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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2004 Week 06 Hansard (Wednesday, 23 June 2004) . . Page.. 2554 ..

All those things considered, I am willing to support the motion put forward today, so that we have the opportunity to properly scrutinise the laws that will be enforced in the ACT.

MR STANHOPE (Chief Minister, Attorney-General, Minister for Environment and Minister for Community Affairs) (6.20) Mr Speaker, the government will not support this motion. The motion appears to be aimed at ensuring that no regulations can be made in relation to the legislation passed during the June, July and August sittings unless they are subject to the full disallowance period before the Assembly.

The motion poses a significant and totally unnecessary constraint on the effective and proper governance of the territory. Effectively, the motion prevents any necessary regulations for acts enacted during this period being made prior to 16 August, an impossibility for any legislation made in the last two sitting weeks of August. It appears that it will have to wait until a new Assembly meets, an event not likely to occur until at least mid-November, and perhaps even later.

In any event, the disallowance period for any regulation is set out in the Legislation Act 2001. Section 71 deals with the period that is worrying the Liberal Party, which applies, I quote, if:

(a) notice of motion to disallow or amend a subordinate law or disallowable instrument is given in the Legislative Assembly within 6 sitting days after the instrument is presented to the Assembly; and

(b) within 6 sitting days after the notice is given, the Assembly is dissolved or expires; and

(c) at the time of the dissolution or expiry—

(i) the notice has not been withdrawn and the motion has not been called on; or

(ii) the motion has been called on and moved, but has not been withdrawn or otherwise disposed of.

Where this occurs—

(2) …the subordinate law or disallowable instrument is taken to have been presented to the Legislative Assembly on the first sitting day of the Assembly after the next general election of members of the Assembly.

This issue was foreseen in the Legislation Act and dealt with. This amendment proposes that we simply ignore the Legislation Act and the decision that previous assemblies took on how this very issue will be dealt with in the Assembly. The issue has been foreseen; the issue has been dealt with.

The Legislation Act further provides that any regulations made after the Assembly rises for the last time can be subject to a disallowance motion within six sitting days of the commencement of the new Assembly. In either case, if any objectionable regulations are made after the Assembly rises, the new Assembly will be able to disallow them. This motion is a serious, and unnecessary, curb on the government’s regulation making powers as provided to it by the Assembly when the Assembly passes a bill into law.

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