De­spite ac­knowl­edg­ing con­cerns raised in the Sen­ate, De­fence Min­is­ter Wayne Sturge says the Vic­tims’ Rights Bill, 2026, must still be passed, ar­gu­ing that vic­tims of crime have wait­ed too long for mean­ing­ful jus­tice with­in the crim­i­nal jus­tice sys­tem.

Con­tribut­ing to de­bate in the Up­per House, Sturge said the leg­is­la­tion rep­re­sents a nec­es­sary first step in ad­dress­ing long-stand­ing fail­ures that have left vic­tims “in­vis­i­ble” with­in the sys­tem. He used two sex­u­al of­fence cas­es to il­lus­trate de­lays in in­ves­ti­ga­tions and pros­e­cu­tions, which he said re­flect sys­temic weak­ness­es that the bill seeks to ad­dress.

Sturge said both cas­es demon­strat­ed how de­lays and in­ef­fi­cien­cies in the sys­tem can dis­cour­age vic­tims from pur­su­ing jus­tice, par­tic­u­lar­ly where cas­es in­volve pow­er­ful or well-con­nect­ed in­di­vid­u­als.