Page 2939 - Week 10 - Wednesday, 14 September 1994
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MRS CARNELL: It is actually a lot more difficult than that. That is exactly what we are talking about. We can then speak about how best to legislate for that in the ACT. We have no problems with a committee looking at the legislation; but, if people in this house cannot bring themselves to accept that citizens-initiated referenda are just a part of the democratic process, then there is no point in sending it to a committee. We should vote on it now and get it out of the way, simply because you do not support it. Let us be sensible. If this committee has to go ahead, let us make it look at only the Bills and how best to initiate or legislate for citizens-initiated referenda in the ACT. I will circulate some amendments to that end.
The implementation is clearly explained in the explanatory memorandum which I distributed with my Bill. Obviously, that is what this committee is going to look at. Nothing could possibly be served by opening up a committee to all of the issues that have already been dealt with at that level. If any member of this house wants more information or wants the basic information that we used to come forward with that, I am sure that we would be happy to produce it - we have said that we would - and I know that Mr Stevenson would be happy to produce his. According to Ms Szuty's motion, she wants to look at the operation of similar processes both within and outside Australia. This has already been dealt with and taken into account. Apart from the principle, there are very few similar situations of direct relevance to our circumstances in the ACT, mainly because we have compulsory voting. That makes our operations and processes quite different from those overseas. You simply cannot look at them in the same light.
So I come back to the basis of it. If you support the capacity of citizens to bring forward referenda and if more than 50 per cent of people support them they should come into this Assembly, be passed and become law, then the issue that we have to address is how you legislate for that in the ACT - not in California, not in Western Australia, but in the ACT, under our rules and under our legislation. Again, we have no problems with looking at that. What we do have a problem with is looking at whether or not we have in-principle support for citizens-initiated referenda. We support it and it seems that Mr Stevenson does, but nobody else does. If they did, they would support my amendment to the terms of reference that Ms Szuty has put forward. At least then we would have a committee process that would have some chance of coming up with an end point that we could all live with, before the end of this parliament, in a timeframe that would enable us to debate this issue.
Quite simply, those around Australia who do support open democracy - and there are a lot from both sides of parliament and there are those who are not involved in the political process at all - are looking to the ACT as being the only place where it looks as though legislation of this nature will get up. It would be an absolute tragedy if, because a committee process has terms of reference that are simply ridiculous, that did not happen in the term of this parliament. I commend my amendment to the house.
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