The ACT opposition used an estimates hearing on Monday to attack the government for delays in bringing in the tough anti-bikie powers, which aim to stymie bikie activity by preventing certain individuals from meeting.

Opposition Leader Jeremy Hanson said the prospect of consorting laws in the ACT was raised in 2009, but was dismissed by the government as "tub-thumping".

Attorney-General Simon Corbell is now pushing ahead with anti-consorting laws in the territory, arguing police intelligence has changed, and the ACT is now at greater risk.

Mr Hanson attacked the government for not acting earlier, despite warnings from groups such as the Australian Federal Police Association that the ACT's lack of consorting laws was bringing interstate bikies to the territory.

"Why is that in 2009, it was tub-thumbing, but the evidence now shows that exactly what was warned in the evidence of 2009 has come to fruition?" Mr Hanson said.

Mr Corbell said the debate in 2009 focused on much harsher regimes being introduced interstate.

He said police advice on the risk posed by bikie gangs had changed within only the past six to 12 months.

Mr Corbell said acting earlier would effectively have been "jumping at shadows", and a disproportionate and unjustified limit on human rights.

"The government's position has always been if circumstances change, we will give considerations to the legal framework to respond to that," he said.

"We won't jump at shadows, but we will respond firmly when circumstances change … and that's clearly now the case."

"We could have responded five, six, seven years ago, but it would have been disproportionate. It would have been pre-emptive, disproportionate and unjustified."

The government has proposed a model of anti-consorting laws, which would rely on consorting bans issued by police or the courts to certain individuals.

If those individuals repeatedly breached the ban, they would face two years behind bars.

The proposed regime has attracted significant opposition, with the Human Rights Commissioner, the Law Society, and the Bar Association concerned about the significant limitation on human rights and the potential misuse of the powers.

A NSW Ombudsman's report published in April found that between 2012 and 2015, 44 per cent of those subjected to consorting provisions by general-duties police were Aboriginal.

Critics have also questioned whether the level of bikie activity in the ACT warrants such a significant curbing of human rights.

The government estimates a total membership of 45 bikies, not including associates, split among three clubs – the Rebels, the Nomads, and the Comancheros.

But Mr Corbell used estimates on Monday to warn that bikies in Canberra, although few in number, were responsible for a disproportionate volume of organised crime.

"It is simply not reasonable to use as an argument against these laws that the number of people involved is small, and therefore we don't need them," he said.

"Because the fact is that this is a small number of people, but with a very disproportionate effect on the level of organised crime in our community. That organised crime has costs and impacts, both economically and on a broad level of individuals in our community."

He said there was also a risk that the ACT's lack of consorting laws was making it a visiting place for bikies, including for gang leadership.

"They are coming to the ACT because they are able to meet together in person here, whereas they can't do that in other jurisdictions," Mr Corbell said.

"So national leadership groups are meeting here in Canberra, and organising and planning their activities here in Canberra face to face.

"I don't want those people here in the ACT, and I don't think anyone else does really either.

"So we need mechanisms to respond to that."