Page 2051 - Week 06 - Thursday, 7 May 2009
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This really is, I think, a remarkable decision or performance by the Speaker. The Speaker produced his own arbiter. An arbiter appointed by the Speaker is belittled and treated in a derogatory and dismissive way as somebody that actually cannot be trusted in his decision. It has to be said that the establishment of the arbitration process for claims of privilege by the executive was part of our parliamentary agreement. I presume it is now part of the agreement that the Greens propose to walk away from. It was agreed that there should be an independent arms-length process for settling disputes between two branches of government as a useful enhancement, an enhancement which we embraced and were prepared to accept as an enhancement to our system of responsible government in the ACT. That is why we agreed to it, have embraced it and have stood ready to stand by the resulting outcomes.
On the first arbitration of a request for privilege, the Greens, through the Speaker, stand in this place and propose to review, to revise, to change the process because on the first outing it did not suit their purpose. The first use of the procedure established by standing order 213A to test the claim by the executive for privilege over documents the Assembly has ordered be produced was always going to be very significant in its precedential value.
That is why the government did devote some time and thought to the submission it would make. It was because it was significant and there was a need to establish an understanding and benchmark around the notion of responsible government and the relationship between the executive and the legislature. That is why this first arbitration was so important. It is a precedent now established. The Speaker appointed the arbiter knowing full well that his first arbitration would, of course, establish some precedential value in relation to the very question that we are dealing with; namely, privilege and the relationship under our system of government and consistent with responsible government that exists in this place and in every other parliament in Australia.
It is important that the decision Sir Laurence Street issues is clear and comprehensive. It is clear, it is unambiguous and it is comprehensive. The government, of course, was pleased that it was, because it provides that benchmark for all of us to have regard to. Of course, it goes back to a long tradition of jurisprudence. The High Court of Australia in the Commonwealth v Northern Land Council held:
… it has never been doubted that it is in the public interest that deliberations of Cabinet should remain confidential in order that the members of Cabinet may exchange differing views and at the same time maintain the principle of collective responsibility for any decision which may be made … Despite the pressures which modern society places on the principle of collective responsibility, it remains and important element in our system of government.
The Speaker now actually rejects that notion of the importance of responsible government. He says that these documents should be released so that there is some notion or understanding of what individual ministers thought or said or what their particular expertise in relation to a particular subject under investigation was. The notion of collective responsibility of cabinet decision making is at the heart of responsible government. It is part of the reason for responsible government being
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