Crispin Hull

Last week, Canberra had three armed robberies in one 24-hour period. That horrific treble came as the climax of two months of high figures for armed robberies. It came after Chief Justice Jeffrey (SUBS: check spelling) Miles said in court that heroin was so commonplace in Canberra that many people no longer saw the possession of it as criminal or at least highly criminal conduct.

There is an obvious correlation between the high armed robbery rates and the drug problem. People on heroin need to finance their expense habit. Even with more heroin on the streets at a cheaper price, there is a concerning pattern with the drug trade which society as a whole must deal with. Armed robbery is not the only way of financing a drug habit, tough it is one of the most visible ways. Another way is to encourage friends to get hooked so they may be a source of funds to buy heroin of which the first user gets a free cut. It is a vicious pyramid-selling scheme.
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The standing committee of attorneys-general has come up with some quite sensible proposals to streamline criminal trials in Australia. The committee comprised senior legal figures from nearly all jurisdictions, and those not formally represented had representatives familiar with their jurisdiction.

The past two decades in Australian have seen a blowing out of the length and cost of trials, both civil and criminal. That trend has been met with another trend towards arbitration and dispute resolution procedures in civil cases because parties see the present adversarial and strict-evidence system as too costly to help their cause. Unfortunately, in the criminal sphere opting out is not an option. The state must prosecute and the citizen must defend. There can be a certain amount of informal plea bargaining, but unlike in civil cases there can be no alternative dispute-resolution processes. It is important, therefore, that the criminal justice system work fairly and efficiently because there is nowhere else to go.

It might be simplifying the report too much but the theme of the recommendations is for the system to stop playing police and lawyers’ games. The report makes the sensible suggestion that in serious cases, lawyers from the director of public prosecutions should be involved at the earliest possible stage. Too often police get into a mindset about who is guilty and close off other options or fail to see weaknesses in the case.
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Some serious questions about over-development have arisen in Canberra and they deserve urgent movement attention. The most pressing problem is recent Administrative Appeals Tribunal decision ruling that the guidelines on multi-unit redevelopment have no force. Without them, it seems, the situation could degenerate into a virtual open slather on multi-unit and dual occupancy development. This would not be good for Canberra for several reasons. It is of utmost importance that the ACT Government strike the right balance between maintaining the residential amenity of existing residents and the need for more efficient use of land and infrastructure in the city. It is important that the Government maintain guidelines that are certain and enforceable. It is important for people engaging in redevelopment and for neighbours to know the limits. Those limits should give guarantees about light and space. The guidelines ruled upon by the AAT are apparently only draft guidelines. Those guidelines have been used for six years. They have become the working model upon which residents and developers have based lifestyle and investment decisions. They should be given force of law. They should also be reviewed in light of the severe risk that some suburbs face over-development and a change in their character.
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Former Victorian Premier Joan Kirner came to Canberra this week with the laudable aim of redressing the gender balance in at the ACT Legislative Assembly. She came equipped with some money from a fund called Emily’s List to support female Labor candidate for the October 20 election. Alas, she also came with a sad ignorance about the ACT electoral system.

Mrs Kirner described the ACT’s Hare-Clark system of voting as “an amazing system” as if it were some sort of biological freak. She admitted that she was still trying to understand it. Moreover, she gave ridiculous advice to the very voters whose hearts and minds she was hoping to influence. She told them to vote 1 with no preferences. Besides offending the requirement to express five or seven preferences (one fore each seat), it is through the full expression of preferences that voters can best influence gender balance.

Mrs Kirner’s basic premise was sound. The ACT Parliament has an unhealthy gender imbalance. Only two of the 17 MLAs are women. In previous Assemblies there were more than double that and at one stage the ACT was unique among state federal and territory parliaments when at the Leaders of the Government and Opposition and the Speaker were all female
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The ACT Government should not delay the two-year trial of 50km/h speed limits recommended unanimously by an ACT Legislative Assembly committee. The Government says it does not agree with reducing the limit. However, Urban Services Minister Brendan Smyth said at the time the report came out earlier this month, that he would implement the committee’s decision. Later he said that some confusion had been created by the committee’s report. That should not be a reason for delay.

The committee defines five types of road: residential, feeder, sub-arterial, arterial and parkway. Only residential and feeder roads would have the new limit. Others would remain as they are. The difficult question, according to Mr Smyth, is to define what is sub-arterial, deserving a 60km/h or higher limit, and what is feeder deserving a 50km/h limit.

