Page 3353 - Week 13 - Tuesday, 24 November 1992
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Bill that is being prepared by Gary Humphries still has a role. The exercise of preparing a Bill like that means that it presents an alternative view, so when one Bill is drafted a comparison will be appropriate. I presume that Mr Humphries's Bill will be available, at least in an exposure form, for us to look at so that we can make comparisons between the way he has gone with the committee that he has working on it and the way the next Bill is drafted. It certainly will be of interest.
I now move, Madam Speaker, to the amendments that I have prepared. The first two amendments, my amendments Nos 1 and 2, are simply to allow appointments made to be a disallowable instrument under section 10 of the Subordinate Laws Act of 1989. The advantage of doing that, Madam Speaker, is not so much to check or double-check what the Chief Minister is doing in the appointment, but more to make sure that it is a shared responsibility of the Assembly. Once an appointment was made it would be inappropriate for a member of the Assembly to say, "Yes, but this person ought not to have been there because I thought they were entirely inappropriate". Any member will have the opportunity to say that on the floor of this Assembly and to move disallowance of any appointment. I hope that that will not be necessary. There certainly are a number of outstanding people in the community who could fulfil the role identified in the Electoral Bill of 1992 without dissent. I am certainly hoping that a disallowance will not be necessary, but that members will accept responsibility for that choice. I will move those two amendments together.
The third amendment that I intend to move seeks to change the flexibility set out in the Electoral Bill. Madam Speaker, currently the Bill sets a range of 102 per cent and 98 per cent as the difference between electorates. I propose making that 105 per cent and 95 per cent respectively. Mr Humphries spoke of this earlier, pointing out that doing it in this way would allow for community of interest. I particularly had in mind the possibility of Weston Creek being divided. For some reason it always seems to be Weston Creek that gets divided, whether in terms of education, health, or whatever. I particularly had that area in mind in preparing this amendment. I hope that it will get the support of members and thus allow flexibility for these people to make these electorates fit into the character of Canberra in the most effective way.
Madam Speaker, with those few comments, I believe that it is appropriate for me to make clear that in general terms I will be supporting this Bill in principle.
Sitting suspended from 4.58 to 8.00 pm
MR STEVENSON (8.00): There are a number of reasons why I think logic would have convinced us that we should not have our own electoral commission in the ACT. This is another expense that need not be met by the people of the ACT if we did not have self-government. Allowing for the fact that we have it, one should look at what sort of electoral system there should be. The Australian Electoral Commission recommended a single electorate with a proportional representation system of voting. That was the recommendation to the Federal inquiry into the ACT electoral system in 1989. This was rejected by Federal members.
The Democrats later on tried to amend the Australian Capital Territory (Electoral) Act by changing the system of counting so that we would basically change the d'Hondt electoral system. The debate in the Senate was interesting. The Liberal Party and the Labor Party had been hard at it, opposing each other on another
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