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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1999 Week 7 Hansard (30 June) . . Page.. 1884 ..
MR SPEAKER
: I acknowledge the presence in the gallery of Ms Annette Ellis, MHR for Canberra and a previous member of this Assembly.MR SPEAKER: Is it the wish of the Assembly to debate this order of the day concurrently with the order of the day relating to the presentation of the report of the Select Committee on the Report of the Review of Governance on the report on the Electoral Commissioner's report entitled "Review of the Electoral Act 1992 - The 1998 ACT Legislative Assembly Election" and associated matters pursuant to the order of the Assembly of 10 December 1998, as amended on 18 February 1999 and 9 March 1999? There being no objection, that course will be followed. I remind members that in debating order of the day No. 1 they may also address their remarks to order of the day No. 2.
MR OSBORNE (9.24): Pursuant to order, I present the report of the Select Committee on the Report of the Review of Governance, including the committee's consideration of the report of the Electoral Commissioner entitled "Review of the Electoral Act 1992 - The 1998 ACT Legislative Assembly Election", together with the minutes of proceedings. I move:
That the report be noted.
I will be brief, Mr Speaker. This report is a majority report. There is no dissenting report because each of the members who did not necessarily agree with a recommendation has made a comment in the text of the report. After the events of today, perhaps it would be best if all members spoke at length on another day about the report. I would like to make just a couple of points, Mr Speaker. One is that there are over 40 recommendations in the report. I think that it would be fair to say that all members of the committee had to concede a little bit in the view that they have brought into this report. Certainly, there are a number of areas in which I would have liked to have gone a bit further, but I think all of us on the committee agreed that the best result would be a report that would achieve something, rather than having extremes on either end of the scale.
I thank the other members of the committee - Mr Stanhope and you, Mr Speaker - for the time that they put into this report. It was obviously a very lengthy process, but a number of issues came up while the inquiry was in train. A number of things arose for the committee that forced this report onto the backburner a little, but I think at the end of the day we have a good report. Someone suggested to me that it is a cautious report, and I would agree, but I think it is a report that can achieve something. I have come to the conclusion, Mr Speaker, that reviews of the way in which this place operates should never finish. I think that we should continue to look at ways of improving it.
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