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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2001 Week 7 Hansard (20 June) . . Page.. 2224 ..
MR HUMPHRIES (continuing):
The ACT has strong competitive advantages in areas such as e-government services, which are now starting to find markets in the United Kingdom and the USA. Our education institutions are also working to expand the export of their services, with places like China included. Clearly, moves to liberalise this trade under GATS is in the best interests of this region and of this city in general terms.
The ACT government, via the Chief Minister's Department, is represented at the national trade consultation meetings hosted every six months by DFAT. At these meetings, DFAT consults with the states and territories on a range of trade-related issues. The last meeting was in Canberra on 10 May this year, where GATS was one of the issues presented. No request for a submission has been received to date. As to the issue of an assessment of the anticipated impacts of the expansion of GATS on democratic processes, I have to advise the Assembly that, while we can advise the Commonwealth of our views, it is they that have sole rights to enter into treaties on Australia's behalf.
I draw on a paper delivered at the seminar on international treaties in Brisbane on 14 August 1998 by the Director-General of the Queensland Department of Premier and Cabinet, Dr Glyn Davis, who reported:
It is now beyond doubt that the external affairs power confers on the Commonwealth almost unlimited authority to legislate in the areas of State responsibility, where these areas are the subject of international instruments ratified by the Commonwealth.
He went on to say:
This situation has been established by the High Court in a series of legal challenges brought by Queensland and other states over the past two decades.
Given that, having an independent assessment could be said to be pointless.
In terms of consulting with the ACT community, I advise the Assembly that the consultation process has been begun by the Commonwealth on this matter. DFAT is embarking on a series of non-government organisation roundtables. The first was scheduled for 4 May in Canberra. DFAT has also invited written submissions from the public, with a deadline of 1 July. The ACT government should not be duplicating that process. In any case, the ACT government when invited to lodge a submission would follow its usual process of consulting with peak industry bodies and, where appropriate and relevant, would put the resulting document to the Assembly.
As the government is generally supportive of the direction proposed for trade negotiations and as all interested other parties have an opportunity to respond directly to the Commonwealth, the ACT government has responded to the Joint Parliamentary Standing Committee on Treaties advising a nil initial response on Australia's relationship with the World Trade Organisation. A call on the federal government to conduct an inquiry in addition to that by the joint standing committee, firstly, would not benefit the ACT and, secondly, would be, frankly, ignored.
I remind the Assembly of my point regarding the value to the ACT economy of services exports. It is reasonable to expect this figure of $688 million in services exports from the ACT to increase in future years as a result of liberalising the trade in services, an
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