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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 1999 Week 9 Hansard (1 September) . . Page.. 2723 ..
MR HUMPHRIES (Treasurer, Attorney-General and Minister for Justice and Community Safety): Mr Speaker, for the information of members, I present, pursuant to section 6 of the Subordinate Laws Act 1989, regulation No. 15 of 1999, Maternal Health Information Regulations 1999, made under the Health Regulation (Maternal Health Information) Act 1998, and notified in Gazette No. S52 dated 1 September 1999; and an out of order petition, pursuant to standing order 83A, lodged by Mr Osborne from 616 citizens concerning the Tuggeranong lakeshore master plan.
That this Assembly calls on the Chief Minister to remove from the responsibility of the Attorney-General the administration of all matters relating to the powers of the Executive in relation to the Quamby Juvenile Detention Facility and allocate those powers to the Minister for Education, pending the presentation to the Assembly of the Standing Committee on Education's report on its inquiry into Quamby.
MR OSBORNE (3.34): This issue is a very difficult one to come to a decision on. When I sit down I still will not quite have come to a decision, but I look forward to hearing what Ms Tucker has to say when she closes the debate. Quite clearly, this Assembly cannot force the Government to change their mind on this. Section 43 of the ACT (Self-Government) Act states in subsection (1):
A Minister shall administer such matters relating to the powers of the Executive as are allocated to that Minister from time to time by the Chief Minister.
When you read that, Mr Speaker, I do not think there is any room in the Self-Government Act for the Assembly to allocate ministerial responsibilities. The role of the Assembly in general is to exact a measure of accountability from the Ministers. I think that all members of the Select Committee on the Report of the Review of Governance agreed that the Chief Minister should allocate the responsibilities for Ministers. Perhaps you, Mr Speaker, or Mr Stanhope could correct me on that but that is where I think that idea went. Our ideas go more to the heart of accountability and cooperative government rather than forcing the Chief Minister to do as we wish in relation to these different departments.
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