Citizens Right of Reply adopted in Legislative Council

Extract from Hansard

Legislative Council
26 October 1999

Mike Elliott
Leader Australian Democrats
Member of the Legislative Council

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That during the present session, the Council make available to any person who believes that he or she has been adversely referred to during proceedings of the Legislative Council the following procedure for seeking to have a response incorporated into Hansard -

I. Any person who has been referred to in the Legislative Council by name, or in another way so as to be readily identified, may make a submission in writing to the President-

(a) claiming that he or she has been adversely affected in reputation or in respect of dealings or associations with others, or injured in profession, occupation or trade or in the holding of an office, or in respect of any financial credit or other status or that his or her privacy has been unreasonably invaded; and

III. The President shall give notice of the submission to the member who referred in the Council to the person who has made the submission.

(a) may confer with the person who made the submission,
(b) may confer with any member, but
(c) may not take any evidence,
(d) may not judge the truth of any statement made in the Council or the submission.

(a) the submission is trivial, frivolous, vexatious, or offensive in character, or
(b) the submission is not made in good faith, or
(c) there is some other good reason not to grant the request to incorporate a response into Hansard ,

he shall refuse the request and inform the person who made it of his decision. The President shall not be obliged to inform any person or the Council of the reasons for his decision.

VI. Unless the President refuses the request on one or more of the grounds set out in paragraph V of this resolution, the President shall report to the Council that in his opinion the response in terms agreed between him and the person making the request should be incorporated into Hansard and the response shall thereupon be incorporated into Hansard .

(a) must be succinct and strictly relevant to the question in issue,
(b) must not contain anything offensive in character,
(c) must not contain any matter the publication of which would have the effect of-

(i) unreasonably adversely affecting or injuring a person, or unreasonably invading a person's privacy in the manner referred to in paragraph I of this resolution, or
(ii) unreasonably aggravating any adverse effect, injury or invasion of privacy suffered by any person, or
(iii) unreasonably aggravating any situation or circumstance, and

(i) the investigation of any alleged criminal offence,
(ii) the fair trial of any current or pending criminal proceedings, or
(iii) any civil proceedings in any court or tribunal.

VIII. In this resolution, `person' includes a corporation of any type and an unincorporated association.

The Hon. M.J. ELLIOTT: I support the motion, as I did in the previous session. I believe that this protection, if we call it that, to people who may be attacked under privilege is a reasonable one. It does not give carte blanche to people to go on their own attack but simply gives them a chance to set the record straight as they see it. We expect that it will not be used very frequently, and we found in the last session that the only people who sought to use it in this place were people who had a very longstanding grievance. To the best of my knowledge, nobody else had come forward in the previous session. That probably gives us a fair indication that not many people will come forward.

Following the experience of that one application, I am not sure whether we have the wording of this quite right, but I am not suggesting amendment at this stage, merely raising the issue. I think that there may be times - and I suppose the President can do it but I do not think that it makes it explicit-when the President might feel that the particular submission being made is not acceptable but that it is capable of being made acceptable.

In fact, when I was shown the original letter that had been written by the former employees and board members of the Christies Beach Women's Shelter, I said to them that there were a couple of very short sections in there, which probably amounted to a total of about 10 words, that I believed went just beyond the bounds and perhaps actually reflected upon members or former members of this place. Clearly, that is outside the bounds of what is anticipated here. It would have been quite reasonable for the submission to be knocked back on those grounds, but it would also be reasonable to offer the chance to come back with some changes.

As things currently stand, of course, one person and one person alone will make a decision about whether or not the submission fits into these rules. Indeed, when the submission was refused during the last session there was no objection from the floor of this place, because we had no way of knowing what the submission said nor any real way of knowing the grounds of refusal, although my recollection was that the President did give some explanation by talking particularly about the age of the complaint. There is no requirement within section V of this motion that information be given: in fact, the reverse is true. Section V states:

The President shall not be obliged to inform any person or the Council of the reasons for his decision.

I wonder whether that does not perhaps deserve a little more exploration so that when submissions are refused we at least have some idea why. As I said, on the last occasion the President did give some reasons, and I hope that that will become the rule. With those observations, the Democrats support the motion.