21125 LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL Wednesday 10 March 2010 __________ The President (The Hon. Amanda Ruth Fazio) took the chair at 11.00 a.m. The President read the Prayers. CRIMES AMENDMENT (POLICE PURSUITS) BILL 2010 CRIMES (ADMINISTRATION OF SENTENCES) AMENDMENT BILL 2010 Bills received from the Legislative Assembly. Leave granted for procedural matters to be dealt with on one motion without formality. Motion by the Hon. John Hatzistergos agreed to: That the bills be read a first time and printed, standing orders be suspended on contingent notice for remaining stages and the second readings of the bills be set down as orders of the day for a later hour of the sitting. Bills read a first time and ordered to be printed. Second readings set down as orders of the day for a later hour. AUDITOR-GENERAL'S REPORT The Clerk announced the receipt, pursuant to the Public Finance and Audit Act 1983, of a performance audit report of the Auditor-General entitled "Improving the Performance of Metropolitan Bus Services: NSW Transport and Infrastructure", dated March 2010, received and authorised to be printed this day. LEGISLATION REVIEW COMMITTEE Membership Motion by the Hon. Don Harwin agreed to: That Ms Parker be discharged from the Legislation Review Committee and Mr Khan be appointed as a member of the committee. Message forwarded to the Legislative Assembly advising it of the resolution. BUDGET 2009-2010 Production of Documents: Disputed Claim of Privilege The Hon. GREG PEARCE [11.04 a.m.]: I seek leave to amend Private Members' Business item No. 239 outside the Order of Precedence for today of which I have given notice by inserting after the word "privileged" in line 4 of paragraph 1 the words ", other than in respect of Energy Australia pages 149-157, Integral Energy pages 184-185 and Country Energy pages 231-238,". Leave granted. Motion by the Hon. Greg Pearce agreed to: 1. That, in view of the report of the Independent Legal Arbiter, Sir Laurence Street, dated 11 December 2009 on the disputed claim of privilege on documents relating to the 2009-2010 Budget, this House orders that the documents considered by the Independent Legal Arbiter not to be privileged, other than in respect of EnergyAustralia pages 149-157, Integral Energy pages 184-185 and Country Energy pages 231-238, be laid upon the table by the Clerk. 2. That, on tabling, the documents are authorised to be published. 21126 LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL 10 March 2010 UNPROCLAIMED LEGISLATION The Hon. Peter Primrose tabled a list detailing all legislation unproclaimed 90 calendar days after assent as at 9 March 2010. PETITION Unborn Child Protection Petition requesting that the House uphold the sanctity of human life, defend the fundamental right of children to be born and reject all attempts to initiate legislation that emulates the Victorian Abortion Law Reform Act 2008, and encourage ways and means of promoting to the people of New South Wales that every baby deserves to be protected and nurtured from conception, received from Reverend the Hon. Fred Nile. BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE Withdrawal of Business Private Members' Business item No. 229 outside the Order of Precedence withdrawn by Dr John Kaye. BUSINESS OF THE HOUSE Postponement of Business Government Business Orders of the Day Nos 1 to 3 postponed on motion by the Hon. Tony Kelly. FIREARMS ACT 1996: DISALLOWANCE OF FIREARMS AMENDMENT REGULATION 2009 The PRESIDENT: Pursuant to standing orders the question is: That the motion proceed as business of the House. Question resolved in the affirmative. Motion by Ms Lee Rhiannon agreed to: That the matter proceed forthwith. Ms LEE RHIANNON [11.10 a.m.]: I move: That, under section 41 of the Interpretation Act 1987, this House disallows the Firearms Amendment Regulation 2009, published on the New South Wales Legislation Website on 13 November 2009 and tabled on 24 November 2009. This regulation seeks to allow security guards, if authorised, to possess and use pistols and certain shotguns that they are currently not permitted to use. It will expand the range of weapons available for security guards to use in carrying out their duties and to store in their homes. The change means that security guards can use high-powered handguns and shotguns. We must ask why such a regulation is necessary. What significant event has occurred to warrant New South Wales gun ownership laws being watered down? Why would we encourage the circulation of high-powered firearms within the community when we should be doing the opposite? Since the Port Arthur massacre in 1996 it has been clear that there was a loophole in those laws; and while we banned semiautomatic long arms, we did not ban semiautomatic short guns, which is clearly needed. What we are