Transport Minister Rita Saffioti has today reintroduced the Government Railways Amendment Bill to the State Parliament.
Under the proposed legislation, fines for offenders who trespass on Public Transport Authority property will increase from $200 to $5,000.
The increase is intended to discourage premeditated and deliberate acts of trespass, including offences such as train surfing and the incident in 2018 when a man jumped off the top of a train crossing the Fremantle Bridge.
Under the Rail Safety National Law Act, 'incidents that may have the potential to cause a serious incident' are classed as Category B offences and must be reported to the Office of the National Rail Safety Regulator.
In 2020-21 there were 992 Category B notifiable occurrences of trespass.
While the increase in notifiable occurrences of trespass in recent years can be attributed to changes in the ONRSR Reporting Guidelines, it nonetheless demonstrates that incidences of this offence can have significant adverse impacts on rail safety, railway operations, railway workers and the community as a whole.
Under the Criminal Code the maximum trespass penalty is a $12,000 fine and 12 months' imprisonment, however, this legislation is rarely applied to cases of rail trespass.
The legislation was originally introduced in September 2019 but failed to pass the Legislative Council.
As stated by Transport Minister Rita Saffioti:
"Today I am reintroducing the Government Railways Amendment Bill to the Parliament.
"This is important legislation that aims to deter would-be offenders by increasing the trespassing fine from $200 to $5,000.
"Trespassing on railway lines can result in serious injury or death and it's important we do everything in our power to stop it happening.
"No one can forget the 2018 bridge jumping incident on the Fremantle Line - this is just one example of why we want to stop this sort of behaviour."
