Page 904 - Week 03 - Tuesday, 20 March 2012
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like your ruling on what a private note is and whether or not Dr Bourke should correct the record for misleading the Assembly by claiming something that it was not.
MR CORBELL (Molonglo—Attorney-General, Minister for Police and Emergency Services and Minister for the Environment and Sustainable Development): Mr Speaker, I think it is important to remind members that Dr Bourke, on tabling that document, did not assert that it was a private note. Dr Bourke, as a relatively new minister in this place, needs to obviously familiarise himself with all aspects of the standing orders. But at no—
Members interjecting—
MR SPEAKER: Order! Let us hear from Mr Corbell. Mr Smyth was heard in silence.
MR CORBELL: time in tabling the document did Dr Bourke assert that it was a private note.
MR HANSON (Molonglo): Mr Speaker, I have to speak. I find it extraordinary that the manager of government business would stand up and say that he is new enough, that he is so new that he should be given leeway because he is not able to understand the process of this Assembly. But the Chief Minister and the government see that he is fit to run a number of departments. I think it is extraordinary—
MR SPEAKER: Order!
MR HANSON: as a position for the government to put forward in this debate—
MR SPEAKER: Thank you. Mr Hanson!
MR HANSON: in this position.
MR SPEAKER: Mr Hanson, we are not having a debate about Dr Bourke’s skills, character or anything like that. We are having a debate about the interpretation of the standing orders. In fact, we are not having a debate. I am granting leave to give Mr Corbell an opportunity to respond. I would rather give leave but I think I will just stop it there and I am going to make a ruling on Mr Smyth’s question.
I think the best advice, members, on this is to turn to the Companion to the Standing Orders of the Legislative Assembly for the Australian Capital Territory. Page 260 seems to provide the most definitive advice on this matter. It refers to a debate in 1995. In that debate it was said that there has been informal agreement that:
… members are entitled to read from briefs or speaking notes without having to table those notes. Where a member reads from, say, a letter or a document, that is another matter. Members would certainly expect to have to table that document if they read it on the floor of the house.
That is the essence of the discussion at that time. I understand that to be, as it is in the Companion, the form or perhaps the convention in this place. I think that is the best definition I am aware of, Mr Smyth.
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