Page 4767 - Week 16 - Monday, 25 November 1991
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Monday, 25 November 1991
_________________________
MR SPEAKER (Mr Prowse) took the chair at 11.00 am and read the prayer.
CRIMES (AMENDMENT) BILL (NO. 6) 1991
MR COLLAERY (11.01): I present the Crimes (Amendment) Bill (No. 6) 1991. I move:
That this Bill be agreed to in principle.
The report of the Commission of Inquiry into Possible Illegal Activities and Associated Police Misconduct, known as the Fitzgerald report 1989, dealt at length with the conduct of officials and with apparent conflicts of interest between public duty and private interest. Mr Fitzgerald recommended that codes of conduct for officials be formulated.
Subsequently, the Queensland Electoral and Administrative Review Commission released an issues paper on the subject of codes of conduct for public officials. The issues paper was essentially about the conflict between public duty and the private activities of officials. It said:
Ministers of the Crown who dishonestly misuse public money, policemen who take bribes, public officials who practise nepotism in employment, local government councillors who profit on the basis of a form of "inside trading" and public servants who exercise power selectively are not unique to Queensland, nor are they new features of the official landscape. However, the Fitzgerald Report 1989 inferred that they represent an unhealthy public administration and require remedy.
At the time of the last Assembly election, the Rally gave an election pledge to introduce measures to combat these concerns that had arisen in the context of land administration and government contracts in the ACT. Accordingly, the Rally pressed in government for the establishment of a public corruption committee. On 1 June 1989 the ACT Legislative Assembly agreed to a motion supporting the early establishment of an independent advisory committee against corruption.
The residents of this Territory are entitled to rely upon the Assembly's subsequent recommendation, through its Standing Committee on Public Accounts, which in November 1989 recommended that a public corruption committee be
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