Page 1230 - Week 04 - Thursday, 4 May 2006
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If Mr Corbell wants to override standing order 225, then he should suspend standing order 225. He cannot amend this motion and use this motion to give effect to his amendment. This is where it is illogical. The amendment really offends standing order 225. Paragraph (5) does not authorise the amendment because the motion has not passed. It is used regularly, it is used annually, because we need to authorise paragraph (4) which is inconsistent with the standing orders. That is the basis of the argument.
We have sought advice. Odgers will support exactly what I have said. In that case, Mr Speaker, you should rule the amendment out of order.
MR CORBELL (Molonglo—Attorney-General, Minister for Police and Emergency Services and Minister for Planning) (4.00): Mr Speaker, your ruling is consistent with practice in this place. Practice in this place has always held that the Assembly as a whole can choose to make decisions which are contrary to the standing orders for the purposes of conducting its business or for the purposes of conducting the business of a committee. It is as simple as that, Mr Speaker, and your ruling is quite consistent.
We do not need to rely upon paragraph (5) of Mr Smyth’s motion. We do not need to rely on it because practice in this place has always provided for the Assembly to be the master of its own destiny and to be the master of how it chooses to conduct its business both in the Assembly as a whole and in its committees. The committees are creatures of the Assembly; they are not separate entities; they do not operate separately from the Assembly—
Mr Stanhope: They are subservient.
MR CORBELL: They are subservient, as the Chief Minister quite rightly points out, to this chamber. The chamber itself can determine how those committees conduct their business. Mr Speaker, I do not, and clearly you do not, see any challenge to standing order 225. Standing order 225 does not conflict with my proposed paragraph (4A). The reason for that is that standing order 225 provides that there shall be an election conducted by the committee of a presiding member and a deputy presiding member.
The amendment that I have proposed does not propose anything different. It simply indicates to the committee that the wish of the Assembly is that that election shall be of a government member. That is what the amendment means. That is in and of itself consistent with House of Representatives Practice, which provides for the election of committee chairs to take place from a field of government members. House of Representatives Practice itself provides—
Opposition members interjecting—
MR CORBELL: I heard Mr Smyth in silence on dissent from your ruling, Mr Speaker, and I ask that opposition members do the same. I repeat: House of Representatives Practice provides for the election of a chair of a committee to be conducted from a field of government members. I am not proposing today that the Assembly as a whole elect that person. I am indicating that the committee should elect a government member to that role. That is consistent with House of Representatives Practice. It is consistent with the
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