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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1997 Week 9 Hansard (2 September) . . Page.. 2725 ..

MR MOORE (continuing):

This Bill, which I believe is entirely appropriate, draws our attention to the need for us to look at other pieces of legislation currently in our body of legislation. It has come to my attention, for example, that there is a whole series of legislation dealing with the churches and how the churches act in terms of their property. Perhaps it is time to look at those and ensure that churches act in the same way as other groups of citizens with regard to property rather than having special pieces of legislation. I do not wish to undermine the rights they are entitled to and have at the moment, but rather to clarify legislation, as this piece of legislation does. The Attorney-General has also taken the opportunity to repeal three ACT laws which are no longer relevant.

This Bill raises a general issue of principle about legislation that was made deliberately for private actions to be taken, to support private companies, to support particular estates and to support particular individuals, about whether or not we should use this form of legislation ourselves and about the extent to which it allows people to make their own decisions based on an individual case rather than one that is applied to the population as a whole. I will be supporting this piece of legislation, but I think it does give us an opportunity to think through some of those principles.

MR HUMPHRIES (Attorney-General) (11.31), in reply: I had the advantage of discussing this Bill briefly with Mr Wood earlier in the chamber and I understand that he expresses support for the legislation. I am pleased to convey the Opposition's support, as I understand it, for this Bill. As Mr Moore has noted, this legislation tidies up a large number of pieces of legislation which are outdated and which need to be removed from the statute books, if only for the sake of reducing the sheer volume of outdated material which remains on our statute books.

The use of private legislation - legislation to effect private purposes such as the incorporation of companies, the correction of wills and even divorces - is a practice which, thankfully, has not continued much beyond the beginning of this century. That, of course, greatly relieves the Assembly of much tedious work which would otherwise be its responsibility. I think it is important that we progressively work through the process of clearing the statute books of legislation which is not necessary and does not contribute to citizens' understanding of the law that affects them.

We need to take very seriously the maxim in the law, to use the Latin phrase, ignorantia juris non excusat, which means ignorance of the law is no excuse. By making sure that we remove laws which are not relevant any longer to the citizens of the Territory, we enhance the capacity of citizens to understand, by looking at what remains, what their responsibilities as citizens are. I thank members for their support and I commend the Bill.

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