To tackle new issues such as cyber bullying.

Significant amendments to the Defence Force Discipline Act 1982 have been proposed to modernise and streamline disciplinary matters in the Australian Defence Force.

According to Minster for Defence Personnel and Veterans’ Affairs Andrew Gee Australia’s military justice system provides the Australian Defence Force with a unique Australian legal framework that is able to be applied on operations anywhere in the world.

“However it has become slow and unresponsive under the weight of administration, requiring modernisation to meet current and future demands,” Minister Gee said. “These reforms will modernise military discipline system bringing it into the 21st Century to tackle new issues such as cyber bullying.

According to the minister cyber bullying can be corrosive to discipline and have an extremely adverse effect on the mental wellbeing of its victims. These new offences will enable Defence to protect personnel from cyber-bullying through early intervention and putting a stop to the behaviour before it gets out of hand.

“These changes to the Act will not only simplify and streamline the current military discipline system, they will deliver a fairer and more transparent system that applies for all servicemen and women,” he said. “Eighty percent of disciplinary matters in the military involve relatively minor infringements. These transgressions will be dealt with quickly, easily and fairly under these reforms.

In 2017 the Chief of the Defence Force commissioned a review of the Summary Discipline System. The Review found that the current Summary Discipline System is overly complex, difficult to use, unresponsive and because of its complexity, results in excessive delay in dealing with minor discipline breaches.

Dealing with minor discipline matters will be made easier in three ways:

• Enabling a wider range of minor breaches of military discipline to be managed quickly and simply as disciplinary infringements, rather than service offences where complex, adversarial court-like procedures apply;
• A better structured discipline hierarchy based on the seriousness of the offending, available punishments, rank of the individual and the seniority of the discipline authority;
• The changes introduce several new service offences relevant to the modern ADF.

“Numerous internal reviews at Defence have found that aspects of the current military discipline system are cumbersome in dealing with minor matters,” Minister Gee said.  “This is not surprising given the existing approach dates back forty years and is based on British military discipline law, introduced with the Defence Force Discipline Act 1982. “Reform is required to modernise procedures that predate modern warfare, current technologies and tactical requirements.

Tags: ADFcyber bully