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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2003 Week 7 Hansard (26 June) . . Page.. 2620 ..
MR SMYTH
(continuing):signing of confidentiality agreements is a fundamental breach of members' rights to information.
If it hinders us in any way in doing our jobs, it is a diminution of our standing as members of the Assembly and our ability to represent our constituents to the fullest of our efforts. It is a sad day for this place when executive government attempts to do that to us, the Assembly of the people. So we will resist this amendment by the Minister for Planning to sign confidentiality agreements. I certainly won't be signing such an agreement. Should the Assembly choose to go down that path, we will have started down a rocky slope where the executive is seen as being above the Assembly. That is not how it is meant to be.
MRS CROSS
(6.12): Mr Speaker, I am flabbergasted by the suggestion of the Minister for Planning that all MLAs sign a confidentiality agreement prior to reading information about the Gungahlin land debacle. It is one thing to attempt to protect commercial-in-confidence information; governments have always done that and oppositions have always objected. It is another thing to attempt to prevent MLAs from pursuing issues as part of their responsibility to the community.Of course, members will wish to discuss what now appears to be the Gungahlin land financial debacle with their advisers, and with each other, if it seems necessary to hold the government accountable over this issue. Minister Corbell knows that this is part of the important role that members play in a democratic system. However, the reluctance of this minister to allow this is strange, given that he was elected on a platform of making things more open and accountable than had the last government.
This minister often demanded of the previous government that such documents were tabled by the end of a sitting day in motions such as this. Conditions were never placed on such motions. Even Ms Tucker's amendment, as I understand it, was never part of this sort of motion in the past. It is simply unacceptable that Minister Corbell should attempt to stymie the political process by placing manacles of this type on elected members.
MR STEFANIAK
(6.14): I agree with the sentiments ably expressed by Mr Smyth and Mrs Cross. This is a very worrying sign and could be regarded as a fundamental attack on some of the principles we hold dear and what the Westminster system is all about. Public interest is very important. The relevant part of Mr Evans' advice is that, if the content of a document reveals information that there is clear public interest in publishing, members should retain the right to do so.That may well not occur here if this document is innocuous and nothing comes of it, but we would be establishing a precedent. What if a document that a member signs a confidentiality agreement about has something that is criminal in it, something that may be exposed as corruption or something that indicates some real problem that the member has a duty to try to get fixed in the community interest? What happens then? That member is stymied. That is a very dangerous precedent to set.
Members in this place can be pretty well trusted to do the right thing. In this little parliament-indeed, in parliaments in Australia generally and throughout the Westminster system-we occasionally have a situation where there is a gentlemen's
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