North Australian FISH FINDER TM forums

Intertidal = 2 km’s ?

Wonder if they’ll have arresting authority at the Perons

In order to prosecute someone, you need to be able to id them
Without rego or licences, how are they gong to id anyone
Years ago in another life, legislation was introduced hat forced people to give their names. You would be surprised at the number of Michael Mouse’s and Donald Ducks that are out there
Just imagine in court “the suspect was driving a 5m tinny and he was male
To be honest, every other state in Oz has some form of fishing permit system so its not a big deal in the big scheme of things
Im currently in Qld and a yearly permit is $35

nomad wrote: ↑Sat Dec 19, 2020 6:55 pm
Im currently in Qld and a yearly permit is $35

As is said every time this topic comes up, for many of us it's not about the money/cost ....

As is said every time this topic comes up, for many of us it's not about the money/cost ....
[/quote].

Later news reported in case anyone missed it. Confusing to say the least...

In other states where you have to pay a fee, you usually get some benefit from it
In tassie, you can nominate where you want your $ spent
In the Qld stocked impoundments, the $ goes to restocking programs
In the NT, we know where the $ will go and it wont be for our benefit

Bizarre series of events, but a good fit for 2020.

Might be small potatoes soon ... the Chinese fishing fleet will soon be based in Daru, Torres Strait, courtesy of a new $200m port - will the fleet respect Australia's maritime borders?

The Daru Chinese "fishing port" is Australia's Cuban missile crisis.

Broad view.

It seems pretty straight forward and the NLC is pretty open about it.

NLC wants more money per annum from the NT Govt or it will "twist the Govt's arm" by making it harder for NT recreational fishermen to access fishing sites.

Govt has to go along with the proposal and provide effective policing of the law or pay more money to the NLC NOT to introduce the proposal.

Effective policing means more resources (funding) and a backlash from recreational fishing circles once the arrests start.

There'll be arrests of the Donald Duck/Mickey Mouse/Donald Trump brigade if the responding officers believe that proceeding by summons/fine would not be effective and the offender would be arrested, no bail if no true and correct i/d is produced and placed before the next sitting of the magistrate's court. Stay in cells until that time if no i/d offered.

A few arrests like that will cause much consternation in fishing circles and the comic book aliases would disappear as fast as the growing public/political backlash.

The Govt could give powers of arrest to public service fishing inspectors OR NTO rangers to reduce the load on water police. THAT wouldn't inflame the situation much would it?

The NT Govt is faced with the choice of going along with policing the proposed NLC permit requirement along with the political and resource funding ramifications OR "buy the NLC off" with face-saving "economic assistance" package.

Until next demand from NLC.

Meanwhile, what savings could the Govt introduce to off-set increased payments to the NLC After all,"somebody" has to pay for it.

What is the NLC offering in exchange for obtaining a permit? Obviously not like Qld impoundments or tassie where they upgrade facilities

I'm not sure where the power of arrest comes into play for something that is non existent ie the need to carry identification while fishing in the NT
I'm not aware if the nt has mandatory requirements to truthfully answer any question of an authorised officer. Yet!

No boat rego = no way to id the boat. No boat licence = no way to id the people on the boat

I can just hear it now “yes your honour, the defendant was in a 5m alum tinny with a motor on the back”
Judge “well officer, that describes about 10 000 boats in the NT
Anything to i/d the defendant?
Yes your honour “he was a male person between 20 and 40 y/o with a scruffy appearance and he was holding a xxx beer”
Judge “well that describes around another 100 000 people in the NT. Case dismissed

The backlash when they were going to intro regos caused the fall of a govt. (I float and I vote)

123. Arrest without warrant by members of Police Force

A member of the Police Force may, without warrant, arrest and
take into custody any person where he believes on reasonable grounds that the
person has committed, is committing or is about to commit an offence.

If a person enters on aboriginal land or tidal waters covering aboriginal land without a permit, they are committing or have committed an offence under the Aboriginal Lands Act and therefore can be arrested without warrant.

