Page 4695 - Week 15 - Thursday, 16 December 1993
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MR CONNOLLY: Madam Speaker, I move:
That this Bill be agreed to in principle.
Madam Speaker, prior to the transfer to the Territory of the Supreme Court on 1 July 1992 the Commonwealth, with the concurrence of the Assembly, amended the self-government Act to provide for the removal of judicial officers to be governed by a judicial commission process. I tabled in the second half of last year exposure drafts of the judicial commissions legislation. I would now like to formally introduce into the Assembly the Judicial Commissions Bill 1993 and report to the Assembly on the public consultation process.
The amendments to the self-government Act to which I have just referred amount to the entrenchment in legislation, which cannot be altered by this Assembly, of key constitutional safeguards for the judiciary. In tabling the Bill for exposure I said:
An independent judiciary is free to interpret and enforce the laws independently of the legislature or the Executive; it is the bulwark of freedom in a society such as Australia's. Protection against arbitrary removal from judicial office is an important element of judicial independence.
That is in the ACT, but not in Victoria.
The Bill provides for allegations concerning a judicial officer's conduct or capacity to be investigated by an independent judicial commission of three members, appointed by the Executive and drawn from persons who are, or have been, judges of superior courts of record, including judges of other courts who hold commissions on the Supreme Court as additional judges, but excluding the three resident judges of the Supreme Court, acting judges and sitting High Court judges. One of the members shall be appointed by the Executive to be the presiding member.
A commission's task will be to investigate allegations referred to it by the Assembly or the Attorney-General. A judicial officer will be removed from office by the ACT Executive, but only at the request by motion of the Assembly following the Assembly's consideration of a report of a commission which concludes that the alleged misbehaviour or alleged physical or mental capacity of the judicial officer concerned could amount to proved misbehaviour or incapacity warranting his or her removal from office and the Assembly's acceptance of the findings of the commission.
Madam Speaker, I think it would be helpful if I were to outline the main issues which were identified during the public consultation process. Firstly, there was considerable support for a discretion to be vested in the Attorney-General to decline to act upon a complaint which is frivolous or vexatious. This idea has been included at clause 17 of the Bill, which also includes a discretion conferred upon the Attorney-General to decline to take action where the complainant does not include sufficient relevant material in respect of the subject matter of the complaint.
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