Page 4771 - Week 16 - Monday, 25 November 1991
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INTERPRETATION (AMENDMENT) BILL 1991 [NO. 2]
MR COLLAERY (11.12): I present the Interpretation (Amendment) Bill 1991 [No. 2]. I move:
That this Bill be agreed to in principle.
The Interpretation Act 1967 provides that, when interpreting the provisions of an Act, a court or other party may have regard to, among other matters, a range of material originating from an Assembly committee, a law reform committee, an explanatory memorandum to a Bill or a presentation speech made to the Legislative Assembly. Section 11B of the Interpretation Act 1967 includes an amended provision allowing the presentation speech made to the Legislative Assembly by a member who introduced the Bill to be used as an extrinsic aid for interpretation in the future as to the background, origin and meaning of the legislation.
Members are fully aware of the introduction in this Assembly over the past two months of Bills originally prepared by the Alliance Government. Almost without exception, there has been reference to the fact that the Bill was prepared by the Alliance to deal with a jointly perceived situation. Unfortunately, that ethic was broken, in our view, by the Chief Minister in her presentation speech for the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Bill 1991. In alluding to the Labor ethics behind the Bill and to certain other matters, including a statement that the Bill prepared by the Alliance Government had been amended to take account of Labor policies, the Chief Minister has not accurately reflected the development of the legislation or the motives behind it.
Accordingly, this Bill now before the house proposes that not only may the presentation speech made to a Bill be used as an extrinsic aid but any relevant speech may be an extrinsic aid if made to the Assembly. Given the nature of the ACT Legislative Assembly and the likelihood of there being minority governments, it seems appropriate to say that a speech in reply might well be as substantive a story about the origin of the Bill as the presentation speech.
The Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Bill was a stark example of that issue, and when the Bill is printed it should not simply carry at the foot the date of the presentation speech by the Chief Minister as a long-term aid to extrinsic interpretation by itself. It should accurately reflect the other speeches in reply by simply stating the date of introduction and the date of passage. I acknowledge that the Hansard may be an extrinsic aid; but the specific enjoinder in the Bill should be altered, in our view.
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