Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . .

Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2003 Week 3 Hansard (23 October) . . Page.. 3979 ..

MR STEFANIAK

What I think they meant there was a change of government within the term of the Assembly. We have not seen that in the last three, although, of course, we saw it with some regularity, as you will recall, Mr Speaker, in the First Assembly.

Another committee looked into the matter and reported in June 1999. It recommended that the Assembly remain at three years. The Liberal government at the time supported an extension of the term to four years. It considered that the Pettit review indicated that there was sufficient community support to increase the length of the term. The then Labor opposition and the crossbench member on that committee felt it should stay at three years and felt it was unnecessary then to increase the term. Since then, of course, the Labor Party has changed its mind on this issue. I suppose some might say that you get a different view in government; but at any rate it certainly has changed its mind.

Since then, in 2002 this Standing Committee on Legal Affairs has looked into the size of the Assembly. A majority of that committee also suggested four-year terms, although the main thrust of that inquiry was, in fact, the size of the Assembly. And now, of course, we have this review.

So that is basically the history of it. A lot of work has been done before. It is important to note what has occurred in the other states. The Commonwealth, of course, has three-year terms and does not have a fixed election date. New South Wales has a four-year term, and has had since 1981, and has a fixed election date. Victoria has had a four-year term since 1984 and has a fixed election date. Queensland has a three-year term and does not have a fixed election date. Western Australia has had a four-year term since 1987 and does not have a fixed election date. South Australia has had a four-year term since 1985 and I understand has a fixed election date. Tasmania has had a four-year term since 1972 with no fixed election date. The ACT at present has a three-year term with a fixed election date and the Northern Territory has since its inception had a four-year term and does not have a fixed election date. So the situation is that, apart from us, Queensland and the Commonwealth, everyone else has four-year terms and has had since those times.

A number of items were raised during this debate to effectively summarise the pros and cons. The pros for a four-year term included that the majority of lower houses in Australia have four-year terms and one of them, the Northern Territory, is a unicameral parliament like ours. It was stated that longer terms result in better policies, facilitate longer-term planning and implementation of policies by the government, enhance business confidence, enhance the standard of political debate and result in cost savings due to fewer elections. Evidence before the committee indicated that we would save $125,000 a year by having a four-year term.

The Canberra Property Owners Association appeared at the hearing and indicated that they certainly favoured four-year terms because that would enhance business confidence. They said that the election cycle is such that prior to an election being held the government goes into election mode and a lot of things tend to come to a stop; then after the election not much happens for a while as the new government has to find its feet. It is interesting to note that, when a Queensland committee looked into four-year parliamentary terms, a similar point was made in support of a four-year term by the Queensland Chamber of Commerce in relation to business confidence.

Next page . . . . Previous page . . . . Speeches . . . . Contents . . . . Debates(HTML) . . . .