Usually that wont happen, the coppers will deal with the situation another way (warn somebody off, on-the-spot fine etc) but they will still want to know the person's true and correct name and address.

If one is given, the person will be asked to produce evidence to that effect. Driver's licence or similar document. The police officer already has reasonable grounds to arrest the person anyway.

Playing ducks and drakes with a suspected untrue name, may simply be a further offence in itself if the piece of legislation provides that a person MUST supply a true and correct name and address when asked to do so.

It's also practically begging for arrest for being a smart-arse.

Once arrested, Donald/Mickey/Bill Smith is processed at the station and bail conditions are looked at.

You can bet that if there is still ducks and drakes about identity, there will be no watch house bail. The person will stay in the cells until the next day when put before the magistrate.

Fronting up to a magistrate on two charges claiming to be Donald or Mickey won't go down well with the beak either when considering a penalty.

Any boating registration info only identifies the boat which can't commit an offence. Only the person in charge of the vessel can commit an offence.

So boating rego info (if introduced) may give details of the person in whose name the vessel is registered but it may not be the person driving it (committing the offence).

 "if the piece of legislation provides that a person MUST supply a true and correct name and address when asked to do so"
Is the critical part.
I've been out of the game for a long time but not many regs have this provision

Every person questioned would be subject to arrest, but that's not practical.
Most are dealt with in other ways or the courts and cells would be fuller than they are

Many DO indeed have the provision that people are obliged to give their true and correct name and address if asked.

However, we're talking about people who are on aboriginal land illegally here. No permit. THEY can be arrested without warrant anyway.

In the case of a summons or an on-the-spot fine for that offence, police must have a person's identity. No identity (or identity believed on reasonable grounds to be false) then no summons and no fine can be issued. Therefore proceeding by summons or fine ticket would be ineffective.

What can a copper do then?

Carry out the arrest, charge the person with an offence against the Aboriginal Land Act and put the person before a magistrate thereby making the problem one between the offender and the court system (NOT the police). Arresting officer can then move on to next reported complaint.

Only have to do that a couple of times and the bravado will disappear rapidly from the "you can't do anything about us" brigade.

For the same reason's that a summons or fine can't be issued, bail can't be gived either.

A night or two in the watch house cells with no bail soon starts people thinking differently.

Every person questioned would be subject to arrest,

No. Only people who a police officer believes (stronger than "suspects" ) on reasonable grounds to have committed,....etc can be arrested. Questioning somebody is NOT "reasonable grounds to believe".

Asking questions is part of investigating (searching for facts to determine the truth of a matter).

It may be that the answers given cause an officer to form sufficient belief...etc..etc.

An officer can indeed determine facts from answers particularly if those are corroborated (2 or 3 witnesses independently saying the same thing would be classed as a fact ---corroboration).

All I'm doing here is trying to show just how easily a circumstance where a person illegally on Aboriginal Land (or waters covering it) fails/refuses to give a true and correct name and address can be handled.

The NT Govt won't want to go down that path (but they can easily if only to make a point quickly as a warning).

yeah the old 'reasonableness' chestnut.
I've spent many a day listening to some of the best silks arguing on the subject and im still no better off

if the fisheries(coppers) dont yet have the provision to answer truthfully on their statutes, they will soon put it in place (but we all know how long legislation takes to enact)

i seriously doubt that and beak will uphold an arrest as the result of 'failure to answer truthfully'.
Its when they play up and resist that they will be validated

I cant wait for the precedent to be set and we all know that the best lawyers win the argument, regardless of the truth

NT fishing permits are back in the news, big story in the NT News today. The newspaper reports that the NLC will make an announcement tomorrow (Monday).

Next step is boat registration and cost to owners, to be able to identify who’s boat it is will need the rego number. At the moment joe blogs owns heaps of boats. I hope you dont get to that, NT has the best boat owner and fishing rules in Australia be a shame to lose it. WA is getting worse by the year with all the licenses required to be able to go catch a feed of different seafood. You need a boat fishing license to go catch some crabs out of your tinny 30 mt from shore