Page 3305 - Week 12 - Tuesday, 18 September 1990
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MR CONNOLLY (3.21): Mr Speaker, I think all members would agree that the future of the courts in this community is one of the more important decisions that will face this Assembly, both this Assembly and future Assemblies after future elections. This is a matter which was raised by me in this Assembly in the first week that I joined it, and I thought at the end of that week that the matter had been, in effect, put to rest. At the end of that week the Attorney-General, following an extraordinary level of public comment and comment from quarters that do not normally engage in public dispute on issues of concern to the community - I refer to reported comments of members of the judiciary - indicated, in what I took to be fairly clear language, an intention to refer this question of the future of the courts of the ACT to the ACT Community Law Reform Committee.
At the time the Opposition welcomed that statement and looked forward to this question of the future of the courts going to that committee. A week or so ago, however, the long awaited Curtis report was issued and the public utterances from the Government seemed to indicate that the Community Law Reform Committee is now no longer the favoured option and that we may be back to the position that we were in in April, with the Government or certain members of the Government determined to press ahead with a particular form of court reform regardless of the views of the community.
Mr Speaker, at the outset I would pass some compliments to the Government, which is something the Opposition does not regularly do, because the ACT Community Law Reform Committee that Mr Collaery has established is a committee that has the full support and confidence of this Opposition. Today, when Mr Collaery announced reference of tenancy law to that committee, members of the Opposition welcomed that.
It is a committee which varies from traditional law reform commissions in that it is not dominated by lawyers. This is the type of law reform committee which achieves bipartisan support in this house. It is chaired by former Justice Kelly, a person in whom all members of the community in Canberra can have the utmost confidence, and its structure is such that it represents the legal profession, people practising at the private Bar in the profession, academic lawyers and people representative of community interests - not necessarily lawyers. This is the sort of body which the Opposition thinks is well qualified to look at fundamental issues of law reform, and we welcome both the reference of defamation law and the reference of tenancy law to that committee.
Mr Speaker, the issue of concern today is reform of the court structure. It is perhaps unusual that this is being raised again by the Opposition as an MPI, as it was first raised as an MPI in May; but we have been forced to do this
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