Colin Barnett has boldly proposed a new plan aimed at decreasing ‘crime,’ in Perth. The idea is to allow police to stop and search anyone, without suspected criminal activity, in Northbridge, Fremantle and beaches Mullalloo and Scarborough. The new legislation allows police to stop and search people (and vehicles) in these areas without having to prove reasonable suspicion that a crime has taken place. Barnett claims they’re going to be targeting people carrying weapons and drugs, I’m not sure they’re going to be able to tell who has a concealed weapon or drugs? These searches are aimed at being non-intrusive. I’m not entirely sure what is considered to be non-intrusive if they expect you’re concealing something? These searches are aimed at protecting families inn Northbridge. I’m not sure how many families are out in Northbridge and how many are the victims of violence whilst there?
Before you leave imagine the following… You’re a young designer who’s just started a job you’ve been dying to do. You’re out in Northbridge and the police want to stop and search you. Funnily enough your boss walks passed as you are being padded down. What do you say on Monday morning and how will your boss react?
As Heads will roll points out, where does this stop? If you’re concerned about your rights, there is information on who to voice your opinion to after the jump and a link to the facebook group directly below.
Colin Barnett
Premier; Minister for State Development
Address: 24th Floor, Governor Stirling Tower,
197 St Georges Terrace,
PERTH WA 6000
Telephone: 9222 9888
Fax: 9322 1213
e-Mail: wa-government@dpc.wa.gov.au
John Day
Minister for Planning; Culture and the Arts
Address: 13th Floor, Dumas House,
2 Havelock Street,
WEST PERTH WA 6005
Telephone: 9213 6600
Fax: 9213 6601
e-Mail: Minister.Day@dpc.wa.gov.au
Donna Faragher
Minister for Environment; Youth
Address: 10th Floor, Dumas House,
2 Havelock Street,
WEST PERTH WA 6005
Telephone: 9213 7250
Fax: 9213 7255
e-Mail: Minister.Faragher@dpc.wa.gov.au
Dr Elizabeth Constable
Minister for Education; Tourism
Address: 19th Floor, Governor Stirling Tower,
197 St Georges Terrace,
PERTH WA 6000
Telephone: 9222 9699
Fax: 9222 9288
e-Mail: Minister.Constable@dpc.wa.gov.au
Colin Barnett defends these laws by saying anyone who is in a declared area is giving up their civil rights. He is seeming to declare that only people who stay home after midnight, curled up in bed, have any civil rights worth defending. Also I just can not understand any logical debate how this plan will decrease violence in western australia? How much violence is being committed by concealed weapons? And if those people didn’t have weapons wouldn’t they just use their fists, or whatever they could get their hands on?
ALex’s time on hack is here… He showed Colin Barnett’s stupid side, wait maybe he just showed Colin Barnett is stupid.
http://www.abc.net.au/triplej/hack/podcast/tuesday.htm
1. I am deeply offended by the sextist remark Colin Barnett made in The West newspaper about this legislation making “young women” feel safer.
2. The police will be given metal detectors to find weapons… what about all the wooden, plastic or glass implements you can injury people with, not to mention what you can do with your bare hands and found objects.
3. Colin Barnett says on Hack that you would only get patted down if you set off the metal detector they run over you.. What about KEYS!? Colin. He reckons you only have to empty your pockets at stage 2 after you set the metal detector off… on those grounds, EVERYONE will get to stage 2!?
4. How are officers going to carry around these metal detectors!?
5. Anything can be defined as a weapon, what happens to the girl who gets her bag searched and they find the knife she cuts her apples up with everyday for morning tea?
6. What happens to the person who object to be stopped 3 times in one night? My sister was breathalysed 3 times on one night within a 10km journey by 3 different patrol cars and she wasn’t too friendly to the 3rd set of officers. (by the way she blew 0.0 all 3 times.)
7. What exactly are the consequences for refusing such a search!?
8. When one persons civil rights are disregarded, all our civil rights are disregarded. Gateway legislation like this is more dangerous then gateway drugs.
I’m glad you mentioned the part about sexism. When I went to write the article I omittted that becausei didn’t know how to explain what he was saying. ‘to protect young women,’ how many young women would feel like they need protecting by a big strong policeman?! Have we gone back in time?
You can listen to the Hack story on this link …
http://mpegmedia.abc.net.au/triplej/hack/daily/hack_tues_2009_10_13.mp3
While we’re at it can we mention the scan your ID and take a ‘mugshot’ like photo of you at increasing amounts of venues now. This wasn’t at any large club or anything either mind you, I was at Rosie O’Grady’s in Freo. Apparently according to the bouncer we will be seeing it everywhere in the next few months…joy.
It’s only a small thing really but doesn’t it create longer lines outside on the street and frustrated people that can’t get in and see who they came to see? I would think that they would want to minimize the amount of annoyed people on the streets since thats where most of the problems take place.
That sounds pretty frustrating. I haven’t had the mug shot thing happen to me yet, I wonder if it even deters any antisocial behaviour. Like you said if people are pissed off in the line then the trouble will start there, before anyone even gets into the club. Does that mean that we’re also forfeiting our rights by just entering a venue? And where’s the database that these photos are stored on? Are we being given a ‘criminal record,’ without committing a crime?
I’m fine with the fingerprint and ID scan if the information isn’t stored on a Database. We all know that there are a few suspect individuals working door security at venues across Perth and I doubt anyone would really want to grant access to such personal information to those people. However if the info was stored only for that night it could be used for good. If someone is kicked out of a club i’m fine with that information being relayed to all clubs across town to stop those people getting into another club and causing trouble. But yeah like i said, just as long as its deleted before the next day.
[...] all heard plenty about the proposed stop and search laws, and both Perthquake (previous article here) and Heads Will Roll (previous article here) are vehemently against these laws, as I’m sure [...]