While the Assembly’s Standing Committee on Administration and Procedure does involve them in the development of the Assembly’s budget submission, it is ultimately the Executive, through the budget cabinet, that unilaterally decides the quantum of funding for the legisla- ture that will be inserted in the appropriation bill. While it is true that the
Assembly as a whole still has an opportunity to vote on the appro- priation bill and can recommend amendments, where there is a majority government (as there cur- rently is), simple arithmetic means that an appropriation bill will almost always be passed in its original form without amendment. In the paper I presented at last
year’s conference,The application of the Latimer House Principles in developing a legislature’s budget: parliamentary autonomy versus executive prerogative, I outlined a number of options that would give better expression to the relevant Latimer House principle and which would fully address the issues that underpinned the inclusion of this particular benchmark by the Study Group.
I believe this is a critical area to Inside the Australian Parliament.
perform as well as it could. Out of the 87 benchmarks, I found that there were seven bench- marks where the Assembly did not fully meet either the spirit and/or the letter of a measure as it had been set out by the Study Group.While I considered the Assembly’s perform- ance to be a high standard (80 out of 87 benchmarks being met) – an A minus if you will – this does not mean that we can rest on our lau- rels. I set out below these areas where I believe we can do better. Appendix A is a full list of the
relevant benchmarks and the Assembly’s performance against them.
The Assembly Budget An issue of ongoing concern is the
inadequate arrangements for formu- lating the Assembly’s budget.This currently involves the Executive to a degree not envisioned by the Study Group in its benchmark related to parliamentary budgeting (benchmark 6.1.2) – namely that,“Only the Legislature shall be empowered to determine and approve the budget of the Legislature”. Nor does the Legislative
Assembly’s approach accord with the relevant Latimer House Principle concerning the development and administration of parliamentary budgets which sets out that,“an all- party committee of members of Parliament should review and administer Parliament’s budget which should not be subject to amendment by the executive”.2
306 The Parliamentarian 2008/Issue Four
progress as it fundamentally affects the proper expression of the separa- tion of powers doctrine.The current state of play involves, in my view, an incursion into the affairs of the leg- islative branch by the executive branch.
Legislative debate
Benchmark 2.5.2 sets out that,“the legislature shall provide adequate opportunity for legislators to debate bills prior to a vote”. While the Assembly largely con-
forms to this measure, as in many other Parliaments, there may be occasions where a majority govern- ment in our case (holding nine or more of the 17 seats) can apply a closure or “gag” motion to a partic- ular item under discussion, including a bill, to end debate and resolve a question immediately. Some would argue that the application of an urgency motion, limiting debating time allotments for each also affects the adequacy of debate on legislation.