Page 2684 - Week 10 - Tuesday, 13 August 1991
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rectify this situation. All I am suggesting to you is that you do it and you put yourself in line with governments right throughout Australia who understand and recognise the role of the Auditor-General, what his responsibilities are, and to whom he is responsible. He is not responsible to you. He should not be subject to your whim. Rectify the situation and do it quickly.
MR COLLAERY, by leave: I thank members. Mr Speaker, surely the issue is not the personality but the principle involved. The first thing that Mr Kaine did was to have the courage to appoint an Auditor-General for this Territory's government, and he did that. I am pleased to see that it was done. He made an appointment that the Labor Party did not make. We desperately needed an Auditor-General during the period of the Follett-Whalan Government and we did not get one. We got an Auditor-General who has fearlessly thrown himself into issues that have not always pleased administering Ministers and senior public servants. I make no comment on those issues; they can await the debates on the various reports that he has tabled.
But, Mr Speaker, in the New South Wales Parliament, only a couple of months ago, a major issue was taken up about the independence of the New South Wales Auditor-General. In fact, there was correspondence in the national press - in particular, the Australian on 18 June 1991 - which no doubt competent politicians in this arena should be aware of, particularly by Mr McGuinness, where he talked about the true independence required of the Ombudsman and the Auditor-General in our process of government.
Members of the Labor Party interject and talk about giving him an acting appointment and seeing how he performs. Those are very cheap comments when one considers that the Director of Public Prosecutions was appointed to a senior government position by agreement across this floor, without this very prudent merit selection process - the practice that Ms Follett says she will follow for all senior positions. The fact is that you do not relegate positions like judges, like ombudsmen, like auditors-general and solicitors-general - positions of ultimate public trust of that nature - to a selection and merit process, "As I do for all SES positions", I heard Ms Follett say.
Ms Follett: No, you did not.
MR COLLAERY: Or words to that effect. That shows a classic myopic lack of appreciation of the separation of powers that is required and the necessity for governments to put themselves in a position where ombudsmen and auditors-general can be as candid as they like about the workings of government.
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