During his first term of office, Brown introduced a wide range of private member's initiatives, which include freedom of information, death with dignity, lowering parliamentary salaries, gay law reform, banning the battery-hen industry and advocation for nuclear free Tasmania. His 1987 bill to ban semi-automatic guns was voted down by both Liberal and Labor members of Tasmania's House of Assembly, nine years before the Port Arthur massacre resulted in a successful federal Liberal bid to achieve the same results.