Page 1529 - Week 04 - Thursday, 29 March 2012
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Again, the reasons for that are spelt out in the report. That follows on specifically from the issues raised by the public accounts committee.
The fourth recommendation is this:
… that the position of Ombudsman be made an Officer of the Parliament, but that this not take effect until the ACT establishes its own Ombudsman or similar changes are made to the Commonwealth Ombudsman.
This recognises the current situation, where the ACT in a sense shares the ombudsman role with the commonwealth; we perhaps subcontract the capability. In light of that very practical situation, it would be fairly difficult, and perhaps unclear, if we were to create that position for the ACT segment of the ombudsman. So the committee identifies that it is an appropriate office, but thinks that, given the ACT’s current administrative arrangements, that is the best way to go.
The committee then goes to recommendation 5:
… in the event that Officers of the Parliament are established, the Assembly should, from time to time, review the appropriateness of each officer of parliament’s status as an Officer of the Parliament and whether new offices of parliament should be established.
The committee explored a number of other positions in the ACT, including the Electoral Commissioner, the Commissioner for Sustainability and the Environment and the human rights commissioners. The committee drew the conclusion that at this time those officers should not be included but that it may be appropriate in the future.
The report then goes on to discuss some of the important details about how this status might be created. It explores the establishing legislation and important issues of governance and administration. Particularly, the committee formed a view that there should be an oversight committee in the Assembly for officers of parliament, and it concluded that the administration and procedure committee would be the most appropriate for the Assembly, given its overall view of the Assembly. However, in light of the current arrangements, the committee recognises that the PAC currently oversights the Auditor-General. In light of the fact that at this point we are recommending that the Auditor-General be the only officer of parliament, the committee formed the view that that relationship is best left intact at this time. When there is more than one, that would be the appropriate time to move across for the administration and procedure committee to take that overall oversight role.
The other substantive issue or particular issue I would point to is that of budget. Clearly, one of the key pointers for an officer’s ability to maintain independence is that it is adequately resourced. The committee formed the view that a separate budget appropriation be identified for officers of the parliament. This would be perhaps most appropriately done by a proposal before the Assembly at the moment that the Legislative Assembly be given a separate appropriation bill. The committee’s view was that that should occur and that the separate designation for officers of the parliament should occur in that same appropriation bill. Clearly, I cannot pre-empt the
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