Page 474 - Week 02 - Tuesday, 8 March 2011
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repeatedly flout the authority of the chair, and I ask you, Madam Assistant Speaker, to take whatever steps you feel are necessary to restore the dignity of this place—because those opposite hold it in contempt.
MADAM ASSISTANT SPEAKER: Thank you, Mr Corbell. Mr Rattenbury, you have—
Mr Smyth: Just on the point of order, there are standards here, Madam Assistant Speaker. Mr Hanson, when challenged, withdrew a comment, and it still is up to the Speaker to withdraw exactly the same comment which Mr Hanson repeated. With this talk of standards, the standards should be applied to all. If Mr Corbell has a problem with your rulings and the way you are conducting the house, then of course he should move dissent. He does not have the courage, and of course he does not have the case, to move dissent. So I think you should instruct Mr Corbell to go and read his standing orders, because there is a form and a way about going about this—
MADAM ASSISTANT SPEAKER: Thank you, Mr Smyth. Mr Rattenbury, you do indeed have the floor, and I trust you will be heard in silence.
MR RATTENBURY: The point I was simply trying to draw out when I was speaking before—I think I might it wrap it up here, because we should really just get on with this debate—is that it is important to focus on what Senator Brown’s bill does.
Mr Seselja’s motion—that is where I was—is unfortunate in that I think many of us would agree with the sentiment in the first part of it, which is that we should undertake a broader examination of the self-government act; I think every member in this place at various times has made observations about their frustration with the current formulation of the self-government act. That cuts across a range of different areas and I think different members would have different views.
There is, undoubtedly, scope to consider whether the self-government act as it was established more than 20 years ago now is still the right self-government act for the ACT. But that should not be diminished by what is on the table today, which is a simple step to deal with section 35 and remove the veto power, the ability to simply wipe out a law on a ministerial whim. We want to move from that veto power to where the federal parliament has to vote if it wants to strike down an ACT law.
Mr Seselja’s motion in seeking to recommend against the adoption of that amendment I think does the ACT a disservice. We have the ability to do something constructive now to address one of the flaws in the self-government act. It is a practical step. It is something concrete that can be done. The Greens believe that that step should be taken now.
We also support Mr Seselja’s sentiment that it is worth looking at other elements of the self-government act; I think we should be seeking to do that. But, certainly, this Assembly has expressed that desire on previous occasions and we have not been able to get the federal government to engage in that process. So I think we have got some more work to do there to get to that point. We should take practical steps now and get on with what can be done at this point in time.
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