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HON JOHN MICKEL MP SPEAKER of the LEGISLATIVE Asselvibly of QUEENSLAND

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HON JOHN MICKEL MP SPEAKER of the LEGISLATIVE Asselvibly of QUEENSLAND HON JOHN MICKEL MP SPEAKER OF THE LEGISLATIVE ASSElvIBLY OF QUEENSLAND 29 April 2011 SCf~UTINY OF iO 3 1,t,i\Y 2011 Mrs Jo-Ann Miller MP LEGISLATION COMMIIT£E Chair Scrutiny of Legislation Committee ~1'IO Parliament House George Street BRISBANE QLD 4000 Dear Mrs Miller Subsequent to my appearance before the Scrutiny of Legislation Committee on 6 April 2011 as part of its consideration of the Parliament of Queensland (Reform and Modernisation) Amendment Bill 2009, I provided to the committee copies of letters I had sent to the Premier outlining my concerns regarding aspects of the Committee System Review Committee's report and recommendations. I enclose for the information of the committee a copy of a reply I have received to my letter of 3 April to the Premier. I point out to the committee that none of the matters raised in that lelter, or in the comprehensive submissions made to the government on 12 January and 27 January, has been refuted or contested in any way. I reiterate the point made in my letter of 3 April to the Premier acknowledging that in its response to the Review Committee's report the government had supported a number of adjustments to the commiltee's recommendations. These included the retention of a separate ethics committee capability; the inclusion of the Speaker as an ex officio member of the Committee of the Legislative Assembly for the consideration of matters relating to Standing Orders; and responsibility for the management of construction and maintenance of Parliamentary buildings being transferred to the Committee of the Legislative Assembly rather than the Department of Public Works as recommended by the Review Committee. I also reiterate my further observation that while these adjustments were a step in the right direction, they did not address the fundamental problem of the makeup of the Committee of the Legislative Assembly given its intended role. (This role is confirmed and clarified in the government's response to the Review Committee's report, and was tabled in the Parliament on 9 March 2011.) Most significantly, the very serious matter that I have repeatedly raised about the Review Committee acting blatantly outside its terms of reference in bringing forth recommendations relating to the management and administration of the Parliament remains uncontested. I believe that the Explanatory Notes accompanying the Bill are seriously misleading in their presentation of the legislation's conception and formulation. Indeed. the Explanatory Notes confer on the Bill a degree of legitimacy that in some critically important respects can be seen as totally unwarranted. Par!l;uncnt HO\lse, George Street, Brisbane, 4000 Phone: (07) 3406 7374 • Fax: (07) 3-/06 7308. E-mail, ~llcakcT@par!lalllcnt.qld.g(l\'.a\l • \'{lebsite: w\\w.parli:lIllwt.qld.g<w.:1I1 -2- Under the heading "Policy objectives and the reasons for them", the Notes accurately describe the purview of the Committee System Review Committee as being "to review the roles of parliamentary committees in evaluating and examining legislative proposals." The Notes state shortly after this: "The Report also made recommendations on the committees responsible for the operations of the Parliament, in particular, the creation of a Committee of the Legislative Assembly." The Notes are grossly defective in that they fail to acknowledge that the "operations of the Parliament" encompass a broad range of management and administrative functions that are essentially separate and distinct from the roles of parliamentary committees in evaluating and examining legislative proposals. The Explanatory Notes can therefore be seen as overlooking or ignoring the Review Committee's failure to adhere to its terms of reference, and in so doing as ascribing to the Bill a policy objective that does not have a legitimate basis. This 'legitimising' of improperly conceived aspects of the Bill continues in the Explanatory Notes under the heading "Achievement of policy objectives". It states that the proposed new structure of the parliamentary committee system is designed to create a parliamentary committee system thal: • contributes to the development of best practice policy and legislation; • provides enhanced parliamentary oversight of the expenditure and activities of the government; and • maintains the standards and operational requirements of Parliament, as a legislature and as a public sector organisation. The latter of these is primarily concerned with the management and administration of the Parliament as an entity and is plainly removed from the roles of parliamentary committees in evaluating and examining legislative proposals. The Explanatory Notes are further seriously defective in their assertion that the Bill is consistent with the fundamental legislative principies set out in the Legislative Standards Act 1992. While it is stated that "the legislation does not adversely affect rights and liberties of, or retrospectively impose obligations on, individuals" the Notes are disturbingly