Page 844 - Week 03 - Tuesday, 20 March 2012
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Public Accounts—Standing Committee
Statement by chair
MS LE COUTEUR (Molonglo) (10.07): Pursuant to standing order 246A, I wish to make a statement on behalf of the Standing Committee on Public Accounts relating to the committee’s inquiry into the Road Transport (Third-Party Insurance) Amendment Bill 2011.
On 31 March 2011 the Legislative Assembly referred the Road Transport (Third-Party Insurance) Amendment Bill 2011 to the Standing Committee on Public Accounts for inquiry and report by the first sitting week in March 2012. This bill proposes various amendments to the Road Transport (Third-Party Insurance) Act 2008.
Pursuant to section 275 of the Road Transport (Third-Party Insurance) Act 2008, the responsible minister has a statutory requirement to review the act and present a report on the review to the Legislative Assembly. Specifically, the act states:
The Minister must review the operation of the Act as soon as practicable after the end of its 3rd year of operation.
The Minister must present a report on the review to the Legislative Assembly within 3 months after the day the review is started.
Statutory review periods are designed to ensure a timely evaluation of the implementation and performance against specific legislation. Consequently, the committee’s examination of the statutory review is a critical aspect of its consideration of the referred bill. Throughout the course of its inquiry the committee has sought to ascertain when the statutory review would be available.
In response to a supplementary question seeking further information on the status of the review, in particular whether it had commenced, when it would be provided to the Assembly in accordance with the act and how its findings and recommendations would be addressed in the context of the bill, the Treasurer told the committee:
The three year legislative review commenced on 6 October 2011.
The act stipulates that within three months of the review having commenced, the report is to be presented to the Assembly. As the three-month period ends on 6 January 2012, the report is expected to be presented to the Legislative Assembly in the first sitting week for 2012. The government will consider the review before deciding on future actions regarding the ACT’s CTP scheme.
I wish to inform the Assembly that, as the statutory review was not tabled in the February 2012 sitting, the committee asks the Assembly for an extension of time to report on the referred bill. This extension will be until such time as the statutory review has been provided and the committee has had sufficient time to consider it in detail.
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