Page 3352 - Week 13 - Tuesday, 24 November 1992
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process being a hallmark for good processes, the legislation itself is good legislation. It accounts for the needs of both the Executive, allowing it to have carriage of the legislation, and the ACT Legislative Assembly, enabling us to have a voice in these important electoral matters.
I look forward to the appointment of the people who will be members of the ACT Electoral Commission and the Redistribution Committee. I am also looking forward to the tabling of the remaining legislation, due in 1993, that will further ensconce the Hare-Clark electoral system as the ACT's electoral system for the future.
MR MOORE (4.50): It is with pleasure that I rise to support the Electoral Bill. There is no doubt that at the referendum held concurrently with our election there was a clear mandate to do this. I think it reflects a very positive attitude on the part of the Chief Minister that she has responded quickly and has brought this Bill before the house. Quite clearly, the referendum result was not the result favoured by the Labor Party; yet this Bill, in its original form and after the discussions we have had and with the amendments, reflects an attitude that should be recognised by the electorate - the attitude of somebody who says, "Yes, we recognise the wish of the people, as expressed in the most significant form of community consultation, through a referendum, and we are prepared to abide by that referendum result". Madam Speaker, I think that is a very positive step forward and a very positive start to the debate on the electoral system.
The Labor Party position, Madam Speaker, was for single-member electorates. The position that we were moving from was a single electorate. I believe that the three electorates that are advocated in this Bill, in accordance with the referendum, based on the Tasmanian system, are in many ways a compromise of the benefits of the two systems. On the one hand, we have a proportional representation system; on the other hand, the people will be fortunate enough to be able to focus on a number of local members.
A good example of that is illustrated by the way people in Tuggeranong are already perceiving Ms Ellis, for example, and Mr De Domenico to be local members for the Tuggeranong area. That is the sort of concept that will become part and parcel of the notion that we have in terms of three possible electorates. Madam Speaker, I believe that 17 single-member electorates in the ACT would have been too small. It would not have allowed for the diversity of opinion within the electorates that we have here. It certainly reflected the good sense of the people of the ACT that they voted so strongly to support the system that this Bill begins to implement.
Madam Speaker, I am conscious of the fact that Mr Humphries announced some months ago - if I remember correctly, it was on ABC radio - that he also was preparing an electoral Bill. I am conscious of the amount of work that is involved in preparing Bills. They go back and forth to Parliamentary Counsel, and I am aware of the effort that Parliamentary Counsel puts in. I also am aware of the amount of work that Ms Follett and her staff have done in preparing this Bill and in getting it to the high standard that it is.
Madam Speaker, I indicated in a response to Gary Humphries on, I think, the Matthew Abraham show that if no other Bill came up I would support his Bill. The process that we have gone through here to date has been a very positive and excellent process of coming up with a very sensible Bill in the first place and then considering some amendments in a bipartisan or tripartisan way. I think that the
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