Skye Kakoschke-Moore (SA, Nick Xenophon Team) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move:

That this bill be now read a second time.

I table an explanatory memorandum relating to the bill and seek leave to have the second reading speech incorporated in Hansard.

Leave granted.

The speech read as follows—

CRIMINAL CODE AMENDMENT (MISREPRESENTATION OF AGE TO A MINOR) BILL 2016

Second Reading

It is with a deep sense of honour, great sorrow and continuing frustration that I rise to speak on this Bill today.

This is a Bill to deal with what I, my colleagues, parents and the wider community believe is an issue of great importance to the safety of our children.

My colleague Senator Xenophon has introduced prior versions of this Bill in previous Parliaments.

This version of the Bill mirrors the Bill introduced in the 44 th Parliament aside from some stylistic changes to reflect current drafting methods.

The reason the Bill exists is because of Carly Ryan. Next year marks ten years since her brutal murder at the hands of a paedophile.

When Carly was fourteen, she started chatting online to what she was made to believe was a twenty year old man named Brandon Kane. Brandon was Carly's ideal boyfriend who portrayed himself as a young guitarist, and she fell in love with him as their online relationship grew closer.

But what Carly didn't know, and what was purposely concealed from her, was that 'Brandon' was actually a forty seven year old predator, Gary Francis Newman. He masqueraded as Brandon, Carly's teenage dream, in a perverted plan to secure the trust of Carly and her mother who were completely innocent to his sinister and sickening motivations. Appallingly, the fictitious 'Brandon' was one of up to two hundred fake online identities Newman had created in a bid to communicate and have sex with young girls.

When Carly turned fifteen, she invited Brandon to her birthday party. He told her he would be overseas and that he couldn't make it, so his adopted father Shane would go in his place, another fake persona. Carly had already been chatting to Shane online, and she convinced her mother that it would be okay for him to come along to her party.

Newman, in his role as Shane, turned up. Carly's mother, horrified that her daughter had become close to a stranger so much older than she was, warned him to stay away from her daughter.

But Newman convinced Carly she would get to meet her beloved Brandon in person. He eventually lured her to a meeting, on 19 February 2007, at Horseshoe Bay in South Australia. There, he brutally assaulted her and left her to die.

It took police eleven days to track Newman down. When they found him, on the day of his arrest, he was logged on to his computer as Brandon Kane, chatting to a fourteen year old girl in Western Australia. Police also found a stash of child pornography on his computer, and discovered he had already pursued many other young girls overseas.

Newman was found guilty of Carly's murder, and is now serving a life sentence, with twenty nine years non-parole.

The aim of this Bill is to make it an offence for a person over eighteen years of age to lie about their age in online communications to a person under sixteen years of age for the purposes of facilitating a physical meeting.

This Bill also makes it an offence for an adult to misrepresent their age in online communications with a minor with the intent of committing another offence.

These two items close an important loophole in the law. There is no reason for an adult to knowingly misrepresent their age to someone they believe is under sixteen, particularly if they believe doing so will make it easier to meet or commit another offence.

The Bill also contains specific provisions to clarify how this offence can be prosecuted and defended.

My colleague, Senator Xenophon, attempted to address this serious issue with earlier versions of this Bill. This version of the Bill will ensure that there are no unintended consequences of enforcing this law. Instead, this Bill creates offences specifically aimed at the circumstances - a person lying to a minor about their age to facilitate a meeting or to make themselves seem 'more approachable' - that need to be addressed. This Bill uses the age of sixteen years to define a minor as it is consistent with the age of sexual consent in the majority of Australian jurisdictions.

The internet is impossible to pin down, constantly evolving and growing. The pace of technological growth means children are almost always much more comfortable with online communication than their parents: what we still see as new and different is as essential to them as breathing.

We know that there is an ever increasing online presence of Australian youth and therefore a concomitant threat from online predators. New forms of communication mean we need new laws to protect our children. Research conducted by the e-Safety Commissioner showed that teenagers spend thirty three hours per week online, outside of school.

In cyberspace, we can't stand by their side as they explore the world. We can't always set rules and curfews, because our kids can be sitting safe in their rooms even while they're in danger.

This Bill is an attempt to address some of the techniques used by online predators, so that we can put an additional safeguard in place for our children.

Current laws are too narrow, and we do not have anything to directly address the situation where an adult lies about their age to a child online for the purpose of encouraging that child to meet them in person. Existing laws require prosecutors to prove that adults who groomed children online had a 'sexual purpose'.

This law would mean that police can intervene at an earlier stage and that will save children from abuse.

Sonya Ryan, Carly's mother, has been pushing for these changes in the law since her daughter's death. Sonya, who was nominated as South Australia's Australian of the Year in 2013, has dedicated her life to raising awareness of online dangers among young people with the Carly Ryan Foundation.

If her actions stop just one young person from becoming a victim, then it's worth it.

That is something we should keep at the forefront of our minds when considering this Bill.

I seek leave to continue my remarks later.

Leave granted; debate adjourned.