Page 3090 - Week 12 - Tuesday, 17 November 1992
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draft report at the meeting I was unable to attend but also had adopted the report, obviously abandoning the suggestion of a meeting on Friday, 6 November. Might I also add here that other members of the Social Policy Committee, in order to arrange a quorum for our public hearing, also had to extricate themselves early from that meeting. It is up to them to worry about whether or not they felt that they were missing out in some way.
I believe that a certain amount of flexibility should be exercised in managing our committee timetable. With public hearings scheduled for some time, it is neither possible nor practical to attempt to change such an arrangement. It has been suggested to me that the Estimates Committee ranks in importance over all other committees. I am not quite sure that I agree with that assumption. All committees are important and vital to the running of the Assembly; but, even given that argument, how do we avoid such a clash? Do we not program other committees to meet at all during the probable life of the Estimates Committee? This would seem impractical, as the Estimates Committee does run for a considerable time each year. It also, I believe, immediately brings into question the importance of other committees, as I have just outlined.
I like to think that our committee system works very well. In the life of this Assembly, the committees I have been involved with work on the assumption that meetings are scheduled when members can be there within reason, are treated seriously by all members of the committee, work across party and crossbench lines and, therefore, achieve a great deal. Unfortunately, I do not believe that the final series of Estimates Committee meetings were run in this way. As a result, some members, including me, were unable to contribute to the extent we would usually expect, particularly in the formulation of the report.
It was noted earlier by Ms Szuty that other people had had time to do the amount of work needed to contribute to this report. I have not been given the opportunity to prove whether or not I had time. I believe very strongly that dissenting reports should be submitted only in extreme cases where members feel that they are unable to have their opinions and contributions included in the report. As I was not given the opportunity to contribute effectively to the drafting of that final report, I felt that I had no option and was compelled to draft my own dissenting report.
I add also that from the time the final report became available on the afternoon of 5 November - still during my public hearings - I was given only until 10.00 am the following day to submit a minority report. This, I believe, was unacceptable, and I can only hope that next year the Estimates Committee as a whole takes into consideration the time available and the commitments of all its members.
MR HUMPHRIES (9.09): Madam Speaker, it is unfortunate that in debating this report we have to some extent strayed from the substance and spoken more about the form of the appointment of the committee and the process whereby it reached its conclusions on the elements of the report. It would be unfortunate if we were to lose sight of the essential recommendations, the essential thrust of this report, and fail to have the Government act on that report.
Mr Berry: They are blurred by the cracks in it. It is flawed.
MR HUMPHRIES: Mr Berry makes a point that he has made before in the media. He used the words "a sham and a dud". He says that the report itself is no good because of the process that has been used.
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