Hon. Donald George Wing, LL.B.

Seat: PATERSON (formerly Launceston)

Party: INDEPENDENT

Contacts

Parliament House:
Phone: (03) 6233 2322
Fax: (03) 6231 1849

Launceston Office:
Phone: (03) 6336 2556
Fax: (03) 6331 1606

Email:don.wing@parliament.tas.gov.au

Map of Paterson
(External site:
Tasmanian Electoral Office: http://www.electoral.tas.gov.au/)

Speeches

Legislative Council Hansard
Thursday 1 December 2005 - Part 2

POLICE POWERS (PUBLIC SAFETY) BILL 2005 (No. 88)

In Committee
Clause 1 -
(Short title)

Resumed from page 32

Mr WING (Mr President) - Madam Deputy Chair, 23 years ago when I was elected to this House, I did not envisage that I would ever see introduced into this House or this Parliament a bill of the nature of either of the two that we are dealing with in an effort to deal with the terrorist threat. I did not envisage that bills of the nature of these would be introduced and I could never have foreseen that I would ever support bills with the provisions that are in these bills, involving detention of citizens without being charged, holding them incommunicado for several days at a time, and with the many other restrictions on civil liberties that are contained in these bills.

Provisions such as these run counter to all of my natural instincts and I find them repugnant and generally unsupportable, but, Madam Deputy Chair, how times and how things have changed since then to the extent that it is now necessary to have legislation of this nature not only introduced but also supported.

Who would have thought 10 or 20 years ago that the world would be confronted with the type of terrorist activities now occurring and which have occurred in several countries - acts perpetrated by people with twisted and distorted minds and beliefs, killing and maiming unarmed innocent citizens - women, men and children - creating death, destruction and mayhem. These events are one-sided incidents of war, and very one-sided where it is a terrorist attack in circumstances where innocent, unarmed citizens have no capacity for defence.

Now, fortunately, such incidents have not occurred on our shores in Australia and, hopefully, they will not but we must take precautions to do what we can as far as possible to ensure that they do not. In this legislation we are not exactly fighting fire with fire because there is nothing here authorising attacks or killing or maiming. The measures are designed to help defend our citizens, to protect them from attacks and to detect and solve attacks if and when they occur.

Although the provisions of these two bills - and I address them both at once, if I may - run counter to all of our natural instincts, and I think that applies to every honourable member of this House and this Parliament, it is unfortunately, in my view and I think the unanimous view of this House, necessary for us to support the measures. They must be exercised and the powers created carried out responsibly. Madam Deputy Chair, I have considerable confidence that they will be. I have confidence in our police force that these measures will not be abused or misused, and I do not say that lightly, and it is important that they are not.

It is important that these measures are not used to excess as measures of a different nature have been by our friends in America in the treatment of some who have been detained at Guantanamo Bay. One such citizen, Mr Habib, was kept in detention in, I think, quite appalling circumstances, not charged and never charged and released after many months, and that is inexcusable. I believe the United States should be quite ashamed of the way they treat people like that, notwithstanding their best motives, and the other person is David Hicks, who is probably facing a kangaroo-type tribunal and who, having been detained for months or years, did not know until recently what he was being charged with. This is deplorable conduct and is inexcusable.

Closer to home, Madam Deputy Chair, I gave two instances during the briefing session of situations that occurred in my city of Launceston: one involved the Sarwari family who came from Afghanistan, although the Department of Immigration, Multicultural and Indigenous Affairs were alleging that they in fact came from Pakistan and were mistreating them on the basis of the incorrect assumption. They moved from the mainland to Tasmania, notified DIMIA officers but did not put it writing. It was well-known to people in Tasmania that they were here because there had been quite a lot of publicity through the media about their circumstances and the fact they were living in Launceston. So it was well-known to DIMIA. But one morning DIMIA officials rounded up the whole family. They went to the home and took the mother. They went to the schools and took the small children from the schools. They went to the husband's place of employment where he had been working, earning enough to support the family without any cost burden on the taxpayers of Australia, put them in a light aircraft and took them to a detention centre. It was an absolutely irresponsible abuse of powers and one can only imagine the effect that had on that family, particularly the young children.

That was not the only incident. There was a another concerning a Ms Sandy Thow who does a lot of good community work in Launceston. Because DIMIA officials felt that an African friend of hers had been using some documents which they thought were not genuine, they raided her home at about dawn one morning a year or two ago. She was in her nightdress, and had no forewarning of this. They rifled through drawers and rooms in her house, and upset her to the extent that she had a fit and had to be taken to the Launceston General Hospital for treatment. I will not mention the inhumane treatment of people in detention centres in our country.

I refer to these matters, Madam Deputy Chair, in the fervent hope and confident expectation that notwithstanding the very extreme and restrictive, draconian provisions in the bills that we are dealing with, they will not be misused in any way and certainly not in the way that Department of Immigration, Multicultural and Indigenous Affairs officers have misused other powers of a different nature. Fortunately, though, we have the expectation that these provisions will not be necessary after 10 years, and we all fervently hope that is so because, as we know, the legislation will expire in 10 years and will be reviewed by COAG in five years' time.

I think that gives comfort to any unease that we have, and for the reasons that I have given, Madam Deputy Chair, and for the reasons that other honourable members have given in their contributions, I support this bill as I do the other bill of a similar nature.

Clause 1 agreed to and bill taken through the remaining stages.