seeing here is a weakening of the laws, not taking them in the direction of ensuring that public safety is the top priority. The types of firearms that this regulation would allow individual security guards to own are the same types of firearms used by Allen Xiang. Armed with five loaded handguns, Mr Xiang, on 21 October 2002, killed two classmates and wounded five others at Monash University. In the six months before these killings Mr Xiang became a licensed gun owner and bought seven firearms, including a CZ 9-millimetre handgun that was used in the shooting. Prior to the shootings he had become a member of the Sporting Shooters Association and had attended target practice. Ammunition holsters, firearm cleaning instruments and another two Beretta pistols were also found in his home. These are some of the weapons that security guards can now use under the regulation we are debating. 10 March 2010 LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL 21127 The regulation will also allow security guards to own the same type of weapons used on 13 March 1996 by Thomas Hamilton, who shot and killed 16 children, one adult and then himself in Dunblane Primary School, Scotland. This was the deadliest single targeted mass murder of children in the history of the United Kingdom. Hamilton used two 9-millimetre Browning high-powered pistols and two Smith and Wesson 357 magnum revolvers. Again, these are the types of firearms that the Government thinks is okay for New South Wales security guards to use. Again, I remind members that it has not been established why security guards need to have a wider choice of weapons. They are already armed; they already have many weapons to choose from. Why should these extremely dangerous weapons be made available to security guards? Crime statistics show that more of these weapons are being stolen and are moving into the illegal market. Theft of firearms is on the rise across Australia and particularly in New South Wales. What these weapons have been used for, and the fact that more of these weapons are falling into illegal hands, is relevant to this debate. A report by the Australian Institute of Criminology showed that 1,712 firearms were reported stolen in Australia between 2007 and 2008. This was an increase of close to 200 from the previous year. Almost a quarter of these thefts occurred in New South Wales. More recently, on 20 October 2009, 12 semiautomatic high-powered Glock handguns were stolen from the security firm with the interesting name of Westshore in Morley, Western Australia. Over a period of six weeks from November to December 2009, 18 firearms were stolen from private residences in Mount Isa, Queensland. On 13 January this year the Sydney Morning Herald reported that in New South Wales there is a growing trend for criminals robbing armed vans and stealing the guns of private security guards. So it is obvious that changing the regulation to allow security guards to access a wider range of dangerous weapons will result in more of these weapons ending up in circulation. That cannot be disputed. Less than 70 per cent of stolen firearms are recovered by police. It is believed that the majority of them make their way onto the black market. This situation is bad enough without a further dilution of gun control laws by unnecessarily putting high-powered weapons into the hands and homes of security guards. It is clear that the theft of guns is on the rise and that security guards are being targeted by individuals looking to get their hands on these weapons. In light of this, it is expected that a responsible government would introduce regulations to remove high-powered firearms from circulation and make it tougher to access them. We should be seeing legislation come before this House if the Government and the Opposition are sincere when they take up their law and order agendas. That is where we need to tighten the current laws. As I said, this regulation will facilitate increased circulation of these firearms. This is not the first instance of the New South Wales Government introducing legislation or regulations that weaken the gun ownership laws. New South Wales has the dubious distinction of being the first State to water down the national uniform gun laws adopted after the Port Arthur massacre. Let us remember that those national uniform gun laws were a big breakthrough. As I have said before in the House, and I am happy to say it again, it is to the credit of the former Prime Minister, John Howard, that after much public pressure—I certainly acknowledge that—he followed through and brought forward national uniform gun laws in the face of incredible and often angry opposition. In this debate the Government should set out why it has chosen to weaken the gun control regulatory regime, because that is the outcome we are facing.