The Bill represents the government’s first step to fulfil its election commitment to bring sentencing practices and sentencing law into line with community expectations. Under a heading entitled Custodial Sentences’, the then Attorney-General ‘Increased explained that the Bill provided two categories of offenders who will receive ‘for increased custodial sentences’ sexual offenders’ and violent – ‘serious ‘serious offenders’. The Bill made two mechanisms available to the courts ensure those ‘to offenders receive the sentences expected by the community’: removing both categories of offender from the ambit of the provision requiring the court to take into account the abolition of remissions in sentencing in order to the effect of consistently and uniformly increasing the custodial ‘have sentences for serious sexual and violent offenders by 33 per cent’; and directing the court, once it has decided that a custodial sentence is warranted, determining the appropriate length of the custodial sentence, to the ‘in protection of the community as the primary sentencing consideration’. In service of this second mechanism, the Bill gave clearly expressed statutory ‘a authority to courts when determining the appropriate sentence that they need not be constrained by the common law principle of proportionality which effectively prevents a court from imposing a sentence beyond what is proportionate to the crime’. Separately, and significantly, under a different head of explanation in the Second Reading Speech, the Bill addresses the community’s concern that multiple offenders generally serve ‘also their sentences concurrently’ by the court that in sentencing serious sexual ‘direct[ing] offenders the presumption is that, unless there are exceptional circumstances, sentences will not be concurrent’. In conclusion, the then Attorney-General stated: The government recognises that parts of the community believe that current sentencing law and practices for violent crime, especially sexual assault, reflect an attitude that such offences are taken lightly. If this were true, it also sends out a dangerous message about how this society values its citizens, particularly women and children. The Bill is clear evidence of the government’s abhorrence of such an attitude. The message of the
The Bill represents the government’s first step to fulfil its election commitment to bring sentencing practices and sentencing law into line with community expectations. Under a heading entitled ‘Increased Custodial Sentences’, the then Attorney-General explained that the Bill provided ‘for two categories of offenders who will receive increased custodial sentences’ – ‘serious sexual offenders’ and ‘serious violent offenders’. The Bill made two mechanisms available to the courts ‘to ensure those offenders receive the sentences expected by the community’: removing both categories of offender from the ambit of the provision requiring the court to take into account the abolition of remissions in sentencing in order to ‘have the effect of consistently and uniformly increasing the custodial sentences for serious sexual and violent offenders by 33 per cent’; and directing the court, once it has decided that a custodial sentence is warranted, ‘in determining the appropriate length of the custodial sentence, to the protection of the community as the primary sentencing consideration’. In service of this second mechanism, the Bill gave ‘a clearly expressed statutory authority to courts when determining the appropriate sentence that they need not be constrained by the common law principle of proportionality which effectively prevents a court from imposing a sentence beyond what is proportionate to the crime’. Separately, and significantly, under a different head of explanation in the Second Reading Speech, the Bill ‘also addresses the community’s concern that multiple offenders generally serve their sentences concurrently’ by ‘direct[ing] the court that in sentencing serious sexual offenders the presumption is that, unless there are exceptional circumstances, sentences will not be concurrent’. In conclusion, the then Attorney-General stated: The government recognises that parts of the community believe that current sentencing law and practices for violent crime, especially sexual assault, reflect an attitude that such offences are taken lightly. If this were true, it also sends out a dangerous message about how this society values its citizens, particularly women and children. The Bill is clear evidence of the government’s abhorrence of such an attitude. The message of the
Sentencing%20of%20Offenders%20Sexual%20Penetration%20with%20a%20Child%20under%2012_0.docx