Julian Leeser (Berowra, Liberal Party, Shadow Attorney-General) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I seek leave to move a motion in relation to the Crimes Amendment (Mandatory Minimum Sentences for Child Sexual Abuse) Bill 2025.

Leave not granted.

I move:

That so much of the standing and sessional orders be suspended as would prevent the Member for Berowra from introducing the Crimes Amendment (Mandatory Minimum Sentences for Child Sexual Abuse) Bill 2025 without notice, with the debate being adjourned to the next sitting following the moving and seconding of the motion for the second reading.

We're seeking urgency because this bill is about the safety of our children. It's also about sending an unmistakable message: those who exploit, abuse or prey upon children will face justice. Child sexual offences are some of the most serious offences on the Commonwealth statute book. Any person who commits one of these crimes should expect to do serious prison time, and I don't think there's a parent in the country who'd disagree with me. This bill is about restoring community confidence that the law treats these crimes with the seriousness they deserve. When I speak to people in my community and across the country, time and again I hear families who are concerned about child sexual abuse and its proliferation. They're concerned about what we saw in the childcare centres. They're concerned about the safety of children online. They want their children to be safe, and they're sickened by the offences we've seen reported in the media.

Data released by the Australian Centre to Counter Child Exploitation revealed that there were 82,764 reports of online child exploitation in 2024-25. That's an average of more than 226 a day. It's a figure that bears repeating. Over the course of the last year, there have been more than 226 reports of online child sexual exploitation every single day. It's an epidemic of child sexual abuse. In just the last year, we've seen a 41 per cent jump in online child sexual abuse exploitation reports. It's sickening, it's sadistic, and it's happening every day. It's clear that more needs to be done and in particular that there's an urgent need to strengthen our sentencing regime to remove predators from our communities and protect all Australian children.

The need for urgent action to strengthen our sentencing regime is highlighted by the case of DPP and Maloney, which has attracted significant attention in the last fortnight. That's the case that was handed down in the County Court of Victoria. It involved a father who abused a five-year-old daughter on 19 separate occasions, producing and transmitting 77 separate files of child sexual abuse material. These files included 13 videos and 64 images. The judgement makes for very difficult reading, and I don't intend to repeat it here. Like every child in that situation, she was powerless. She was five. She was vulnerable and dependent. But the point that made it particularly difficult for me was when it became clear that, as she was being abused, the young girl knew what was happening to her was wrong. On at least two occasions, she told the father she didn't like it. She told him she didn't like it. No child should have to do that.

The worst thing about it is that there are literally tens of thousands of instances that involve that type of horrific abuse or worse every year. We know this from data released by the Australian Centre to Counter Child Exploitation and others. Australian families rightly expect that any person who commits these appalling crimes should be removed from the community for a very long time. They should serve serious time in prison. But the Maloney case also highlights a problem: the offender in that case will be eligible for release after just 2½ years. That's a shockingly low sentence. It means that the young girl who was so shockingly abused by her father will not even be eight years old when her abuser is back on the streets. When you dig into the detail of the sentencing, it gets worse. The need for action by us here in this federal parliament becomes clear.

The offender in the Maloney case was convicted of three offences: one state offence for the sexual abuse of their child and two Commonwealth offences for producing and transmitting child sexual abuse material. Each of those Commonwealth offences carries a maximum sentence of 15 years imprisonment, but, shockingly, in the Maloney case, the court directed that the offender serve just six months for those Commonwealth offences. After that, the offender will be released on a recognisance release order, which is similar to good-behaviour bond. Six months—it's just appalling.

It's for Victoria and the Allan government to account for the justice system in that state, but, at the Commonwealth level, there is something seriously wrong with our sentencing regime if a person can produce 77 separate files of child abuse material and then transmit them to the world at large via the internet and face just six months in prison. These sentences don't reflect community expectations. They're a travesty, and this bill seeks to correct that.

