017 was amended and adopted by the Senate in February 2017. It’s now over 13 months since the nation could have had tougher, stronger and better gun laws, but, due to government stubbornness, the bill as agreed to by the Senate was rejected in the other place. As a result, we do not have those laws in place today.

The Nick Xenophon Team sought to strengthen the bill by moving sensible amendments that would have increased the maximum penalties for firearm-trafficking offences within Australia and into and out of Australia. As I said before, these amendments were supported by the Senate. We also supported Labor's amendments which sought to strengthen the bill with life sentences for the worst kinds of firearm traffickers and which also sought to remove the mandatory sentencing provisions in the bill. Mandatory minimum sentences are inappropriate and do not currently exist in the Commonwealth Criminal Code. They restrict judicial discretion and hamper the sentencing judge's ability to hand down a sentence that is appropriate after taking into account all of the circumstances of an individual case. Mandatory minimum sentences depart from the fundamental principle that the punishment should fit the crime. Law enforcement agencies don't like mandatory minimum sentences because they mean offenders are less likely to cooperate with the police to bring down other serious criminals.

Illegal firearms remain a major issue in Australia. During last year's national firearms amnesty, 57,324 firearms were handed in. Authorities received around 2,500 fully automatic or semiautomatic guns that were previously unaccounted for, and 2,900 handguns. That is a lot of firepower that had the potential to cause very serious harm.

All of us in this place must work to keep our communities safe. We must support tougher sentences for gun traffickers. The government should have passed the bill as it was agreed to in the Senate. It is now time to stop playing political games with peoples' lives and for the government to take the right action to protect all Australians.