Page 778 - Week 03 - Wednesday, 13 April 1994
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Mr Connolly, in his dissertation, asked the Liberals whether Mr Fahey would be happy with this Bill. I think there was an interjection about Clover Moore, perhaps from Mrs Grassby, and that has given me an excellent idea. I will give Clover a call and fax a copy of the Bill to her and perhaps the New South Wales Parliament may consider something similar. We appreciate that interjection from Mrs Grassby for that idea. It is the role of Independents throughout Australian parliaments, and a growing role, to provide for accountability, and this is just one of the ways of providing stable government on the one hand and real accountability on the other. A recent Australia-wide poll indicated that Australians are finding that a useful and important role for people to play.
Mr Humphries, in his comments, talked about an orderly process. That is exactly what we have described here - an orderly process, where the Minister must consult. It does not even say how you must consult. The Minister must consult with the appropriate committee. If there is not an obvious committee he must consult the Public Accounts Committee. Having done that, the Minister then makes the appointment and it is subject to a final form of review - a disallowable instrument in the Assembly. The process has been carefully chosen to avoid conflict, to avoid the sort of situation that we had with reference to a person who has been named in this house on many occasions, Mr Wright. There was instantly a political conflict. This process can avoid that situation. Contrary to the idea put forward by Mr Connolly, this provides a process of consultation before the appointment is made. Unfortunately, in our parliamentary system - I imagine that it will always happen - we tend to favour the conflict method before we favour an orderly process. This is an attempt to ensure that orderly process.
The real concern of the Government is the limitation of their powers, and I understand that. That is where we have a basic and fundamental difference. The Government feels that they should have all the power to make all the decisions, as happens in most cases with majority governments. We simply have a different view on that. We believe that minority governments allow for a situation where parliament takes its appropriate precedence over such decisions.
Mr Deputy Speaker, I would like to draw attention to the amendment that I have circulated. The amendment I have circulated was drafted to include the Executive as well as the Minister. That was done because my attention was drawn to the appointment of the Auditor-General which is done under our legislation by the Executive. That had not been included in the Bill. The Australian Society of Certified Practising Accountants has issued a paper, discussion paper No. 8, and one of the recommendations in that is that in order to enhance the independence of Auditors-General they should become officers of the parliament. The whole of discussion paper No. 8 is about the independence of the Auditor-General. They were looking for a method whereby an Auditor-General becomes a parliamentary officer and as such is dealt with more by the parliament than by the Executive. I think that applying this method to the Auditor-General will achieve the same goal in a different way. It would assist in ensuring the independence of the Auditor-General. That discussion paper, if I may digress for one minute, Mr Deputy Speaker, also raises quite a number of important issues about the independence of Auditors-General.
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