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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1995 Week 9 Hansard (23 November) . . Page.. 2594 ..

22. Section 65(2) enables a member to move an amendment to a proposal unless the amendment is to increase the amount of public money of the Territory to be appropriated. It seems that the only way to transfer money from one vote to another is to amend one vote by decreasing the amount of public money of the Territory being appropriated, and to amend another vote by increasing the amount of public money of the Territory being appropriated. In my view, the former amendment would be allowed but not the latter as there would be an increase in the vote in question and thus a contravention of section 65(2) of the Self-Government Act.

23. This view is not inconsistent with the statement in the Explanatory Memorandum to the Self-Government Act which refers to a 'transfer' of amounts. The Explanatory Memorandum envisages that certain types of transfers are permitted though these are not specified. I think 'transfer' refers to transfers within a proposal (i.e. vote) so far as that is possible.

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24. Accordingly, in my opinion, section 65(2) would permit members to move amendments to transfer funds within a vote but not between votes. This would mean that amounts could be transferred between recurrent and capital expenditure within a vote.

Other views on the meaning of `vote'

25. There are however, three other possible interpretations as regards the meaning of 'vote' as applied to the Appropriation Bill 1995. The first being that a 'vote' is the aggregate figure declared to be appropriated by clause 4 of the Appropriation Bill 1995. Thus, a member could move an amendment to the enactment known as the Appropriation Bill 1995 to move money around within the enactment and not be in breach of section 65(2). However, I do not believe that such an argument should be preferred as it would make use of the word 'vote' meaningless. There would be no occasion where a member could not amend an enactment dealing with a number of lines of appropriation. If there is a meaning that could be given to 'enactment' and 'vote' that allows both to operate, that meaning ought to be preferred.

26. In my view, for both 'enactment' and 'vote' to operate in section 65 of the Self-Government Act, it is necessary to accord 'vote' a meaning of each line of appropriation within an enactment while 'enactment' would refer to enactments such as the Appropriation (ACT Forests Trusts Account) Act 1993. Such an approach is in accordance with Westminster Parliamentary practice. Additionally, such an approach is obviously designed to stop an Appropriation Act from being amended generally by inserting some new expenditure into the Act.

27. A second possible interpretation would be to read each item in Part II of the Schedule to the Appropriation Bill 1995 as a separate 'vote'. In my

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