Bob Brown (Tasmania, Australian Greens) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I move:

That this bill be now read a second time.

I seek leave to have the second reading speech incorporated in Hansard.

Leave granted.

The speech read as follows—

After the quarter of a million voters (227,541 in 2004 election) in the ACT elect a government, its laws should not be overridden by the federal government, in particular, the executive of the federal government.

The Commonwealth Parliament’s power to make laws for the territory comes from Sections 52 and 122 of the Constitution. Notably, the Constitution gives this power to the Parliament. In 1988, the Parliament delegated the power to the elected Legislative Assembly of the ACT through the Australian Capital Territory (Self-Government) Act 1988.

The Self-Government Act provided for the Parliament or the Executive to disallow any Act of the ACT’s Legislative Assembly. This bill removes the power from the Executive, and leaves no doubt that any disallowance of an ACT law should be by legislation of the Parliament as a whole.

The Executive can and does meet in secret, without the direction or agreement of the Parliament. The provision for the executive override of the ACT’s laws leaves Parliament, and its consultative committee system, diminished and reactive. This is not in the spirit of the Constitution.

This bill removes this anomaly and restores, unequivocally and exclusively the Parliament’s power to wield or constrain Constitutional authority over the territorial assembly.

I commend the bill to the Senate.

I seek leave to continue my remarks later.

Leave granted; debate adjourned.