Andrew Bartlett (Queensland, Australian Democrats) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

This report is from the Senate Standing Committee on Regulations and Ordinances. I have spoken on this already but I thought it appropriate, because of the topic, to speak to it just fleetingly again before the question is put. It is actually fairly rare for the committee to bring in an interim report; it usually does an annual report. The Senate Standing Committee on Regulations and Ordinances is over 75 years old. It is the oldest substantive committee, as opposed to administrative committee, that the Senate has. As its name suggests, it looks at all the regulations and ordinances. There are many of these—thousands of them every year. I suppose one should be fair and say that the committee members do not look at every single one of the thousands of regulations and ordinances. We pay a very intelligent legal professor to read all the thousands of legislative instruments and regulations and ordinances and he draws problematic ones to our attention, which makes for a far more efficient process.

One of the issues that have regularly been brought to the committee’s attention since the Legislative Instruments Act 2003 came into being has been widespread failure of many departments to engage in consultation in developing legislative instruments. Without going through all the details in the report, which I urge those of you who are interested in good governance to read, there is now a requirement under the Legislative Instruments Act, which came into being in 2003 after a very long gestation, to engage in consultation or to indicate in the explanatory statements to regulations why consultation was not necessary in a particular case or to detail what consultation did occur. It is a sad fact that in far too many cases that is not being detailed at all when the regulations are put together and the explanatory statement is attached. It is either stated that no consultation occurred with no reason as to why or there is no detail as to what consultation happened—in many cases, because it did not happen.

That is not good enough. These might seem like tedious, boring, administrative regulations and ordinances that are of no great consequence, but they are all items that have the force of law. They all affect people in different ways. People who are going to be affected by changes to the law, even if they are arcane regulations and ordinances, should be consulted whenever possible. That was the spirit, principle and intent of the Senate when it passed the Legislative Instruments Act and it is not being fulfilled on far too many occasions, including on occasion by officers within the Attorney-General’s Department, which is the department that has overarching responsibility for the implementation and enforcement of the Legislative Instruments Act.

It is a pity, in a way, that some sort of sanction if consultation did not occur was not included in the act. Indeed, argument about that was one of the reasons why the Legislative Instruments Act took so long to come into being. But, given the Senate did decide not to put in place a sanction, there is no reason for any department, government officer, draftsperson or minister to decide that we do not need to bother with this. It is a requirement under the act that is not being fulfilled on far too many occasions. I take the opportunity once again, via this report, to strongly urge all ministers in particular to ensure their departments lift their game in this area because it is not good enough. This is an important area. The areas that do not get all the headlines can still have just as big an impact on people as the ones that do get the headlines, and we need to do far better.

Question agreed to.