Page 2681 - Week 09 - Thursday, 25 August 1994
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MR HUMPHRIES (11.27), in reply: I note the comments of the Attorney-General. The issues that are contained in the Bill have not been traversed in this debate and, therefore, I do not propose to go back over them. I will deal briefly with the question of how we proceed in circumstances where, as the Attorney has indicated, a committee report has been brought down and significant new evidence has come forward to the Assembly or to the Assembly committee, or to the Government, which might tend to suggest that issues should be re-examined as a result of that evidence coming forward.
Mr Deputy Speaker, I accept that those things will happen from time to time. I also understand that the Government must have certain prerogatives about engaging in inquiries or examining issues separately from the Assembly. The concern I have about the approach suggested by the Attorney is that there is a process here that is subject to Government direction, to some extent at least; that is, the Community Law Reform Committee's considerations are generally, if not exclusively, initiated by the Government. In those circumstances, there will clearly be some capacity by the Government to set the direction and to determine the priority of issues that are being considered by bodies such as that.
I would be reluctant to see issues that have been taken up in the Assembly subsumed by Government processes in such a way that they might cut across or redirect those sorts of inquiries being initiated in the Assembly. I accept that from time to time the Government will not be happy with particular inquiries or wish them to proceed; but it is important, nonetheless, that the Assembly's processes be given, I think in general terms, priority in these circumstances.
Mr Connolly: I would be happy for your committee to reconsider it with the Crispin and Clynes material.
MR HUMPHRIES: The Attorney indicates that he is happy for the committee to reconsider it. The issue I was raising was the way in which the other inquiry into public places behaviour had come about. I think the issue is one that has to be sorted out. I am not entirely sure how it should be sorted out. I simply note my concern that in all cases the Assembly's processes should, in general terms, take priority; but I am prepared to accept that that is subject to some further exploration and perhaps some qualification of circumstances.
I am going to consider the position of Mr Moore's Bill and indicate to my colleagues in the Liberal Party whether we should support proceeding with that legislation. We do, in general terms, see merit in it; but we acknowledge that there are difficulties. We also acknowledge the further issue of whether the inquiry being conducted, to which the Attorney referred, ought to be allowed to complete before we proceed in this Assembly. That is where I think the Assembly as a whole should leave it.
Question resolved in the affirmative.
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