Blewett said this week he hoped to head a parliamentary committee into improving the processes of Parliament. He hopes to give MPs a greater say in the legislative process.
It sounds like a novel idea: that MPs should legislate, but in case anyone has forgotten, that is what Parliament is for.
Dr Blewett, of course, is too late. It is almost an axiom of history that as soon as an institution moves into a perfectly designed building, like our multi-million dollar Parliament House, the institution has lost its power and function. There are plenty of examples. The British monarch moved into the new Buckingham Palace in about 1840 just as the monarchy lost its force as a politically powerful institution.
The Egyptians moved their culture south to Upper Egypt after the completion of the Great Pyramids.
Versailles was completed after Louis XIV had done all of his magnificent things.
The dome Capitol of the US Congress was finally completed as the Congress finally lost its primacy during Lincoln’s presidency.
The League of Nations is another classic. It got its splendid new building in Geneva in 1937, shortly after it had lost all efficacy and power.
And so it goes on. The Australian Parliament moved into a splendid new building in 1988. By then it had lost virtually all its functions. Private Members’ Bills are virtually non-existent. The last time a Government fell on the floor of the House was in the old building in 1941. The parties and the Executive treat Parliament with contempt as soon as the numbers are in.
December 1991 was a good example. When Hawke lost the Labor leadership, did anyone think to have a vote in the House of Reps to see is Keating had confidence of the majority of the House before Paul was sworn in at Yarralumla? No; it was an irrelevance.
When was one Opposition amendment in the House of Representatives ever passed? Clearly Parliament is an irrelevance as a legislative body apart from some tampering in the Senate, and that is generated by party machines on the other side anyway.
What should Dr Blewett suggest?
A critical issue is the seating plan. (No; I’m serious.) While ever the two parties sit opposite each other like some gladiatorial game, the Parliament will remain just that. Seats should be drawn by lots or assigned alphabetically, irrespective of party allegiance. Liberal would sit next to Labor. Independent next to National. They would get to talk to each other more.
Of more importance they would not be able to bellow at Members opposite. They would not be able to interject with “”Shame” or “”Hear, hear” purely on the strength of which side of the House the speaking MP happens to be speaking from.
A further reform should be electronic voting. Aside from saving time, Members would have to think about what they were doing rather than follow other MPs to the left or right of the Speaker like sheep.
I suspect, however, that it is too late to reform Parliament. The power game has moved on to party rooms and the Cabinet and even the kitchen Cabinet now that Cabinet itself is too big. The best evidence of parliamentary ineffectiveness is the lavishness of the building. Effective organisations usually work out of dumps.
On this theory, the next big power shift in Australian politics will be when the Prime Minister builds a splendid new Lodge. When that happens you will know the prime ministership is a powerless office and we are all being ruled by the bureaucrats.
O UE1N AN utterly different topic, Andrew Ettingshausen was awarded $350,000 by a jury for loss of reputation and hurt feelings in a defamation action last year because a magazine published a photograph of him in the nick and suggested that he had condoned it when he hadn’t.
Last week in a personal-injuries case the ACT Supreme Court, the Master, Alan Hogan, after “”anxious consideration” awarded $250,000 to Sarah for pain and suffering and loss of enjoyment of life. Sarah suffered grievous brain damage which wrecked her promising life.
That alone should bring the defamation law into the hatred ridicule and contempt it deserves. But it deserves further ridicule and contempt when you realise that the judges have ruled that it is inadmissible for a defamation defendant to draw to a jury’s attention typical awards for personal injury.
Sarah’s case, incidentally, is right at the top, if not a record for damages for pain, suffering and loss of enjoyment of life. Of course, she got additional damages for loss of earning capacity and other economic loss, just as Ettingshausen would have got if he had lost his job or capacity to earn.
Ettingshausen was a NSW case, but we have had large damages awards in the ACT for defamation bearing no proportion to personal-injuries cases. Over to you Attorney-General Terry Connolly to do something about capping defamation damages.