The Commonwealth doesn't have a general power to make criminal laws; that's the preserve of the states. Commonwealth crimes must be linked to a head of constitutional power, and that means the Commonwealth Criminal Code deals with child sex offences in Australia in two ways. First, it establishes child sex offences that involve the use of a carriage service. Those are offences that involve the use of the internet or communications networks. Second, it establishes child sex offences that involve the use of a postal service. This bill today is a simple bill. It's about the sentences that are handed down for five existing offences.

There is using a carriage service for child abuse material, which is an offence under section 474.22 of the Criminal Code. This is the provision that, among others, makes it an offence to transmit child abuse material. This is one of the offences at issue in the Maloney case. Another is possessing or controlling child abuse material obtained or accessed using a carriage service, which is an offence under 474.22(a) of the Criminal Code and is more or less self-explanatory. Possessing, controlling, producing, supplying or obtaining child abuse material for use through a carriage service is an offence under 474.23 of the code, and this appears to have been the other offence at issue in the Maloney case. The bill also deals with sentences for analogues of these offences that involve the use of a postal service. That's using a postal or similar service for child abuse material, an offence under 471.19 of the code, and possessing, controlling, producing, supplying or obtaining child abuse material for use through postal or similar services, an offence under 471.20 of the code. These are all existing offences.

The bill that we seek urgency to bring on does not change them or introduce new ones. We're not asking the parliament to deal with complex questions of fault and criminal guilt; we're dealing with sentencing only. More specifically, we're talking about the existing mandatory sentencing regime found in part 1B of the Crimes Act. The existing mandatory sentencing regime in part 1B of the Crimes Act is a legacy of the former coalition government. The case for the scheme was clear. Before it passed into law, 39 per cent of Commonwealth child sex offenders did not serve a single day in prison. There was a clear need to strengthen our sentencing regime, so the coalition introduced a bill in 2019. Among other things, it delivered a carefully calibrated mandatory minimum sentencing scheme for child sex offenders. This is not the sort of flat scheme that's usually criticised in academic literature. It has significant flexibility and important carve-outs for things that underage offenders so you don't end up with a situation where children themselves end up being in prison.

It's been the subject of a statutory review. As the Attorney herself has acknowledged, the review showed the existing scheme's been effective. As a result of that scheme, we've seen the proportion of offenders pleading guilty increase, imprisonment and total effective sentences are generally longer, and a higher number of offenders commit to rehabilitation. What does this lead to? It leads to safer streets and safer communities for all our children.

I want to acknowledge that that bill was eventually passed with bipartisan support. Labor initially pressed the Senate to remove the mandatory sentencing regime and in fact were successful in doing so. But, when they saw the extent of community backlash, they dropped their opposition. They didn't insist on their amendments to the scheme, and they facilitated its passage on a bipartisan basis through the parliament.

The mechanics of the bill that we propose to introduce if we get urgency are very straightforward. The bill would amend the Crimes Act to establish mandatory minimum sentences of five years imprisonment for the five offences I mentioned earlier. This is done in items 1, 2 and 3 of the schedule to the bill, which amend section 16AAA of the Crimes Act. This is the first-offence regime. Section 16AAB of the Crimes Act deals with the second and subsequent offences. This bill, in items 3 and 4, increases the existing mandatory minimum sentences for a second or subsequent instance of these offences. In those cases, the minimum will now be six years.

The remaining items deal with the recognizance release order scheme, which was the mechanism used in Maloney to release the offender after only six months for the Commonwealth offences. The bill addresses these issues by making it clear that, unless there are exceptional circumstances, a court that is sentencing a person for child sex offences must not grant a recognizance release order.

I want to conclude by emphasising that from the very beginning the coalition has sought to take a constructive and bipartisan approach to this issue. I wrote to the Attorney on 6 October flagging the coalition's grave concerns with the outcome we'd seen in Victoria and our intentions to introduce this bill. We asked for the government's support to do so. Yesterday I saw the Attorney's comments on Sky News indicating that she was open to the bill, and I welcome the bipartisan spirit in which they were made. In that same spirit, last night I wrote to the Attorney again, attaching a copy of the legislation, flagging our intention to introduce it today and again asking for support. It's disappointing that the spirit of bipartisanship did not extend to allowing us leave to introduce this bill today. I would have preferred not to attempt to suspend standing orders, but this is an issue on which there's clear and legitimate need for urgent action.

