Page 2940 - Week 10 - Wednesday, 14 September 1994
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MADAM SPEAKER: Do you actually want to move it, Mrs Carnell?
MRS CARNELL: Yes. I move:
Omit paragraph (2), substitute the following paragraph:
"(2) the Committee shall compare the provisions of the Bill with other similar laws in operation in Australia and other countries.".
MR STEVENSON (4.35): I certainly agree with community consultation. We started to survey people on this question about five years ago, in 1989. It goes back further than that, to meetings held during the second half of 1988. This is one of the major aspects we were speaking about at meetings around Canberra. I first spoke on citizens-initiated referenda over a decade ago at a public meeting held in Melbourne. I talked about the Swiss system and how it would work. I have been contacted by a number of people who believe that sending the Bills to a committee of inquiry at this late stage could be seen as a means of obstructing the chance of having citizens-initiated referenda. It does not have to be; but people have contacted me and said that they are concerned about that. I have confidence that the matter will go ahead.
I look forward to serving as a member of the committee, to assist it in getting its work done in sufficient time to make sure that the proposals can go ahead. I have been studying CIR in detail for many years. I have spent literally hundreds of hours looking at details and talking on the phone and at meetings, not only in Canberra but also outside Canberra. When you start doing that, you understand that there are a lot of different details to look at. Indeed, there are good arguments for both sides on a number of details. This is one of the reasons why I thought it important that people in Canberra should have an opportunity to comment on the principle of the Bill that I presented. I do not say that it is my Bill; it is simply a Bill that I presented.
We sent information about the principle to over 300 community groups around Canberra. Later we sent out to community groups, organisations and individuals around Canberra hundreds of copies of the Bill for their comment. I did not think that that was enough, because they were mainly organisations. I felt that there could have been more talk about the principle in the daily media. So, we had a little newspaper printed - members have a copy of it - called Direct Democracy. So far, over 50,000 of them have been letterboxed to homes around Canberra, and many more have been given out, so that people can have an opportunity to look at some of the details and comment on them.
From all this community consultation that has been carried out extensively during the last year, and to a lesser degree over the last six years in Canberra, we have received a lot of suggestions, comments and questions. Each time, I and other people have taken those items on board. There would not have been a decision on that Bill that I made by myself. I would not dream of doing that when there are capable people around who understand the subject well and whom I could consult. So, after all this consultation, we made quite a few changes. They were largely initiated because of the good work that the
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