Page 871 - Week 03 - Thursday, 14 April 1994

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The other issue that is very important, Madam Speaker, is the issue of a referendum to entrench the Hare-Clark electoral system. The indications from the cross-chamber body language that was going on during Mr Humphries's speech and perhaps in a couple of interjections were that it may well be that there is no referendum legislation prepared by the Government in time to do this. I would suggest to Mr Humphries that I am happy to work with him on this.

There are two options that we have to ensure the entrenching of this legislation. The first one is to prepare a simple Bill ourselves that goes along the line that Federal legislation, where it is at all applicable, will apply in order to allow this referendum to proceed. I think we could achieve something in that way. The Government and the Parliamentary Counsel might dislike that so much that they might find time to prepare a proper Bill for us. I think we could work out something along those lines. Alternatively, and perhaps better, we could look at legislation that is used successfully in other States, simply adopt it and put it through this house to ensure that we can provide entrenching legislation. If we adopt legislation from other States it might need some minor modifications. I am aware of Labor, when they were in opposition, tabling some pieces of legislation that they had taken from other States. This is a method that has been used before and I think we could well look at. So we do still have a couple of options to ensure that such legislation is entrenched by referendum, if Mr Stevenson decides that enough questions can be asked. If not, then, like other issues, we lose.

Madam Speaker, I would like to take up a question that Mr Stevenson has raised, and that is the question of fraud in relation to the questions asked in this referendum and the fact that not enough questions were asked. I would like to talk about the impact that that has had on me. There is some irony in the fact that Mr Stevenson has argued this so strongly. Mr Stevenson has come very close to convincing me that citizens-initiated referendums are not an appropriate way to go. I now have reluctance and will take some convincing before believing that his Bill on citizens-initiated referendums should proceed. The reason, Madam Speaker, is that it seems to me that, no matter what question is asked and no matter what group of people is put together to ask the question, there will always be those who, like Mr Stevenson, will point the finger and say that the referendum is a fraud. If we have a situation where people are saying that a referendum is a fraud, citizens-initiated referendums cannot work. In that case there is simply one question: "Are you going to accept the law of the Territory or are you going to override the law of the Territory?". Whilst I have always supported voters' veto, Mr Stevenson has been very successful in convincing me of a major difficulty with citizens-initiated referendums, and that is why I am getting cold feet. I had begun to get cold feet because of the number of times he had said that recently, and my feet are feeling like they are on iceblocks now as far as that issue goes.

Madam Speaker, it is ironic that Mr Stevenson should talk about a "fraud of the year" in terms of that issue. He sits in this Assembly having been elected to abolish self-government. I probably do not need to say more, but I am going to. It is ironic that Mr Stevenson says that and then brings us one of his surveys in which the question he asked was, "Should we have two-year terms, four-year terms, six-year terms?". I think they were the questions.

Mr Stevenson: Two-, three- and four-year terms.


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