This week, the Queensland government is continuing its push to rush through new laws cracking down on environmental protesters' use of lock-on devices.
The move comes off the back of fresh protests from Extinction Rebellion, which saw a number of activists chain themselves to drums and pipes full of concrete. The proposed laws aim to expand police powers to search protesters, and introduce prison sentences of up to two years for activists using these so-called "dangerous devices".
Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk claims the laws are necessary because protesters who lock themselves to these devices are 'booby-trapping' them with materials that could injure anyone who tries to cut them free.
There's just one problem: there's very little evidence that the Premier's claims are actually true.
"The Police Commissioner showed me evidence of locking devices that are laced with traps which are dangerous," Palaszczuk told Queensland Parliament while announcing the proposed legislation back in August.
"Inside these cylinders and drums are glass fragments—even butane gas containers—so that anyone trying to cut a protester free will be injured or worse."
For Queensland Greens MP Michael Berkman, the Premier's description of booby traps was surprising.
So back in August, Berkman asked Palaszczuk to provide Parliament with details about how many devices had been found to be laced with traps, when and where these devices were used, and whether any emergency services personnel had been injured by such devices.
"I received a briefing by the Police Commissioner and the Assistant Police Commissioner in relation to operational Police matters," Palaszczuk responded. "It would not be prudent to publicly disclose the contents of that briefing."
That was two months ago. Since then, Berkman has been trying to find evidence of the booby-trapped devices the Premier described.
He approached Queensland Police to request a briefing similar to the one provided to Palaszczuk, but was denied.
Queensland Police did not respond to The Feed's questions about why Berkman was denied a briefing, but provided a statement confirming that "the placing of objects (butane canisters, glass sleeves and fragments, wire, steel etc) into the devices has the capacity to cause harm to protesters and police."
Last week, in response to widespread protests by environmental activist group Extinction Rebellion, Palaszczuk announced her government's plans to fast-track the passage of the proposed laws.
A hearing on the bill scheduled for October 21 was moved forward to October 11, allowing MPs and witnesses less than 24 hours to review public submissions.
As the hearing began on October 11, there was still no publicly available evidence supporting Palaszczuk's claims that protesters have been employing lock-on devices "laced with traps" like butane canisters and glass.
"I've never seen anything like it," Berkman told The Feed on the morning of the hearing. "I still haven't seen evidence that demonstrates that protesters are setting out to harm first responders in the way that the Premier and the police minister have claimed."
So is there any evidence of booby-trapped lock-on devices?
It was only on the afternoon of Friday October 11, close to two months after Palaszczuk first claimed that new legislation was required to combat the use of lock-on devices laced with traps, that photos allegedly providing evidence of these booby traps were made public.
During the October 11 hearing, representatives of Queensland Police provided a series of photos of the "dangerous attachment devices" described in the proposed legislation, including "sleeping dragons" (devices where a person is handcuffed to another person or object inside a pipe or tube), and "dragon's dens" (sleeping dragons concreted within a barrel or drum).
A number of the photographs, which Queensland Police provided to The Feed, appear to show metal or wire embedded in concrete inside a barrel.
An anti-Adani protester locked to a railway line using a sleeping dragon lock-on device. Source: QLD Police
However, police acknowledged that they are aware of just two instances where glass has been embedded in the barrel, and a single incident in 2005 where a protester claimed to have embedded an aerosol can.
The police were unable to confirm whether the aerosol can was actually present. Acting Deputy Commissioner Brian Codd was aware of only one instance where a police officer had been harmed while removing an attachment device. Queensland Police Inspector Shane Williams said he was not aware of any instances where protesters had been injured during the removal of an attachment device.
Queensland Police told the hearing that they consider attachment devices to be dangerous regardless of their exact contents, as they require police to use power tools to remove them.
Police cutting open a dragon's den lock-on device which appears to have metal scraps embedded in the concrete. Source: QLD Police
Michael Berkman told The Feed he doesn't believe this constitutes evidence of the booby-trapped devices the Premier described.
"They haven't demonstrated the need to create new offences with maximum penalties of years in prison. It's just a completely inappropriate response, when the government should in fact be listening to the reasonable demands of protesters and taking serious climate action."
Alice Drury, a lawyer for the Human Rights Law Centre, told the hearing on Friday that in most cases the devices are used in a non-violent matter.
Environmental protesters blocking a rail line with a dragon's den lock-on device. Source: QLD Police
"We are aware that these devices have been used for many years across Australia in many peaceful protests and they are fundamentally peaceful devices typically because they immobilise the protester," she said.
Both Drury and Berkman expressed concerns that in the absence of stronger evidence of the use of lock-on devices to cause harm, Palaszczuk's proposed laws risk curtailing Queenslanders' right to peaceful protest.
"This bill is fundamentally about stopping people from engaging in peaceful forms of protest," Drury said.
"It may be uncomfortable or temporarily disruptive, but peaceful process is a hallmark of our democracy. So much of the process that we take for granted in Australia, be it the vote for women, the vote for Aboriginal people or, crucially, the eight-hour work day, only came about after people took their concerns to the streets, made some noise and disrupted business as usual."
A spokesperson for Palaszczuk provided The Feed with a single, partially-obscured image of a Dragon's Den containing a combination of materials inside.
"We say these [lock-on devices] go beyond the bounds of peaceful protest because the traffic snarl they are designed to cause risks stopping, for example, an ambulance trying to reach a patient or a hospital," the spokesperson said.
"The Premier has said that she needs fire-fighters fighting fires at the moment, not taking hours to cut protests from lock on devices. Have the protest, just don't use these devices."
When asked for evidence of a lock-on device "laced with traps", Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk's office provided this image. Source: Office of QLD Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk
