Lyn Allison (Victoria, Australian Democrats) Share this | Hansard source

I move Democrats amendment (1) on sheet QM342, circulated in my name:

(1)    Page 5 (after line 20), after clause 9, insert:

9A  Procedures for merit selection of appointments

        (1)    The Minister must, by legislative instrument, determine a code of practice for appointing members of Skills Australia that sets out, in addition to the requirements outlined in subsection 9(2), general principles on which appointments are to be made, including (but not limited to):

             (a)    merit; and

             (b)    independent scrutiny of appointments; and

             (c)    probity.

        (2)    Not later than the fifth anniversary after a code of practice has been determined, the Minister must review the code.

        (3)    In reviewing a code of practice, the Minister must invite the public to comment on the code.

As I indicated earlier, the Democrats have put the basic structure of our appointments on merit amendment before the Senate many, many times. This, as I mentioned, slightly differs from previous ones circulated. We have said for more than a decade that appointments on merit are a fundamental integrity issue. The coalition did not support our amendments previously and Labor have also rejected them more often than not. But on some occasions they have supported them, so I hope that this will be one of those occasions—the first chance the government have to make good on what was a failure of the previous government in the past.

Essentially, the principles that we consistently put before the chamber are built on the Lord Nolan examination in 1995 of the issue of appointments and patronage in the UK and on his proposals, which were agreed to by the Conservative government of John Major, were then carried through and supported by the Blair government and are now to be further enhanced and improved, as I understand it, by the Brown government. We are trying to build on best practice that is emerging in democratic countries with which we have common traditions. It is simply a safeguard that, in future governments under future ministers, the procedures for merit selection appointments will always be conducted to the highest level.

Subclause 9(2) of the Skills Australia Bill 2008 has the effect of providing that ‘In making appointments, the minister must ensure that the members of Skills Australia have between them experience’ in those areas that are indicated, but that does not guarantee appointment on merit. It is not a fully transparent or accountable process either. The basic structure of our amendment has been put before the chamber, as I said, more than 30 times now. Normally we know the exact number—I am sorry I cannot quote it here today. It calls for the general principles on which the selections are made to be established by a code of practice, including that the selection of the person shall be on merit and shall cover independent scrutiny of appointments, probity and so on.

I will not say this is a last-ditch effort, because I promise we will keep putting these up whenever boards are the subject of legislation in this place. We will not give up on it, but it would be fantastic if the government would on this occasion support our amendment. As I said, the amendment has been amended in light of the fact that, as I understand it—this is the advice that I was given by the government—this appointment is underway anyway. So we have dropped off ‘the need for openness and transparency’, sad though that may be, but we have kept in ‘merit’, ‘independent scrutiny of appointments’ and ‘probity’. We have also dropped off the need for the minister to publish the code of practice in the Gazette. It is clearly a bit too late for that. However, it is hard to see why the government would not agree to this amendment as circulated in the chamber.