Logie Jan: Policing (Cost Recovery) Amendment Bill — First ReadingText is incorporated into the Bound VolumeLogie Jan: Policing (Cost Recovery) Amendment Bill — First Reading[Sitting date: 04 November 2014. Volume:701;Page:531. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.]JAN LOGIE (Green):I rise to take a short call in this the first reading of the Policing (Cost Recovery) Amendment Bill. The Green Party opposes this bill. We have been told that the core police services are there to benefit society and therefore should be provided by baseline funding and the example the Minister gave was front-line services. But this bill is proposing that where benefit primarily accrues to individuals or private organisations rather than society as a whole police should be able to recover costs yet as has already been pointed out in the debate this bill does not consider cost recovery in all situations that could be described in that way—for example commercial use of police say for large concerts or sports events where there may I suggest be massive profits to be made. This bill applies primarily to police vetting. Police undertake vetting mostly in situations relating to education community services health services and public services. The Teachers Council is the biggest organisation using police vetting. The regulatory impact statement has recognised that there has been increased demand on these services and indeed the Minister noted that in 2013 457000 requests were put into the police for police vetting. That demand is still rising yet there has been no increase in the police budget to allow them to do this work. In fact the Government has cut the police budget by $114 million in real terms since 2009.We have heard from the Government side of the House tonight that this is not about raising money for the police; it is just about cost recovery. Well I think that is playing with words really. This job was up till this point considered a core function of the police and a service to the public so that we could all have a feeling of safety when we accessed services where we might be vulnerable or our children might be vulnerable. In fact the core reason that there has been increased demand for this service is the Vulnerable Children Act imposing mandatory vetting. I would like to just read out the purpose of the section that applies to the safety checks from the Vulnerable Children Act which says: “The purpose of this Part is to reduce the risk of harm to children by requiring people employed or engaged in work that involves regular or overnight contact with children to be safety checked.” How—how—is that more a private good than a public good? The Government on one hand through the most significant piece of legislation that went through Parliament last term said that this is mandatory because this is essential to public safety. Now here we are only a few months later in this House and the Government is saying this is not a public good; this is a private benefit and let us charge for it. It does not make sense.The Minister has characterised the plan as charging a small fee for something that previously had been free. The Government is saying it is around $7 per check and that most organisations would be easily able to absorb that. Well the Teachers Council does about 40000 vets a year so that is a cost of around $300000 a year—$300000 a year being transferred from our schools to the police. Has the Government not heard of the old adage “A stitch in time”? Our children would be better off if we invested in these mechanisms to protect them before something goes wrong. Although crime is supposedly going down—except for domestic violence and sexual violence which are crimes quite relevant to this topic—the Government is moving funding from community services that provide protection and from our schools into policing. It makes no sense and the Greens are proud to oppose this bill.