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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2000 Week 3 Hansard (8 March) . . Page.. 714 ..
MS TUCKER (continuing):
Auditor-General needs to be able to have the power to check that information to ensure that it is accurate, as the Auditor-General can do with other aspects of the operation of agencies.
In drafting this Bill, it was thus necessary to ensure that under the ACT Auditor-General Act the Auditor-General had sufficient power to review this aspect of annual reports. I should point out that it was the Greens that inserted the provision in the Auditor-General Act that the Auditor-General can take into account environmental issues in performance audits. When drafting this Bill, it was pointed out to us by the parliamentary drafters that there was an inconsistency between the Auditor-General Act in terms of which entities can be subject to performance audits and the Annual Reports (Government Agencies) Act in terms of which entities are required to provide annual reports. We took the view that it would be better for this part of the Auditor-General Act to be consistent with the Annual Reports Act in terms of the entities covered.
It was also our opinion that the definition of "public authority" in the Annual Reports Act was slightly broader than the definition of "Territory entity" in the Auditor-General Act. "Territory entity" is defined in the Auditor-General Act as:
(a) a Territory authority; or
(b) a public sector company.
"Territory authority" is not defined, but it is assumed to mean ACT statutory authorities. "Public sector company" is defined as:
(a) a subsidiary of a Territory authority;
(b) a Territory owned corporation;
(c) a subsidiary of a Territory owned corporation;
(d) a company prescribed by the regulations; or
(e) any other company in which the Territory or another Territory entity has a controlling interest.
"Public authority" is defined in the Annual Reports Act as:
(a) a Territory instrumentality;
(b) a statutory office holder declared by the Minister by instrument to be a public authority for the purposes of this paragraph; or
(c) an authority, tribunal, commission, council, board, institute, committee, organisation or other body that is established by or under an Act and declared by the Minister by instrument to be a public authority for the purposes of this paragraph.
A territory instrumentality is subsequently defined as a body corporate that is established by or under an Act or under the Corporations Law. I will not read out the whole of the definition, but it does include territory owned corporations and corporations subject to direction or control by a Minister or with a governing body that has a majority of persons appointed by a Minister or an agency or instrumentality of the Territory. I should note
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