Sophie Scamps (Mackellar, Independent) Share this | Hansard source

While I really am grateful for the steps in greater transparency around the merits based appointment process, the advertising and the fact that new commissioners will need to do the training, I think there's something we're missing the point on, and that is the fact that an Independent Parliamentary Standards Commission must be independent. An absolute key part of that is that it must be independently appointed. While we talk about commissioners having the right merit and the right expertise, that doesn't stop them from all being a part of the Labor Party or whichever party. Just because you have the right expertise or the right merit does not mean that you are independent. Having an independent selection panel is absolutely required. If we are to call this the Independent Parliamentary Standards Committee, an independent selection process must be required. Otherwise, we can't call it independent—we can call it merit based or expertise based, but we can't call it independent. There must be an independent selection panel if we are to call this the Independent Parliamentary Standards Commission.

I'd also like to talk about this being modelled on other appointments processes. A precedent has been set with the establishment of the new Administrative Review Tribunal because amendments were taken on board for there to be independent selection panels. Prior to negotiations by the crossbench, an independent selection panel was not going to be mandated or legislated. It is now mandated and legislated, and I think that we should use that appointments process to the Administrative Review Tribunal as the precedent gold standard for an independent body. We know that the core and fundamental part of having an independent body is for it to be independently appointed, not only based on merit and expertise. Of course that is important, but it must be independently appointed. Otherwise, the board is not independent. How can we call it independent?

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