This is an issue on which we've sought to find common ground, and that common ground is very simple: any adult who sexually abuses a child should do serious prison time. I don't think there's a parent in Australia who'd disagree with us. I commend this motion to the House, and I encourage members to vote for the urgency that is needed to deal with these matters today.

Milton Dick (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Is the motion seconded?

Anne Webster (Mallee, National Party, Shadow Minister for Regional Development, Local Government and Territories) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I second the motion. Victorians, families and all Australians are reeling from the sentence imposed against a person for the sexual abuse of their five-year old daughter on at least 19 occasions, producing 77 files of child abuse material and sending it to a US paedophile in 2023. Leaving aside the public reaction to this monster's gender transition and resultant incarceration in a women's prison, and leaving aside the outcry from women's rights groups, for today's debate the key point is that the effective jail time this monster will serve for Commonwealth offences will be just six months. How does this even relate to the trauma that parent has left their daughter to live with for the rest of her life?

The way our justice system works means we can't do anything in this place about that sentence, but we can ensure that, for similar offending under Commonwealth law, a weak sentence like that never happens again. Leader of the Opposition Sussan Ley said on Tuesday:

When a monster abuses a five-year-old child, yet is then free to roam the streets of Victoria when that poor child hasn't even turned eight, that is not justice—it is a betrayal.

Just two weeks ago, the Albanese government took a delegation to the United Nations to promote how it was protecting children online. If this is genuinely a principle Labor stands by, it would support this bill.

Mandatory minimum sentencing generates a strong deterrent effect and is the front line of protecting children online. Without serious consequences for circulating child abuse material, online predators will be more inclined to run the risk of circulating their filth online.

On mandatory minimum sentencing, let's be clear that there has been a bipartisan approach to the need for such sentencing previously—for instance, on hate crime offences created earlier this year. I note, even on that front, the AFP commissioner, Krissy Barrett, has indicated those laws might need to be even stronger after antisemitic attacks that are now occurring. Late last year Labor also introduced mandatory minimum sentences for failure to cooperate with removal from Australia—in other words, for noncitizens facing deportation.

The merits of mandatory minimum sentences are not in dispute here. Therefore the question is why, having applied mandatory minimum sentences to other offences, they cannot also be applied to this form of crime. Mandatory minimum sentences under the Crimes Act are already imposed for the aggravated offences of using a postal, carriage or similar service for child pornography material. When the then coalition government introduced mandatory minimum sentences for those offences in 2020, the bill passed without division in the House. It was bipartisan. This bill expands that regime to first instances of offending and transmitting child sexual abuse material. Just one instance of child sexual abuse offending has devastating consequences. Present mandatory minimum sentences apply to cases of repeat offending, but why not for first-time offenders, where significant harm does occur? Why not when it might well be that the offender has been engaging in that activity for some time but never been caught until that time?

The AFP led Australian Centre to Counter Child Exploitation's triage unit reports said in recent years that the production of child sexual abuse material is rising very fast. The AFP reported last month a 41 per cent jump in the last reporting year to over 82,700 reports. That increase in the last reporting year is on top of a 45 per cent increase in the reporting year before that. Indeed, reports have more than doubled since 2020 and 2021. The latest figures equate to an average of 226 reports of child online sexual exploitation every single day. The ACCCE has warned that this is the tip of the iceberg due to underreporting. The Australian Child Maltreatment Study's latest data indicates 28.5 per cent of Australians aged 16 and over have experienced sexual abuse—more specifically, one in five men and one in three women.

On this government's watch, there is a child sexual abuse epidemic occurring. This bill implements one step in the many needed to protect children, our most precious little ones, and ensure future generations of Australians are safe, well and able to contribute fully to Australian society.

Julie Collins (Franklin, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

This bill was already scheduled to be introduced during the appropriate time for private members' bills. On that basis, I move:

That the debate be adjourned.

Milton Dick (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The question is that the debate be adjourned.