Keypoints

Attachments: Parliamentary Briefing Note Template, Parliamentary Briefing Note Example

Content and Nature of Proposals for inclusion in Bills

Bills will continue to contain the following matters only:

• minor amendments proposed by government agencies (but not a significant number of amendments to one Act)
• minor amendments by way of pure statute law revision proposed by the Parliamentary Counsel
• transfer of savings and transitional and other provisions of ongoing effect
• repeals of obsolete or unnecessary Acts, proposed by government agencies or the Parliamentary Counsel
• savings and transitional provisions.

Amendments proposed by agencies must be non-controversial and must contain no more than minor policy changes. Matters that are inappropriate for inclusion in the Statute Law Revision Program include but are not limited to:

• amendments increasing penalties for offences punishable by imprisonment on conviction, or creating offences punishable by imprisonment on conviction
• amendments increasing monetary penalties by very high amounts
• amendments intruding on or prejudicing the rights of any person
• amendments retrospectively imposing liabilities on any person
• amendments to Acts dealing with controversial subject matter
• amendments that have been the subject of disputes between agencies, or that require considerable whole of government consideration
• lengthy or voluminous amendments.

Procedures for Submission of Proposed Amendments

Ministers should ensure that their agencies are advised of the following procedures for submission of proposals.

• Requests for matters to be included in Bills should be drafted for the Ministers signature and addressed to the Parliamentary Counsel.
• Requests should be accompanied by a parliamentary briefing note of not more than one page per proposal. A briefing note template and an example are set out in Attachment 1 and Attachment 2 respectively. Each briefing note should relate to amendments to one Act only and should be in plain English, assuming no knowledge of the particular issue. It should include:
  • a broad statement of the rationale for the proposal (ie: why it is required), its context and who has proposed it
  • a general outline of the proposal in non-technical terms and how it will resolve the problem
  • full implications of the proposal.
• Each matter will be assessed initially by the Parliamentary Counsel and then by the Policy and Strategy Division of the Department of Premier and Cabinet. Any matter considered to be unsuitable for the program will not be included.

Dates for Submission

To facilitate preparation of Bills, Ministers should ensure that proposals from their agencies are submitted to the Parliamentary Counsel throughout the year as soon as the need for an amendment is identified and approved by the Minister.

Subject to their being assessed as suitable for the Statute Law Program, proposals approved by the relevant Minister and received by the Parliamentary Counsel by 17 April (or, if 17 April is not a business day, the closest business day thereafter) in any year will be included in the Bill for the Budget Session, and proposals received by 17 September (or, if 17 September is not a business day, the closest business day thereafter) will be included in the Bill for the Spring Session.

Proposals submitted after these dates will be considered for inclusion in the following Sessions Bill unless formally withdrawn.

Enquiries may be directed to the Parliamentary Counsels Office or the Human Services and Justice Branch of the Policy and Strategy Division of the Department of Premier and Cabinet.

Brendan OReilly
Director General