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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2003 Week 11 Hansard (22 October) . . Page.. 3906 ..

MR STEFANIAK (continuing):

I do not think that the Prime Minister's proposal-I wonder whether Ms Tucker has read it-actually involves a rubber stamp. On pages 5 to 8 of the executive summary of "Resolving Deadlocks", the discussion paper which has been issued, there is a bit of a history about the federal Constitution and some of the changes to it. The most important change, which is very pertinent for us because we are discussing a motion by a member of the Greens, relates to proportional representation being introduced in 1948. I think that everyone here accepts that as a principle; we certainly do.

It took effect in 1949 and one of the consequences was that it fostered the development of minor parties. The Prime Minister says in this booklet that this has been a valuable evolution in the representative character of the Australian parliament, and it certainly has. He goes on to say that there was an amendment in 1983 which increased the number of senators in each state from five to six at a half-Senate election.

In practice, the election of an even number of senators at a half-Senate election, combined with proportional representation, has meant that it is virtually impossible for a government to obtain a majority in the upper house, no matter how large its majority in the lower house. That is something we have seen since then. I think that the last majority in the Senate was in the days of Malcolm Fraser. It is interesting that he did not actually use it, either.

The booklet goes on to say that the consequence is that the Senate holds effective control over the legislative and policy agenda upon which the government of the day has been elected, which is probably a fair statement and that, in practice, the minority has assumed a permanent and absolute veto over the majority, which has occurred on occasions. It is true that most of the government's legislation is passed by the Senate. That is obviously because most legislation is non-contentious. We see the same thing happening in this little parliament. The paper goes on to say:

The Prime Minister goes on to speak about a bipartisan committee in 1959 with Gough Whitlam and Alec Downer, the father of the current foreign minister, which outlined the need for, and elements of, reform to the Senate. They suggested reform of the relationship between the two houses in the light of the change in the Senate's composition and function.

That committee reported that section 57 needs to be amended in such as way as to maintain the principle of responsible government and to ensure the precedence of national interests over other interests. A quarter of a century later, those concerns have been reinforced by the 1983 reforms which effectively ended the potential for a government to obtain a majority in the Senate.

The Prime Minister goes on to say:

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