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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2000 Week 7 Hansard (27 June) . . Page.. 2074 ..

MR HUMPHRIES (continuing):

Members have already described some of the fairly extraordinary provisions of this bill which the government is asking the Assembly to support and which, despite the comments, I gather members are still going to pass tonight. The measures effectively give us as a community the flexibility to be able to deal with unexpected twists and turns in the way in which the implementation of the GST might proceed in the next few months. In particular, the power to modify territory law, a quite extraordinary power, as members have noticed, is contained in this bill in the expectation that there may need to be a number of provisions adopted in the territory at short notice to deal with the transition to a new tax system.

I make no secret of the fact that I think Henry VIII provisions are generally undesirable. In fact, some time ago I probably would have been found to be quoted somewhere as saying that I thought that they were entirely unacceptable, but I have to say that I cannot think of a way-

Mr Quinlan: As I mature and wend my way through life, I learn by hard experience!

MR HUMPHRIES: I know. I have spent almost a quarter of my life in this place, Mr Quinlan, so I have grown old in the precincts of this wonderful place.

Ms Carnell: Not yet.

MR HUMPHRIES: I am growing old. I have to say that my views have changed over time about some of these things. I would like to think that there was a way of avoiding having to use Henry VIII provisions, and I suppose there are ways of avoiding the use of Henry VIII-type clauses. One of them would be for us to agree at short notice, on perhaps a day or two's notice, to have the Assembly reconvene to introduce and pass legislation. We could do that. If the Assembly rejects the bill tonight, we will go back and do that as a way of dealing with any unexpected problems. But that could be quite inconvenient to anyone who is planning to go away on holiday, be out of town or whatever.

It seems to me, reluctantly, that a Henry VIII provision is actually necessary, as was the Assembly's view last year or early this year with the road transport reforms. There was a Henry VIII clause in there as well, as I recall. Mr Speaker, I can only indicate that the government proposes to exercise those powers with very considerable restraint and only in these exceptional circumstances because there is really no alternative to doing that.

Mr Speaker, I think it is important to be able to put in place a number of provisions which are covered in the amendments, and I will speak on those in a moment. But issues about pricing and the way in which both governments price their services to the community and individual providers of goods and services price their goods and services need to be flexible enough to accommodate the change. In particular, governments need to be able to ensure that, if they have a power to levy a fee or a charge in respect of legislation, the legislation here makes it clear that there is also the power in doing so to be able to collect the GST.

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