Concerns have been raised about the accuracy of the government data which stakeholders have used for their submissions to the ACT Assembly's ongoing inquiry into dangerous driving.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
Tom McLuckie, who is advocating for an independent review of sentencing in the ACT, brought the data anomalies to the attention of one of the stakeholders, the Justice Reform Initiative.
It is understood the ACT Law Society also used the same data in its submission. Mr McLuckie, who has analysed ACT sentencing data in detail and has access to the database, was worried if the data concerning one of the most serious of driving offences - that of culpable driving causing death - had not been tallied correctly and that data has then been used by a variety of agencies and stakeholders to support their positions, this would badly skew a range of outcomes and views.
"The data flaw inflates the number of culpable driving causing death offences over the past 10 years from nine to 15, and also the time that offenders spent in prison as a result of this offence, which is not the same as the custodial sentence pronounced in the judgement," he said.
"I raised the issue of duplicates in the database with the Attorney-General's office almost a month ago and their response was they would 'get back to me'. This still hasn't happened."
Under public pressure to hold the independent judicial review - backed by an online campaign and e-petition which gathered thousands of supporters - last month ACT Attorney General Shane Rattenbury announced a new law and sentencing advisory council.
In August 2022, Mr Rattenbury also commissioned a study to be undertaken by the Justice and Community Safety Directorate around bail practices - concentrating heavily on the question of whether recent bail outcomes meant a rethink of existing attitudes around the granting or denial of bail was overdue.
Police data showed more than 940 bail breaches in the ACT for the first half of 2021, placing the capital on target to record its highest ever number of breaches.