Ms BADGER – Minister, on hooning; you have been tough on ‘TikTok turkeys’, but you’re not afraid to post videos of hooning on your own Facebook page. I and another Greens colleague, Ms Burnet, had a briefing with Tasmania Police around some matters not necessarily exclusive to hooning but we did have a discussion around the promotion and the fact that when we’re sharing those kinds of videos it’s not a deterrent. If anything, it’s sometimes considered a compliment by the people committing that offence and doing the reckless, irresponsible thing, to have a minister or the police then sharing that online. Will you seriously crack down and stop sharing those sorts of things online? It’s not a deterrent to stop it from happening.
Mr ELLIS – Thanks, Ms Badger. Also, just confirming with you, Ms Butler, it is three months that someone has to do the changeover with their licence when they move interstate.
Ms BUTLER – And how long –
CHAIR – We’ll leave that until your next round.
Mr ELLIS – I’m happy to clarify the law.
Ms BADGER – No, if you’ve got the answer for Ms Butler, I’m happy for you to say that now.
Mr ELLIS – I’ve just provided it.
Ms BADGER – That wasn’t her question.
Ms BUTLER – How long were you driving without a licence?
Mr ELLIS – In terms of your question, Ms Badger, it’s also important for people to understand the policing capabilities. That’s part of the reason Tasmania Police, for example, shared the video of drone footage taken over an area here in Hobart that is then able to track the person who committed the hooning offence and then shows a visual demonstration of police cars locating that person and pulling them up. It’s important for the community, and people doing the wrong thing, to understand that police have significant capabilities in that regard. That’s part of the reason Tasmania Police shared that. We want to also reassure the community more broadly, that if they’re reporting these kinds of offences to Tasmania Police, then Tasmania Police has the capability to take action.
Now, it is important that we also take action on people glorifying crimes, but showing the tools and powers of law enforcement is quite a different thing. I’ll pass to the commissioner if there’s anything further to add.
Ms ADAMS – Thank you, minister, and through you. We recently, through our media, published some footage of hooning as part of a crackdown. We think it is important for the community to understand the capability we have to detect vehicles as part of trying to educate motorists and drivers that that type of behaviour is completely unacceptable and we do have response capabilities.
Hooning was featured quite significantly in our community survey. Tasmanians want us to take action on poor and dangerous driving and, as a result, the use of drones and the work of our uniformed police in the coordinated response to some of the poor levels of driving, has been quite successful in being able to identify some of those poorer road users.
Ms BADGER – I don’t think anyone is disagreeing that it’s important for the community to be aware, whether they’re committing the crime or concerned about hooning, to understand what resources Tasmania Police have to crack down on that and how that’s changing. I wouldn’t underestimate the intellect of Tasmanians, most of them understand how drones work and there’s a way to mediate what responses are available to crack down on this crime without showing it and making it something that people might strive to have shared and be a part of. Will you seriously reconsider how that is being mediated to the Tasmanian people into the future? That’s probably more directed at yourself, minister, than Tasmania Police, appreciating that was there’s only been one incident recently where that’s been shared.
Mr ELLIS – Thanks Ms Badger. It’s important that we are communicating about our police capabilities.