That should present no real concern. When implementing the committee’s recommendation Mr Smyth can take the approach of Humpty Dumpty in Lewis Carroll’s Through the Looking Glass. He said, “”When I use a word it means just what I choose it to mean — neither more nor less.” Mr Smyth can designate whatever road he wants as feeder or sub-arterial and put up the 50km/h signs accordingly. That may pose a little political difficulty as he gets blamed on one hand by residents of some roads for not lowering the limit and on the other hand by those who motor on some roads for lowering the limits on them, but that is of little moment. If should not be beyond the wit of his advisers to work out which roads get changed.
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Governments in Australia must realise that the mere attaining of a majority in one house of parliament does not give them the right to rule as a dictatorship. In a liberal democracy there are checks and balances which should it make governments accountable during the period of governance in addition to the ultimate accountability at election time.

This week, we have had examples at both Territory and national level of governments withdrawing from their duties of disclosure.

At the federal level, the clerk of the Senate, Harry Evans, has highlighted how the second term of the Howard government has been more secretive than most of its predecessors. In the latest edition of Odgers’ Australian Senate Practice, Mr Evans noted that in the second term of the Howard Government one in five orders for government documents had been refused, a greater rate than previous governments.
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On one account the Australian dollar is falling. It hit new lows again yesterday. But this was only on one account: that of the mighty US dollar. The Australian dollar is more than holding its own against the euro, the pound sterling, the New Zealand dollar and the yen – the currencies of our other major trading partners. However, a lot of world trade is done in US dollars so the currency change will have a more profound effect in Australia than the bilateral US-Australia trade relationship would otherwise warrant.

What should Australian policymakers do in the face of the weakness of our dollar against that of the US? For a start, they should not panic. Australia’s is a floating currency. It means that the price of imports will go up. When that happens demand for imports will fall somewhat. Further, the value of Australia’s exports will rise. These two effects should help our balance of trade. However, if Australian goods are priced in US dollars, demand for them will contract. In any event, a free-floating currency will self-correct in time – provided the fundamentals are good.

That proviso is very significant for Australia. Australia is vulnerable on several fronts but has a very good report card on two other fronts (inflation, govt spending).
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The Act Government is now officially in caretaker mode and the election campaign for the October 20 poll is officially under way.

Almost immediately, the Liberal leader and Chief Minister, Gary Humphries, sought to distance himself from the approach of his predecessor, Kate Carnell. In particular, he sought to distance himself from chasing big-ticket items – like Bruce Stadium and the V8 race – and he sought to emphasise all the Liberal candidates and what they can do for their electorates, making himself less presidential.

On the presidential front, Mr Humphries does not have to do anything to be less presidential. It is difficult to imagine an Australian party leader less presidential than Mr Humphries – with perhaps the exception of his Labor counterpart, Jon Stanhope. There is nothing wrong with being less presidential, provided the team members are up to it and do not require the leader to repair damage created from within.
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The Federal Government has made the correct decision not to bail out Ansett, but rather let it fall into receivership. The situation is difficult for the 16,500 staff, but that should be a temporary affair for most of them. As one staff member said, Ansett is a great airline, but it has been let down by bad management. It means that a buyer is likely to be found for the airline’s aircraft, on-ground infra-structure, rights of access to airports and what remains of its goodwill. If that happens, it is likely that shareholders will lose a considerable amount of money. But there is always an element of risk in the purchase of shares. The risks range from poor dividends because of poor profits or outright loss of capital because the venture fails.

In the case of Ansett, it is likely that that the administrators will be able to sell the airline as a going concern and save many of the jobs. The return to shareholders will be small.

The Government’s duty is not to pick winners, or in this case pick which losers it will bail out. Rather its job is to set reasonable regulations for safety, administer laws to prevent anti-competitive conduct and ensure employee rights are protected.
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The protests at the meeting of the World Economic Forum are symbolic of a wider conflict that world political and economic leaders will have to consider very seriously. The protesters represent widely held views in the world, whether one agrees with them or not. They argue that globalisation is causing environmental damage, more inequality both within and between nations and more poverty. Economic leaders at the forum have championed free trade, globalisation and the economic growth its creates as the means to reduce poverty, improve the environment and reduce inequality. The protesters represent a range of people with quite diverse views – from unionists who support forestry and mining and the jobs they create to radical environmentalists who see forestry and mining as destructive industries. Inside the forum, there is probably as much diversity of views, but not so obvious – from rampant free-traders who see virtually all government as enemy to more moderate voices.
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