Page 2310 - Week 08 - Friday, 21 June 1991
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aware that the Westminster system does not actually provide the government or the politicians that they can respect. It would be a pity if we could not now, as an Assembly, reflect on the mistakes of the past and seek to provide a new direction for parliaments throughout Australia, and maybe even the Commonwealth.
I am the first to admit that, if we have made a mistake because the information used to make a decision was found to be flawed, we should stand up and say so. To do anything else is dishonest, and I think that recent events on the Federal and local scenes have shown that honesty and integrity have not always been the way of some politicians, both local and Federal. I have no doubt that the voters will remember that.
Mr Berry: You take the cake. You got the big belt this time.
MR JENSEN: You were not told any lies at all, Mr Berry. It has been said that if you want something to happen it will happen, and I take Mr Kaine's point. I think that, in fact, if the community wishes to make a system work and is prepared to work towards that, it will happen.
As part of a vision for reform of the parliamentary system, I would like to make some comment on the future of the committee system in our Assembly. It is my firm view that if we are to maintain some credibility within the community we must do much more with our committees. I quote from Professor Emy, who said, in The Politics of Australian Democracy:
... the case for committees rests on the general premise that the House as a whole is no longer an appropriate body to carry out the legislative functions of scrutiny and investigation. The House should ... provide greater job satisfaction for the back bencher, utilise those talents which are at present frustrated by parliamentary ritual, and offer Parliamentarians a more positive chance to contribute to policy discussions, both before the government is publicly committed to a course of action, and prior to the purely symbolic exchange of views in Parliament.
This means that not only must the reports be well researched and presented to the people but the committees and the members must have sufficient resources to do that necessary research and prepare the reports. For this reason it is very important that the Assembly, and not the Executive, must have greater control over the size and shape of the Assembly's budget.
For committees to function effectively, they need to incorporate the following characteristics, I believe, as identified by Professor Pat Weller at the biennial meeting of the public accounts committees in Brisbane last year. Professor Weller said that expertise was the first item
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