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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1996 Week 1 Hansard (20 February) . . Page.. 73 ..

MR MOORE (continuing):

as the previous one of which she was chair, that exactly the same effort is made to ensure that the committee acts as fairly as it possibly can. That is one of the things, Mr Speaker, that members of the public miss. They often see us in this chamber in full conflict. Rarely do they see the real negotiations that go on in places such as the Administration and Procedure Committee to look for the best possible solution and to include members as far as possible.

Mr Speaker, I think it is a very sensible report. I hope that in future we will go beyond this experimental stage, but I think it is appropriate that we take it step by step. As the author of the original legislation, I think it is an appropriate move.

MR BERRY (4.35): Mr Speaker, I rise to express a view dissenting from that of the advocate in support of the report, Mr Moore in this instance. I would like, first of all, to deal with the legislation which was put before the Assembly by Mr Moore. Mr Moore's legislation was referred to the committee. It is legislation which goes all the way in relation to the broadcasting of proceedings. So far as that is concerned - that it go all of the way - the Labor Opposition would support it; but we oppose strenuously some of the detail in the legislation.

The first point I want to refer to is the authorisation to broadcast proceedings, which is dealt with in recommendation 2 of the report. The recommendation is that the responsibility lie with the Speaker. I would expect, Mr Speaker, that in the normal course of events that would be done in consultation with the Administration and Procedure Committee or with knowledge of the attitude of the committee, and, if that was not enough to influence you, knowledge of the attitude of this chamber, or what it might be should you choose a course that was unacceptable. From our point of view, we believe that the Speaker is the appropriate person to make the authorisation.

So far as privilege is concerned, Mr Moore, in his legislation, proposed absolute privilege. That is something that the Labor Opposition would oppose because we believe that qualified privilege should apply in relation to anybody who broadcasts parts of a debate or parts of one's response in this place, and that qualified privilege ought to apply in all other areas. I do not think anybody could imagine circumstances where, if somebody broadcast the whole of proceedings, there would be an action available to them under the qualified privilege rule. So far as absolute privilege is concerned, we oppose that position.

Recommendation 3 deals with allowing broadcasting to the public of designated, significant or landmark debates. That is a real issue of concern for us because it really is a matter of who decides what is a designated, significant or landmark debate. That would go to the majority of this Assembly, so anybody who is not among the majority in one way or another may well miss out. I will try to create a hypothetical example. If the Greens decided that something was a significant or landmark debate and the Liberals and the Independents disagreed, it would be unlikely that it would be broadcast. That is the real problem with that particular approach. We take the view that all of the Assembly's proceedings ought to be broadcast, and that all of the Assembly's proceedings ought to be available to whoever wants to report from them, with qualified privilege.

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