Laws aimed at assets of underworld bosses require suspects to prove they have not been involved in crime

This article is more than 7 years old

This article is more than 7 years old

The Queensland government has traded in its citizens' right to privacy with new laws that allow the assets of crime suspects to be frozen, the state's law society says.

Under laws that came into effect on Friday, anyone suspected of engaging in criminal activity can be made to forfeit all their property, whether it was obtained legally or illegally. They would have to prove they were not involved in criminal activity to have their assets returned.

Queensland attorney-general Jarrod Bleijie said the laws were aimed at the "Mr Bigs" of the criminal underworld.

"The crime bosses who pull the strings in the background will be forced to explain where all their wealth has come from, but if they can't, they lose it," Bleijie said.

"In the past, they could rake in the money and let lower level criminals take the fall."

Queensland Law Society committee member Ken Mackenzie said the new laws were "draconian, intrusive, fundamentally unfair".

"We understand the policy aims, the policy aims are to deprive criminals of their profits, but in pursuit of those aims the government has traded in the citizen's right to privacy," he said.

"If you give law enforcement agencies free range to snoop into every aspect of people's lives, then they will in the course of that uncover interesting evidence of criminal activity, but as a society we have decided that it is important to maintain the citizen's right to privacy against the state."

Mackenzie said the law society had been consulted "extensively" and had lodged objections with the state government, but were ultimately ignored.

"We don't like them [the laws], we're opposed to them in principle," he said.

"They reverse the onus of proof – it is no longer the case the government has to prove there is anything criminal about the person's assets. It reverses the case the person has to prove what they have is obtained legitimately."

Mackenzie said there was already a regime in place to seize the assets of convicted criminals.

The seizure laws would apply even to gifts given to other people by the suspected criminal in the past six years.

The suspect's children may be entitled to hardship payments from the government if their assets are seized.

"These criminals' lavish lifestyles are paid for with pain and suffering, with illicit drug use costing Queensland more than $1bn a year," Bleijie said in a statement.