Page 3650 - Week 12 - Wednesday, 20 October 1993
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For the moment let us put this law aside. Let us assume that this law was not there. If, in fact, the other laws had been broken they ought to have been dealt with in an appropriate way. What I am suggesting is that the very issues that he raised at that time over the leaking of information to the Canberra Times ought to be dealt with in the same way as if information had been leaked by somebody from perhaps the National Australia Bank, the Commonwealth Bank or another bank, or any business, such as Mr Westende's business. What happens when, in a business like that, one of the employees breaches the privacy of the business? That can have a major impact. It can have an absolutely major impact on the business. If our laws are inadequate in dealing with that, then it is quite appropriate for us to change or modify those laws. A very special set of laws was drawn up just for the Government to look after its own. It was drawn up by bureaucrats and agreed to by Ministers. This particular Act was delivered to us as an ordinance just prior to self-government. That re-emphasises the fact that it is bureaucrats looking after bureaucrats, and looking after the interests of bureaucrats - in this case protecting privacy. We ought to look very carefully and consider whether or not we actually want this piece of legislation in place.
Madam Speaker, I would like to deal with some of the specific comments made by Mr Connolly on 31 March. Mr Connolly used the good old argument that every State government in Australia, whether it be Labor, Liberal or National, has ensured that they have this type of legislation. Sure. So what? If we take that attitude to every piece of legislation we will never do anything other than what other people do. If we are never going to do anything other than what other people do, do we really need self-government at all? I am sure that Mr Stevenson would suddenly prick up his ears on hearing this and would be asking that very same question. It seems to me that this argument is brought in only when it happens to suit the Government. We always do the comparison if it happens to suit us, but if it does not suit us we do not bring in a comparison at all. Therefore I think that that argument carries very little weight.
Mr Connolly took great delight in dealing with the Epidemiological Studies (Confidentiality) Act which I introduced and which has secrecy provisions. The secrecy provisions there deal with people who are acting outside the law in particular. It was designed specifically to allow us, in public health terms, to get information. There are other Acts - they were referred to by Ms Szuty - that specifically have provisions in them for reasons like that, and I do not seek to change those laws. It is this overriding law that applies specifically to government when, in fact, if there is a need, it ought to apply also to private enterprise as well.
Madam Speaker, Mr Connolly went on to justify his argument against this Bill by saying, "Look, we have really great freedom of information laws in the ACT and they work so well that anybody can find out whatever they want to". I remember recently Mrs Carnell raising in the public arena that she had attempted to get some information and the costs were quite prohibitive, even though it is quite clear, or it is clear to me, that members seek information in the public interest. It would be very unusual for a member to pursue freedom of information for their own specific interest. No doubt there would be occasions when that would occur. That would have to do with information, for example, about your own file. Clearly, that would be a personal issue and, as far as I am concerned, all members would identify it as such and would be quite happy to
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