"no intelligible boundary" on what "causes annoyance".

One up for the "No to Pope" group. They have tested the law about which I drew attention last week - the regulations governing World Youth Day.

As the Fairfax Press website reports:

• Annoyance clause invalid

• The judges said that the interpretation of clause 7.1 of the act, which allowed regulation of conduct deemed to be a cause of "annoyance", was invalid because it "affects freedom of speech in a way that, in our opinion, is not supported by the statutory powers".

• There was "no intelligible boundary" on what "causes annoyance".

Amen to that!

It is yet another embarrassment to the Iemma Government, although, in truth John Watkins ought carry the can for this. Even I could see that you could have driven a truck through those stupidly worded Regulations. I am glad that the court has ruled against the "annoyance" provisions.

Fw: Papal visit - outrageous regulations

I decided a long time ago that I would not go to Sydney to see the Pope.
I am over Popes, to be truthful.

However, that was before these outrageous Regulations were promulgated, last week.

It is modelled on the APEC legislation - the laws which brought us the arrest of the Chaser team, and then the subsequent expensive and embarrassing dropping of charges against them.

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Her Excellency the Governor, with the advice of the Executive Council, has made

the following Regulation under the World Youth Day Act 2006.

World Youth Day Amendment Regulation 2008

under the

World Youth Day Act 2006

JOHN WATKINS, M.P.,

Deputy Premier

25 June 2008

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World Youth Day Amendment Regulation 2008

Explanatory note

(f) empowers police officers and authorised members of the State Emergency Service and

the Rural Fire Service to direct a person within a World Youth Day declared area to cease engaging in conduct that is a risk to the safety of the person or others, causes annoyance or inconvenience to participants in a World Youth Day event or obstructs

a World Youth Day event (proposed clause 7 (1)), and

(g) makes it an offence (carrying a maximum penalty of 50 penalty units, currently $5,500) to fail, without reasonable excuse, to comply with such a direction (proposed clause 7 (2)), and

---

World Youth Day Amendment Regulation 2008

under the

World Youth Day Act 2006

7 Control of conduct within World Youth Day declared areas

(1) An authorised person may direct a person within a World Youth

Day declared area to cease engaging in conduct that:

(a) is a risk to the safety of the person or others, or

(b) causes annoyance or inconvenience to participants in a

World Youth Day event, or

(c) obstructs a World Youth Day event.

(2) A person must not, without reasonable excuse, fail to comply

with a direction given to the person under subclause (1).

Maximum penalty: 50 penalty units.

(3) A person is not guilty of an offence under this clause unless it is

established that the authorised person warned the person that a

failure to comply with the direction is an offence.

WORLD YOUTH DAY ACT 2006

Order under Section 3A

(World Youth Day declared areas)

I, ROY WAKELIN-KING, Chief Executive Officer of the World Youth Day Co-ordination Authority, in accordance with

the functions under section 3A of the World Youth Day Act 2006 ("the WYD Act") that the Deputy Premier and Minister

administering the WYD Act has delegated to me under section 51A of the WYD Act by Instrument of Delegation dated 29 May 2008, and having determined that certain areas are required for hosting a World Youth Day event, or for the provision

of services in relation to a World Youth Day event, hereby DESIGNATE each area specified in Schedule A hereunder to be

a "World Youth Day declared area".

WORLD YOUTH DAY ACT 2006

Order under Section 46

(Control of sale and distribution of articles in certain public places)

I, ROY WAKELIN-KING, Chief Executive Officer of the World Youth Day Co-ordination Authority ("the Authority"),

in accordance with the functions under section 46 of the World Youth Day Act 2006 ("the WYD Act") that the Deputy

Premier and Minister administering the WYD Act has delegated to me under section 51A of the WYD Act by Instrument of Delegation dated 29 May 2008 and having consulted with the Council of the City of Sydney in respect of land within the City of Sydney to which this order applies hereby SPECIFY:

1. each area described in Part 1 of Schedule A hereunder, excluding any part of the area described in Part 3 of Schedule A hereunder, to be "an Authority controlled area" for the purposes of section 46 of the WYD Act; and

2. each public place, or any part of a public place, that is within 500 metres of a transport facility or interchange or a World Youth Day venue or facility, being a public place, or part of a public place, that is shown on a map referred to in Part 2 of Schedule A hereunder, excluding any part of the public place described in Part 3 of Schedule A

hereunder, to be an "Authority controlled area" for the purposes of section 46 of the WYD Act.

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If I go I will wear a T-shirt with the following logo (on the front)

and photo (on the rear).

Surely a defence of truthfulness would get me over the narrow definition of "causing annoyance to participants in a World Youth Day event".

If not, I would love the opportunity to defend myself in court.

The photo is real, not faked up. Taken at Castel Gandolfo (Pope's Summer Residence) outside Rome, 8 September 1968.

It is a photo of me being introduced to Pope Paul VI, and about to kiss his ring.

---

Something to think about, eh?

Not many people could wear this T-shirt with it being "offensive", gratuitous or annoying to Pilgrims. It is almost too good an opportunity to resist.

More on Iemma's Transport "dream"

You will recall I wrote on Thursday about Iemma's mad proposal to sell off the power system in NSW, justified (supposedly) by the promise of an European-style metro system. Fat chance!

This is an independent view on the Sydney transport system and the litany of broken promises associated with it. This article is written by Ben Sandilands, and published by crikey.com.au on Friday, 14 December 2007.

Ben Sandilands writes:

In a curtain raiser to the silly season in Sydney, commuters are struggling to digest the linking of the $15 billion power privatisation/metro building/Iemma-escapes-from-being-Premier scenario outlined earlier this week by Crikey's Alex Mitchell.

City Rail, under its assorted logos and names under a string of Labor and Liberal premiers, has never completed a single rail project in full. It can’t even make the pitifully antiquated system it has today work with any semblance of efficiency. Nor the buses, or ferries, or their ticketing systems.

And Morris Iemma somehow expects people will elect John Watkins on the back of a promise to built a much needed metro system more than 10 times larger by any measure than the one it abjectly fails to run today.

The highlights of this grotesque and entrenched culture of total dysfunctionality in public transport include:-

The Chatswood to Parramatta line which supposed to open next December. It will open, perhaps even a few months early, but will only go as far as Epping, which is barely half way, even though most of the final stretch to Parramatta has already existed for decades as a little used surface line.

The stations are gorgeous, glittering neo modern masterpieces except for one problem: the tunnels that link them are so steep where they pass under the Lane Cove river that half the rolling stock in the suburban fleet can’t get up the grades without an unacceptable risk of bursting into flames from overheated motors.

The airport line which opened in 2000 went broke and has only recently found a new buyer. It is almost totally useless or uneconomic depending on where you set out from or if you try to board it with bulky luggage or if two travellers share a taxi.

The eastern suburbs line which was fitfully built between 1926 and its final completion in 1979 only goes as far as Bondi Junction, on the edge of the eastern suburbs.

Hundreds of buses cram the roads between Central and the University of NSW each day because the station that would have seen thousands of students complete their journeys in minutes was never built.

Even a minor extension to Bondi beach was canceled because residents led by actor Michael Caton, objected that it would be too successful in transporting the public to ‘their’ beach.

So much for ‘public’ transport.

And despite years of pledges and the waste of tens of millions of dollars, the city’s public transport system has failed to master the stored value ticketing technology most of the world has been using on a large scale since at least 1974.

If today’s trains could be made to work, the metro plan might lurch toward borderline credibility. Trouble is, that Iemma and Watkins think they are working, and every person using them knows they are in the hands of fools and liars.