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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1997 Week 8 Hansard (28 August) . . Page.. 2614 ..

Mr Hird: Mr Speaker, speaking to the point of order, I would like to draw your attention, sir, to standing order 202(a) - "persistently and wilfully obstructed the business of the Assembly", and (b), "been guilty of disorderly conduct". That member should be dealt with by the presiding officer accordingly.

MR SPEAKER: Mr Hird, I will pay attention to standing order 202(a) - "persistently and wilfully obstructed the business of the Assembly". I caution members.

MRS CARNELL: Mr Speaker, I find it very difficult to understand Mr Corbell's position on this when I was outlining the dates of meetings that were cancelled. I am very happy to go on and explain why they were cancelled, Mr Speaker. They were cancelled by New South Wales while they established their own position on a number of issues and because their officials were not available on the agreed dates. The issues that New South Wales had not established their position on include access charges, joint use of track, capacity on existing lines, ownership of the alignment, land acquisition and project finance. Many of these issues will be hard to resolve - there is no doubt about that - until the details of the proposal are available; but what the Prime Minister said last night was that he intended to get Bob Carr and me together to make sure that we could resolve these outstanding issues and do it quickly. Mr Speaker, Mr Corbell made some very trite comment about a train led recovery. I would be very happy to have a very fast train led recovery in the ACT.

MR OSBORNE: My question is to the Attorney-General, Mr Humphries. Minister, in this morning's Canberra Times there is an article about a Canberra lawyer who basically swindled a person - there is no other way to describe it - out of a parcel of shares worth $20,000 on behalf of his or her client. The resulting complaint that was made to the ACT Law Society was referred to the society's Professional Conduct Board and four charges were subsequently proven against the lawyer. So far so good. How is it possible, then, Mr Humphries, that while the charges were proven by the board - they were very serious charges, I might add - the Law Society has decided to impose no penalty? Even worse, the guilty lawyer has been left unnamed. Do you consider that this is the best way for complaints against lawyers to be handled and that it is one that appropriately serves and protects the public interest?

MR HUMPHRIES: Mr Speaker, I thank Mr Osborne for that question. Let me say, first of all, that the processes that govern the work of the Professional Conduct Board of the Law Society are processes that are laid out in legislation - the Legal Practitioners Act - and reflect a longstanding arrangement whereby the Law Society exercises discipline over its own members. It is perhaps anomalous that that should occur in that way. It is a system of discipline which is not quite like any other used in any other profession in the ACT. The Medical Board does not operate in quite the same way, nor do other bodies of a similar kind, and it may be, Mr Speaker, that the system is susceptible to some reform.

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