silent on the extent to which the Bill conforms with Section 4(2)(b) of the Act, which requires that legislation has sufficient regard to the institution of Partiament. I find it extraordinary that the Notes do not address this dimension of the Bill - this of all Bills. I contend that the legislation seriously transgresses fundamental legislative principles in that it shows alarming disregard for the institution of Partiament by the estabtishment of a management committee for the Parliament which excludes the Speaker and which, through its membership, entrenches control of the legislature by the executive. The Explanatory Notes are seriously misleading where they state lhat the Bill implements recommendations which resulted from consultation conducted by the Review Committee. The recommendations relating to the Committee of the Legislative Assembly and the management and administration of the Partiament were not the subject of consultation by the Review Committee. These recommendations were hatched in secret by the Review Committee, outside its terms of reference. I canvassed these inter-related aspects of the Review Committee's report at length in my letter to the Premier of 12 January. I urge the committee to read that letter and to consider carefully the implications of the matters raised, none of which has been refuted or contested. The Committee of the Legislative Assembly, given its intended role, has been illegitimately conceived. The Explanatory Notes for the Bill now before the Scrutiny Committee, a Bill which creates the Committee of the Legislative Assembly, provide a false account of the committee's conception and in so doing improperly proVide validity and legitimacy to the committee's creation. The Explanatory Notes to the Bill are also misleading where they state, under the heading "Consistency with legislation in other jurisdictions", that: "The Bill is specific to the State of Queensland. However, it draws on practices that exist in Parliaments in other Australian and international jurisdictions". Nothing could be further from the truth in terms of the intended role of P;lrli:lmcnt J louse, George Street, Brisbane, 4000 Phone: (07) 34061374 • fa,,: (07) 3'106 7308 • E·mr\i1: ;i:pcilker@p:uli"ment.qld.goy.;m + \Veb~he: \V\\'\\'.parli:uncnf.gld.I'o\'.au -3- the Committee of lhe Legislative Assembly and its composition. This Bill establishes a Commillee of the Legislative Assembly for Queensland that will be totally at odds with the arrangemenls and praclices that exisl in Parliaments in other Australian and internalional jurisdiclions, in that the Speaker is excluded from the commillee, and the makeup of the committee - it is chaired by lhe Leader of Government Business and includes the Premier and Deputy Premier - effeclively transfers adminislrative control of the Parliament from the Speaker and the Parliament 10 the executive. Additionally under the heading "Policy objectives and the reasons for them", the Notes cile lhe government's August 2009 discussion paper Integrity and Accountability in Queensland as being the genesis for the creation of the Parliamentary Commillee System Review Committee. The purpose of the discussion paper was to promote public discussion on improving Queensland's integrity and accountability framework. The inclusion in the Explanatory Notes of this background to the establishment of the Review Committee adds to lhe credibility and respectability of thai committee's recommendations, including the creation of the Committee of the Legislative Assembly. I draw to the attention of the Scrutiny Committee the statement in the Integrity and Accountability in Queensland discussion paper that "Democratic government, including the doctrine of the separation of powers, is a keystone of any integrity framework" and ask the committee to reflect on how the establishment of a powerful new management committee which excludes the Speaker and effectively transfers control of the Parliament to the executive makes an absolute mockery of the separalion of powers. I am conscious that under our Westminster system of government, we do not have a strict separation of powers and that our system of responsible government means there is some degree of overlap between the legislature and the executive, whereas the judiciary is more clearly separated from the legislative and executive arms of government. However, I am equally conscious lhat the rationale for striving to maintain as clear a separation of powers as possible, even if in a limited form, always was and still is to divide and distribute the power of government, thereby safeguarding against tyranny and preserving the rights and liberties of the individual. It is my strong view that the exclusion of the Speaker from the Committee of lhe -Legislative Assembly subverts the separation of powers, and the effective transfer of management control to this committee, which is dominated by the executive, violates the sovereignty of the Parliament. (I attach for the information of the Scrutiny Committee a transcript of a recent interview with lhe former Clerk of the Senate, Mr Harry Evans, on this and other aspects of the role of the Commillee of the Legislative Assembly).
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