Clendon David: Policing (Storage of Youth Identifying Particulars) Amendment Bill — First Reading Second Reading In Committee 
Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume 
Clendon David: Policing (Storage of Youth Identifying Particulars) Amendment Bill — First Reading Second Reading In Committee 
[Sitting date: 16 August 2011. Volume:675;Page:20883. Text is incorporated into the Bound Volume.] 
DAVID CLENDON (Green) 
: 
 Part 1 of the Policing (Storage of Youth Identifying Particulars) Amendment Bill is clearly about the purpose of the legislation and is the heart of the proposed Act. Part 1 states that it seeks to amend the principal Act particularly in relation to the issue of the storage of youth identifying particulars. I think it is worth reflecting just for a moment on exactly what those are. 
This morning we heard reference to fingerprints. In fact youth identifying particulars include names addresses dates of birth photographs visual images—presumably footage from cameras cellphones or whatever it might be—fingerprints palm prints and footprints. Potentially quite an extensive body of information is being retained in these instances for young people who have been through a Youth Court process. We are told—in fact we are assured—that the issue has been corrected and again we can assume in the absence of any information that the youth identifying particulars that were retained post-2008 were destroyed perhaps 8 or 10 months ago presumably in October 2010 when this issue came to light. 
One wonders whether there has been an explosion of youth offending since that time. Have we seen the unfortunate repercussions that we are told would follow from the inability of the police to retain this information these youth identifying particulars? We now have nearly a year’s worth of evidence to inform us whether there is actually a real problem or whether a problem has been created. I think it is reasonable to suggest that we should have a proper process involving a select committee involving some time for consideration and involving external agencies with expertise in youth offending in youth law and indeed in ways to bring youth back on to a proper footing and leave criminal offending behind. We have that body of information available to us and I think it is worth considering that before we charge on and pass this legislation a couple of hours after many of us in this Chamber were blessed with its first reading. 
We have heard that the purpose of the bill is necessary and that we need to restore the police’s ability to store information because it will somehow enable us to intervene more readily and at an earlier stage in dealing with youth offenders—in particular with repeat offenders. There is somehow an assumption that having this information to hand will enable us to more readily steer youth on to a better path. I think that is a fairly dubious proposition. Our young people—indeed our young offenders—might be misguided but they would not have to watch too many television programmes to know how to avoid leaving behind fingerprints and getting themselves on cameras. I do think there is a considerable overstatement of the value of retaining this information in terms of enabling us to intervene at an earlier stage. 
I absolutely take the point though; many times in this House I have advocated in different contexts that we need to intervene at the earliest opportunity. Unfortunately a lot of the policy in relation to justice and corrections that we have seen passed in the last 12 months or so is steering us in quite the opposite direction. We are not dealing at an early stage with youth offending and we are not giving them the necessary treatment; we are simply resorting to prisons more and more routinely.  
We have heard the proposition that we need to consider the broader issues that underpin the purpose of this bill which is to amend section 34 of the Policing Act. I think that is the key section. To be fair having read that section just this morning I can understand that it is clear and easy to see how the issue could have been overlooked. The section simply states—I will paraphrase—that the decision from Crown Law turns on the definition of the word “conviction”. Obviously the legal definition of that word is such that the police were in error when they were retaining information relating to young people because technically it was not a conviction coming through the Youth Court unless it triggered section 283(o) of the Act or the penalty applied was involving direction to the District Court. So there is clear evidence—or it can be reasonably said—that this issue was overlooked that there was no analysis and that nobody at the time picked up the fact that the simple declaration of that word “conviction” was actually going to put in error the police’s assumptions that they could continue to gather that information.  
It is perhaps pre-empting a later part of this bill and a later clause but I think that under the purpose clause we can entertain the slightly broader issue— 
Debate interrupted. 
Sitting suspended from 1 p.m. to 2 p.m. 
House resumed.