Page 2689 - Week 09 - Thursday, 8 August 2013
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Steps which may be taken to encourage public sector accountability include:
(a) The establishment of scrutiny bodies and mechanisms to oversee Government, enhances public confidence in the integrity and acceptability of government’s activities.
The committee are obviously such a structure. It continues:
Independent bodies such as Public Accounts Committees, Ombudsmen, Human Rights Commissions, Auditors-General, Anti-corruption commissions, Information Commissioners and similar oversight institutions can play a key role in enhancing public awareness of good governance and rule of law issues. Governments are encouraged to establish or enhance appropriate oversight bodies in accordance with national circumstances.
The continuing resolution also states:
Parliaments and governments should maintain high standards of accountability, transparency and responsibility in the conduct of all public business.
Parliamentary procedures should provide adequate mechanisms to enforce the
accountability of the executive to Parliament.
The problem is that if you have a committee structure where government members can essentially prevent any of that from happening because nothing can move through the committees without their support, how is it possible to have parliamentary procedures that provide adequate mechanisms to enforce the accountability of the executive to the parliament? That is what we all agreed to in the continuing resolution. That is what the Chief Minister signed off on, and I remember her speaking in praise of it. That is certainly what was being driven by Mr Rattenbury and his colleagues. Perhaps the nub of this is the advice from the Clerk when he says:
The adoption of a committee system without non-government majorities is, in my opinion, a step away from the spirit of those principles.
So we have a decision here, Madam Speaker. It is a decision for the government, and it is particularly a decision for Mr Rattenbury about whether he is going to step away from the Latimer House principles that he championed. In 2008, through that period as Speaker, he was a great champion of the Latimer House principles. He was a great champion of what they were, and he voted for the continuing resolution, as we all did. We are now in a position where there is deafening silence from the Greens minister on this issue, having written to him on 28 May and not heard back.
I understand why the Chief Minister does not want that scrutiny of her government. It is fairly true that this government is one that says it wants openness and accountability, but when it comes to the mechanisms that can be put in place to enforce that, as we all agreed to in the continuing resolution, this government does not live up to its rhetoric. I do not think that is going to be a great surprise to anybody.
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