[Peetwo]

CASA Hansard is out:  Rural and Regional Affairs and Transport Legislation Committee(Senate-Friday, 27 October 2017)

This Hansard segment IMO is one of the most interesting to come out Senate Estimates for a long time. I have already quoted certain parts on the Drone Wars thread but in light of the CASA/ATSB/ (Hood & Carmody) continued embuggerance of Dom James, I would like to draw attention to the following quoted Hansard:-    

Barry O on investigative standards & administrative due process... :

CHAIR: I get the resource thing. I get that. I know what's required in terms of resources to investigate matters. If I were a drone operator out there and decided I was going to flout the rules—this debate's not going to go away. In the last 24 hours, we've had drugs dropped into a prison. It's like living through a self-fulfilling prophecy about what's happening around this space. I wouldn't be concerned about you mob. I would think: 'There have been these other incidents. They didn't pursue them with any energy. If they're not going to go after them, they're definitely not going to come after me.' This is a problem. If you've got a resource issue that you say impedes your ability to direct people to do a thorough investigation about breaches of the law around the use of drones, my advice is you should start making the argument to government that you need more resources, not say, 'We're not going to do it because we're not equipped to do it.'

Mr Carmody : I understand your point, thank you. My only response is that the allocation of resources for investigations of drones or any other matter depends a great deal on the seriousness of the matter.

CHAIR: That takes up the matter of Senator Sterle. It's my background, to some extent. We investigate matters and we prosecute people, where possible, for breaches of any law—drones or anything else—and we do that for a purpose. It's to inhibit this behaviour in the first instance. If we have to wait until the person is murdered before we dispatch a team of detectives around to have a look at it—there are similarities here. If you know that people are breaching the law, but we wait for some catastrophic aspect to it before we dedicate a body of resources, that's not a deterrent for people to behave in a lawful manner, in my view.

Dr Aleck : I understand your view. We did not wait. We did investigate. We issued. We came up with a penalty.

CHAIR: We'll wait to see the matters come back on notice, but I have to tell you, an interview—and I don't know who the others were. Dr Aleck's investigator would be one of the few people in the room who wouldn't know who was at the rugby match or who goes to these matches. It's well known. It's well publicised. You can Google it. The same people go and run around that flat every time. This young man who operated the drone knows everyone in this place—I promise you. I'm interested in what he said when your investigator quite properly said to him: 'Who else was present? What are the names and identities of the other people that you don't know about?'

Dr Aleck : We took on notice whether that question was asked. I said that, in my view—

CHAIR: Of course. I've got to tell you, if your investigator didn't ask it, you want to get him or her down into the car park and get them out of your business as quickly as you can. That would have to be the most fundamental question.

Dr Aleck : I would say that the questions that were asked of the individual were not answered in a particularly fulsome manner—and there's no obligation for anyone to do so. I'm not justifying that, but it's a reality.

CHAIR: You're telling me now that you have at least advice that the individual did not cooperate with your investigators in a full and wholesome manner.

Dr Aleck : I would say that the individual did not respond fulsomely and, to that extent, was not as cooperative as we would like to have been.

CHAIR: Were these interviews recorded?

Dr Aleck : Not to my knowledge, no.

CHAIR: You're telling me someone started an investigation and interviewed an individual, at least with a view to a prosecution, and didn't record it to the standard that would be required to underpin that prosecution? Are there no notes, no contemporaneous record of the conversation, no recording taped, no video or otherwise? Is that what you're telling us?

Dr Aleck : I will only say that the maximum consequence of such an event was an infringement notice. I'm not aware of matters of that kind.

CHAIR: That is not the burden of my question. Are you telling this committee that your investigator, confronted with a witness or a potential offender, who you say wasn't totally cooperative, did not record in any shape or form the interview that took place?

Dr Aleck : I said I don't believe so, but I'll confirm that.

Senator STERLE: Is the investigator in the room?

Dr Aleck : No.

CHAIR: I'll tell you what we'll do—are they in Canberra?

Mr Carmody : To clarify, if I may, I thought the question might not have been clear for Dr Aleck. When you said, 'Record in any way, shape or form,' I'm not certain whether there was a voice recording, but there was an investigative report. There will be notes. There is an investigation.

CHAIR: That's different from the evidence. I'll tell you what we're going to do. When my colleagues have finished with you, why don't you have tea and bikkies in the other room, reach out and come back to give us a more fulsome answer of you records? I don't want to just take this on notice, because this has taken a direction of its own. I'd like you to come back and, if there's any possibility in this modern world that they can transmit those notes taken at the time or get any other recording into your hands, we'll look forward to listening to it and examining it further

MTF?- Definitely...P2