Commonwealth Parole Board Bill 2025 and Commonwealth Parole Board (Consequential and Transitional Provisions) Bill 2025

Submission Date: 10 November 2025

The Law Council of Australia provided a submission to the Legal and Constitutional Affairs Legislation Committee’s (the Committee’s) review of the Commonwealth Parole Board Bill 2025 (the CPB Bill) and the Commonwealth Parole Board (Consequential and Transitional Provisions) Bill 2025, together referred to as ‘the Bills’.

The Law Council strongly supports the establishment of a Commonwealth Parole Board to make independent, risk-informed decisions about the conditional release and management of federal offenders. The Law Council therefore welcomes the Government’s progress in this important area of reform.

While the Law Council supports the passage of the Commonwealth Parole Board Bill 2025 and the Commonwealth Parole Board (Consequential and Transitional Provisions) Bill 2025, the Law Council has identified several areas where the proposed framework can benefit from further attention. These areas relate to:

• the reliance on non-legislative guidelines to set out important procedural aspects of the Parole Board, and the absence of an obligation to consult on the development of such guidelines;
• the absence of a legislatively enshrined right to appear before the Parole Board;
• the absence of a legislatively enshrined right to legal representation and assistance when preparing submissions to the Parole Board and any subsequent appearance;
• the minimum qualifications of the Chair and Deputy Chair, noting the important functions delegated to these positions;
• the need to promote gender equality on the Parole Board and ensure that it consists of individuals with a diverse range of lived experiences, including First Nations people, culturally and linguistically diverse communities, and persons with knowledge or experience of disability; and
• the importance of public reporting on the Parole Board’s activities, including information on demographics of parole applicants, and data on federal parole outcomes in relation to offence types.

The Law Council thanks the Committee for its consideration of these matters.

Recommendations

• The Commonwealth Parole Board Bill 2025 (the CPB Bill) should be amended to require that guidelines developed under section 13 are to be subject to stakeholder consultation and, where appropriate, publicly available.
• The CPB Bill should be amended to include an opportunity for offenders to appear at a hearing before the Board where the authority is of the opinion that the information currently before it does not justify releasing the person on parole.
• In the alternative, section 23 should be amended to list considerations that must be taken into account when determining whether an interview should be conducted with a person being considered for parole.
• The CPB Bill should be amended to include an express recognition of a federal offender’s right to legal representation or assistance.
• Passage of the Bills must be accompanied by additional funding for the provision of legal assistance for federal offenders interacting with the Commonwealth Parole Board.
• Proposed subsection 29(3) should require that both the Chair and Deputy Chair are enrolled as legal practitioners. Consideration should also be given to requiring a minimum level of practising experience in a superior court for a sufficient number of years.
• Proposed paragraph 29(4)(b) should include reference to the desirability of ensuring equal gender representation on the Parole Board.
• Proposed subsection 29(5) should include reference to individuals with a diverse range of lived experiences, including First Nations people, culturally and linguistically diverse communities, and persons with knowledge or experience of disability.
• The CPB Bill should provide that the Parole Board is not bound by the rules of evidence.
• The Parole Board annual report should be required to report on further matters, subject to confidentiality and privacy requirements, such as the demographics of parole applicants and data on federal parole outcomes in relation to offence types.

General comments

Release on parole engages several connected and important statutory purposes including:

• the protection of the community;
• the rehabilitation of the offender; and
• the reintegration of the offender into the community.¹

These purposes provide essential context for considering the amendments proposed by the Bills. Importantly, while those three purposes cover different ground they interact and, in some respects, overlap. No pre-eminence or priority is given to any one purpose.² As Chief Justice French commented in Hogan v Hinch, ‘[r]ehabilitation, if it can be achieved, is likely to be the most durable guarantor of community protection and is clearly in the public interest’.³

The Law Council has for many years supported the establishment of a Commonwealth Parole Board tasked with making independent, risk-informed decisions about the conditional release and management of federal offenders and other detained persons. The Law Council's 2022 Position Paper, Principles Underpinning a Federal Parole Authority, continues to set out the Law Council’s views on the key design principles for the Parole Board: namely independence, transparency, procedural fairness, and accountability.⁴

The current legislative framework is no longer appropriate given the significant rise in Commonwealth criminal prosecutions and convictions since 1990. Among other things, it provides that the Attorney-General, or their delegate, is the decision maker in relation to an offender’s release on parole or licence, and requires parole to be considered only annually following the end of the non-parole period. This legislative framework has been described as ‘labyrinthine’.⁵

The Law Council has long argued that individuals incarcerated for federal offences should have their application for liberty considered in a transparent and accountable manner. This is better supported through the establishment of an independent statutory body with the power to make parole decisions. An independent Parole Board addresses the risk of perceived political pressure or interference in parole decisions and brings the federal process in line with state and territory jurisdictions.

While the Law Council supports the passage of the Bills, there are aspects of the proposed Parole Board that fall short of the recommended approach. These areas for improvement are outlined in this submission.

^{1 Crimes Act 1914 (Cth), s 19AKA.
2 Khawaja v Attorney-General (Cth) (2022) 293 FCR 396; [2022] FCA 334 at [15] (Thawley J).
3 Hogan v Hinch [2011] HCA 4, [32].
4 Law Council of Australia, ‘Principles underpinning a federal parole authority’ (Position Paper, November 2022), available at <https://lawcouncil.au/resources/policies-and-guidelines/position-paper-federal-parole-authority>.
5 R v Carroll [1991] 2 VR 509 at 514. See also Justice Mark Weinberg, ‘The Labyrinthine Nature of Federal Sentencing’ (Keynote address, Current Issues in Federal Crime and Sentencing Conference, National Judicial College of Australia and ANU College of Law, Canberra, 11 February 2012).}

Last Updated on 28/11/2025

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