ANOTHER Dubbo City Councillor has weighed in on the sentencing debate, encouraging Council and the community to lobby for tougher mandatory minimum sentences for a wider range of crimes.
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Cr Greg Mohr believes there are numerous instances in NSW where tougher penalties should apply for repeat offenders, but says Mayor Mathew Dickerson is barking up the wrong tree by singling out the sentencing behaviours of individual magistrates.
"We need to lobby the State Government to change the laws," he said.
"The magistrates are working within the scope of the law presented to them. They can't work outside those boundaries."
Cr Mohr claimed mandatory minimum sentencing had worked when it was introduced in New York and said it needed to be introduced in NSW.
The elevation of Dubbo MP Troy Grant to Deputy Premier had presented an ideal opportunity to "get into the Premier's ear" about taking a good hard look at issues such as sentencing, bail and parole, Cr Mohr said.
"As a council we need to work together with our judicial officers, them knowing how someone can be sentenced and how things are done, and work with our state MP and Attorney-General to change the laws."
Cr Mohr was concerned government policy was being shaped as a result of "jails being full", so while there was an emphasis on rehabilitation, with many offenders it was not working.
"There used to be weekend detention, but now people are being pushed out into society to rehabilitate," he said.
"An issue is the difficulty of accessing rehabilitation. At the same time, if someone goes into rehab, they have to be fair dinkum about it, much like if you want to give up smoking, you either want to or you don't.
"A court can't force someone into rehabilitation without the offender wanting to rehabilitate."
Serious consideration needed to be given to tightening parole conditions for repeat offenders, Cr Mohr said.
"If there is someone who's been in and out of jail all of their lives and they're granted parole again, obviously it's not working, so we need to look at fixed terms for mandatory sentencing after so many times," he said.
"Three strikes and you're out, for instance, you're not entitled to an intensive correction order or home detention.
"It needs to be made a lot harder, making the laws tougher, to deter people at the coalface and get them to really think about it before they commit a crime."
Mandatory sentencing might also reduce instances where police had worked hard to arrest and prepare a case against someone who was "let off on a technicality", Cr Mohr said.
Cr Mohr also raised concerns about "discounts" offenders received during sentencing, some of which he believed needed to be re-examined.
"Someone might come to court for the first time and if they plead guilty they'll get a 25 per cent discount straight up," he said.
"But there are other discounts for being underprivileged, having a bad upbringing, using drugs and alcohol.
"Some offenders couldn't care less about rehabilitation, but if a solicitor puts forward that they have drug and alcohol problems, under the sentencing regime the magistrate has to consider that."