Nigel Scullion (NT, Country Liberal Party, Minister for Community Services) Share this | Hansard source

As I have already stated, whilst I, like the Leader of the Opposition in the Senate, am not a lawyer, from time to time we have to rely on legislative draftspeople. This particular aspect of those two words has been strongly considered over some time. The Commonwealth believes that this is the way that the drafting process should work—and there is extensive precedent, particularly in the OIPC legislation—and that this is the standard way that this type of legislation is drafted. I have been advised that you can also find these words in other legislation. The reason that they use these words is that they are well understood by the courts, and this has become the pro forma for how we do this. It has been tested and it is the best way to reflect exactly what we wish. It is not just a matter of turning something around. The advice was that that was part of the discussion process to arrive at this circumstance. Certainly, they have said, ‘Not only do they enjoy a similar role, when we stuck to the legislation in another matter, precedent decided that we were in fact correct.’ I am simply taking the advice of the legislative draftspeople: this is the standard procedure and this is the wording that should be used, simply because the courts understand it, and if the trigger is that it goes to the courts then they will be able to deal with that. That is the advice I have. We take advice from the legislative drafting people, as you well know. They give very good advice, they are very experienced in these matters and the advice I have is that the courts understand this matter very well and this is in fact the standard drafting process of this sort of legislation.