Page 331 - Week 01 - Thursday, 14 February 1991
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MR SPEAKER: Members may wish to look at the motion, but you do need to seek leave of the members of the Assembly to move that motion.
MR MOORE: I see. Mr Speaker, perhaps at this stage I will just distribute the motion. I will hold back on seeking leave to move the motion until the members have had a chance to look at it. In the meantime I will point out, as part of my speech, that in no way do I intend this to be seen as seeking to undermine the decision of the Speaker. I started my speech by saying that I respect his decision. I see it as a fine line, and I respect the effort he has made to make the decision. It is not meant in any way to be a motion that indicates a lack of confidence in the Speaker, but rather to provide an opportunity for members of the Assembly as a whole to take a small, specific issue, as far as the rulings of the Speaker go, and have the courage to take a decision which will have wide-ranging ramifications for all Australians.
It is quite clear that the very powerful banking organisations that we have in Australia are almost unequalled in the amount of power that they can have. They are incredibly advantaged in the courts. There is no question in the minds of most Australians that the wealthier you are the greater the advantage you have in front of courts. In this case we have the opportunity to make a move for justice as opposed to the legal system.
Mr Speaker, under those circumstances I have decided to seek leave to move this motion, even though, at the same time, I respect the effort and the time that you have taken in coming to the conclusion that you have. I think it is an appropriate situation for each and every one of us, as members, to look very carefully at the sub judice convention and see whether this is an appropriate time to make a move in the interests of the small person in our society, in the interests of justice.
As you yourself said, we follow the sub judice convention in House of Representatives Practice. It is by no means clear cut, or black and white, that we will be breaching a sub judice convention. I quote from that volume part of the first sentence of what is said about the sub judice convention. It states:
Notwithstanding its fundamental right and duty to consider any matter if it is thought to be in the public interest -
there are very few matters that have come before this Assembly that are of such great public interest -
the House imposes a restriction on itself ...
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