Page 466 - Week 02 - Tuesday, 8 March 2011
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only body that can claim to have a mandate to reflect the views of the community of the Australian Capital Territory. It is this Assembly which is elected by universal adult suffrage and by the people of the territory alone.
What is so radical about that position that forces the Liberals in this place to shy away from supporting the rights of this place to legislate for its citizens without the fear of the Crown overriding its laws? What is so radical and exceptional about that that leads the Liberal Party to shy away from that fundamental constitutional argument?
It is an absolute disgrace that those who claim to be elected by and to represent this community believe it is all right for the Crown to override a law of this parliament. That is exactly what they are saying when they refuse to support a motion that says that that power must go. That is what this motion is about today—the removal of the power of the Crown to override a law of this parliament—and they have failed to support that fundamental principle.
They can stand up here and say, “Well, we want a broader review of the self-government act. We all want a broader review of the self-government act, and the Chief Minister and I have repeatedly made representations to our federal colleagues of both political persuasions seeking a review of the self-government act. But there is one particular egregious element of the self-government act that should not wait for a broader review of its operation, and that is this provision—section 35 of the self-government act.
The fact is that there is a proposal before the federal parliament today that that section be removed from the self-government act. We should as an Assembly overwhelmingly and unanimously say that, when it comes to the ability of the Crown to veto a law without regard to the self-government act, the federal parliament or the ACT parliament, that provision should go. It is as simple as that. Yes, we should have a broader discussion about the operation of the act as a whole, about the powers granted to this place, about the operation and the interaction between this place and the federal parliament.
Mr Smyth interjecting—
MADAM ASSISTANT SPEAKER (Ms Le Couteur): Mr Smyth, please stop interjecting.
MR CORBELL: But that is not the question before us. The question before us and the question before the federal parliament is: should section 35 be repealed? That is the question that those opposite must answer. Yes or no? Should the Crown have the ability to veto the laws of this place in a manner that has no reference to the federal parliament or this parliament? Should the Crown be able to act unilaterally in that manner? We say no. We say it offends fundamental democratic principles of constitutional government. It is up to those opposite to show that they are not reluctant democrats and that they also agree that the Crown has no role in overriding the act of any elected parliament, particularly this one, as far as we are concerned.
We have heard some furphies advanced by those opposite in support of their amendment today. One of those furphies has been that there have been attempts made
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