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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1996 Week 12 Hansard (20 November) . . Page.. 3841 ..

MR MOORE (10.48): I present the Electoral (Amendment) Bill (No. 2) 1996.

Title read by Clerk.

MR MOORE: I move:

That this Bill be agreed to in principle.

Mr Speaker, this Bill is exactly the same as the one I introduced on 4 September 1996. When I introduced the Bill the title read "A Bill to amend the Electoral Act 1992". Unfortunately, I left off the words from the long title "and for related purposes". In fact, there are hardly any related purposes in the Bill. Nevertheless, I left this off. I was advised that, having done so, there may be a sense in which the Bill was not properly introduced and, therefore, it could be questioned on that basis in due time.

I must say, Mr Speaker, I think we have to improve our systems because this is on the same level as the sorts of corrections that the Clerk makes to a piece of legislation in terms of full stops, commas and so forth; they do not change the meaning and they do not change the intention. This sort of reintroduction of Bills seems to occur two or three times a year because some small mistake of this nature has been made. I think it is appropriate for us to look at our processes. That having been said, I made the mistake and it is now being corrected. In a short while, with leave of the Assembly, I will discharge the old motion in order to get this legislation up. I draw members' attention to page 3006 of Hansard of 4 September 1996 for the introduction speech to this Bill.

Debate (on motion by Mr Humphries) adjourned.

MR MOORE: I ask for leave of the Assembly to move a motion to discharge order of the day No. 21, private members business.

Leave granted.

MR MOORE: I move:

That order of the day No. 21, private Members' business, relating to the Electoral (Amendment) Bill (No. 2) 1996, be discharged.

I am moving that it be discharged from the notice paper because the title did not include "and for related purposes".

Question resolved in the affirmative.

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