By
That was Jason Clare, federal minister for home affairs, in an ABC radio interview earlier this week. Clare has been spruiking the Gillard government’s proposal to implement national anti-gang laws. Prime minister Julia Gillard announced the proposal on Wednesday ($), while she was
“National anti-gang and asset seizure laws will help ensure police have the powers they need and there are no safe havens,” Ms Gillard said.Simply put, the proposal to introduce “unexplained wealth” laws cannot be tolerated in a liberal democracy. Such laws undermine property rights and reverse the burden of proof by forcing property owners to justify to the police how they came to own their property.
The laws will give courts the power to declare that a body, such as a bikie gang, is a criminal organisation and then impose control orders on designated members.
The orders, which would take effect across the country and not just in one state, will prevent members from meeting with other club members, holding a liquor licence, visiting clubhouses or holding weapons or explosives licences.
The suggested provisions relating to prevention of meetings also clearly undermine freedom of association. Chris Berg wrote about this issue when NSW passed consorting laws last year.
It’s concerning that ministers continually take heed of law enforcement agencies telling them they need new and greater powers. Blindly following their recommendations indicates a failure to recognise that bureaucrats – whether they’re in law enforcement or any other area of government – are always going to ask for more powers and more money. It’s the kind of ignorant approach to policy-making that gave us the privacy-crushing data retention proposal. Self-interest doesn’t suddenly disappear when someone takes a job with the government.
The government’s proposal also ignores basic facts. The laws have been introduced in part to tackle drive-by shootings in Sydney’s western suburbs. But it should be noted that crimes of this kinds aren’t always gang-related. As former NSW detective Tim Priest writes ($):
I fail to see just how this initiative is actually going to stop random drive-by shootings that are not connected to gangs. There is evidence in Sydney that some of the shootings are more about culture and how some in our community deal with personal offence, rather than being gang related.Criminal law is properly a domain of the states and the states ought to continue dealing with these issues. They are better than the Commonwealth at identifying local problems and tailoring appropriate policy solutions. And we already have a host of laws at the state level that deal with the kinds of issues that the Commonwealth government is attempting to address. Duplication won’t solve anything.
We’ll have more on this as further details emerge.
