Page 857 - Week 03 - Thursday, 14 April 1994
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above-the-line voting system - she did say that in a radio interview, that she did not actually hear anybody tell her that they were not interested or did not like her proposal - we have to assume that they similarly would not express a view about three- or four-year terms, and have not done so.
What does this Government feel it needs to be able to make these decisions? I believe that before this Government embarks on four-year terms, before it embarks on public funding for election campaigns, before it introduces the how-to-vote cards, which are not part of the electoral system used in Tasmania, it has a strong responsibility to say to the people of the ACT, "This is what we propose to do". Of course, it has not done that. Even after this Bill was tabled in December last year, no attempt was made to start to generate some debate about this matter. All the debate about, for example, three-year terms versus four-year terms has been generated by the Opposition and the Independents. There has been none at all by this Government - no press releases on the subject, no invitations for public comment, no other means for people to put a point of view. I think it is quite extraordinary that this Government somehow believes that it can divine the will of the people through some kind of extraordinary process of examining the entrails of goats or something of that kind. I do not know what they do, but they certainly do not seem to talk to people about these sorts of issues. If the reaction of the electorate in December was any indication, people are quite concerned about some of these issues, and it took a week of the electorate stamping its feet and almost storming the Assembly before the Government reluctantly came to the view that they had a strong point of view about above-the-line ticket voting.
I remain very concerned about the whole process of the Electoral (Amendment) Bill and the electoral system. I believe, Madam Temporary Deputy Speaker, that the only clear way of dealing with that issue is by putting the fundamentals of our new Hare-Clark electoral system beyond the grasp of politicians operating from the basis of self-interest. I believe that this Assembly should facilitate a referendum, in conjunction with the 1995 election, to exploit section 26 of the self-government Act, to entrench the key elements of the Hare-Clark electoral system; and my party will be doing just that when the ACT Government brings forward its own legislation to enable referenda under section 26 of the self-government Act. I hope and trust that we have the bona fides of the Follett Government in making sure that that particular piece of Government legislation comes forward in sufficient time for it to be considered in an appropriate timeframe and for - - -
Mr Berry: No.
MR HUMPHRIES: No. Well, there is no undertaking. I see that the Chief Minister shakes her head. Mr Berry, who is still partly on the front bench apparently, also says no. Let me put it in clear language for you so that you understand. We cannot have a referendum unless we have a Bill to facilitate it. We cannot have a Bill for a referendum on the electoral system until we have legislation to facilitate referenda under section 26 of the self-government Act. That is your responsibility and I suggest that you make sure that it happens in time for that debate to take place. That is my advice to the Government, and I hope that this Government has the decency to ensure that it happens that way. I am not so sure that it will.
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