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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2002 Week 4 Hansard (9 April) . . Page.. 802 ..
MR SPEAKER (continuing):
The action I have taken has not been taken lightly. As I stated to the Assembly on 19 February, the privileges or immunities that this Assembly and its members and committees possess are fundamental to its ability to perform its functions, and to its members' abilities to perform their roles. This privilege cannot be waived.
We must ensure that no action, inadvertent or otherwise, is taken that could impede the Assembly, its members or its committees, in the performance of their duties. It is for these reasons that I have taken the action outlined.
Estimates 2001-2002-Select Committee
Report
MR HUMPHRIES (Leader of the Opposition) (11.33): Mr Speaker, pursuant to order of the Assembly of 19 February 2002, as amended on 7 March 2002, I present the following report:
Estimates-Select Committee-Report-Appropriation Bill 2001-2002 (No 3), dated 8 April 2002, together with a copy of the relevant extracts of the minutes of proceedings.
I ask for leave to move a motion authorising the publication of the report.
Leave granted.
MR HUMPHRIES: I move:
That the report be authorised for publication.
Question resolved in the affirmative.
MR HUMPHRIES: I move:
That the report be noted.
Mr Speaker, Appropriation Bill (No 3) is, at one level, a fairly unexceptional document. In recent years, it has been the practice for appropriation bills subsequent to the main appropriation bill of the year to be moved, in order to deal with matters that have emerged in the course of the financial year. This has been necessary as, in recent years, the practice has grown of both introducing and passing appropriation bills before the beginning of a particular financial year.
I think the first year in which the Assembly did this was 1994. As a result-perhaps not surprisingly-there has been an increase in the number of subsequent appropriation bills moved here, because of issues that have arisen in the course of that financial year.
This bill deals mainly with a variety of cost pressures on the budget in the course of the year-issues that the Treasurer describes as mechanical, for the most part. They include funding for the office of sustainability. That is a clear government election commitment which, with this appropriation, has been fulfilled.
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