Page 887 - Week 04 - Tuesday, 27 March 1990
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representing that very same area. That is of particular concern. It is not just a concern of mine. It is a concern in the wider community because it is concerned about the committee system - how the committee system operates and how it is seen to operate. It must be seen to be totally above board and that is what this is about.
Mr Speaker, in concluding I ask you to take to the Administration and Procedures Committee a recommendation that standing order 234 should be amended by removing the last part of the sentence after the final comma, "and shall always withdraw when the committee is deliberating". Those words should be removed and the Government should seriously reconsider having the Executive Deputies in a particular area either chairing or on the committee for that particular area. It would require a minor reshuffle, but I think that it would be an appropriate reshuffle in order to ensure that the public in general perceived that everything about the committees was above board. I can think back to many occasions with Mr Humphries when we were on the Conservation, Heritage and Environment Committee, we had many long discussions, particularly when we were travelling, where we reached compromises. Often those compromises were reached on the most informal occasions, such as having dinner or breakfast as I remember on one occasion in Melbourne. That is where the compromises are made and that is where the discussion takes place so you understand what the other people are thinking and why they think the way they do, rather than through the rather formalised committee system, in debate or the formalised system on the Assembly floor.
MR STEFANIAK (4.31): I am pleased to see in this report and in the documents attached to it that there is a fair amount of agreement by all parties in this Assembly. I would like to take up a couple of points Mr Moore raised, one of which was also raised by the Leader of the Opposition. The first point is in relation to standing order 234 which indicates that:
Members of the Assembly may be present when a committee is examining witnesses, but shall withdraw if requested by the Presiding Member or any member of the committee, and shall always withdraw when the committee is deliberating.
I have served on about three or four committees of this Assembly and a couple of the select committees where a fair amount of evidence was taken. One thing about the committees of this Assembly, and indeed, parliamentary committees, especially when it comes to the taking of evidence, is that the members have a quasi-judicial role in that they are there asking questions and taking evidence. Then they have to sift through the evidence. I can see the logic behind standing order 234. I suppose it is like a court of law where persons give evidence and then it is up to the bench - be it a single magistrate or judge, or be it in superior courts a bench of maybe three judges, five or
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