Page 2897 - Week 11 - Thursday, 22 October 1992
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We should do anything we can do to clear up legal gobbledegook. We should clear up legal gobbledegook not just to make it easier to understand. These things impinge on business. They impinge on the viability of business. They impinge on employment in business. Indeed, they determine whether or not businesses will keep going. Businesses have been put out of business by legislation similar to this. I refer to one specific instance in New South Wales where a person was told that his business was illegal, and he had to try to prove that it was not. That is not a fair onus of proof, I would suggest.
When legislation is not clearly drawn, lawyers can suggest that it means one thing, while the explanatory memorandum, as we have seen with the credit card, suggests that it means an entirely different thing. What I am saying is that it should be clear. I note that Mr Humphries will refer the matter to the Scrutiny of Bills Committee. In future legislation, when we include definitions in a Bill, we could put them at the start rather than at the end. I look forward to that possibility.
Amendment negatived.
Clause agreed to.
Clauses 32 and 33, by leave, taken together, and agreed to.
Clauses 34 and 35, by leave, taken together
MR STEVENSON (12.06), by leave: I move:
Clause 34, page 24, line 17, after paragraph 34(b), add the following new paragraph: "(c) has been assented to by the Assembly with or without amendments.".
Clause 35, page 24, line 22, at the end of subclause 35(2), add the words "and the assent of the Assembly".
Madam Speaker, I might mention why I hopped to my feet when you mentioned clause 31. We tend to whip along. Mr Connolly made a point before about the definitions at the end, saying that I had already let one go by in clause 28. I had an amendment, but we shot by so fast that I missed that one. He made a good point.
Clauses 34 and 35 talk about codes of practice and allow codes of practice to be approved by a Minister. My proposed amendments require that such codes also receive the direct approval of the Assembly. I well understand that gazetted matters can be disallowed by the Assembly. Indeed, the Minister gives a list of matters that are being gazetted and that could be disallowed. However, I make the point - I think it is a highly valid one - that something like a code of practice that can regulate an entire industry should be the type of matter that is presented to the Assembly in the same way that an amendment would be or in the same way that a Bill would be.
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