Privilege — Consideration of Report of Privileges Committee—Disclosure of Outcome of Vote Taken during the Environment Committee’s Consideration of a Bill

I move, That the report of the Privileges Committee concerning a member’s disclosure of the outcome of a vote taken during the Environment Committee’s consideration of a bill be noted.

The Privileges Committee report on this issue has been presented to the House and is on the floor for members to see. Those who read it will see that the Privileges Committee found that the complaint in respect of disclosure of the outcome of a vote taken during the Environment Committee’s consideration of a bill was upheld. I’ll go through a bit more of the detail in a second.

The committee also, whilst not wanting to minimise the transgression, didn’t think that the matter was so serious as to warrant a widespread debate in the House, and so recommended to the Business Committee that we didn’t think a debate was necessary. The Business Committee said findings of the Privileges Committee are always important and ought to be brought to the attention of all members so that we avoid those sorts of errors being repeated in the future, and then requested that I, as the chair of the Privileges Committee, take a single call on the matter in order to describe the events that we reported to the House upon.

The Speaker made a reference to the Privileges Committee as a consequence of a complaint from the Hon Eugenie Sage to the Speaker about Simon Court having released the outcome of a vote during the consideration by the select committee of an item of business before them, which was the consideration of the Natural and Built Environment Bill. There was a closed session, and during the session the member formally proposed that a definition of a term be inserted into the bill. That motion was voted down, and then the member, by press release, disclosed that.

The matter was initially referred to the Speaker by the Hon Eugenie Sage. She also said she was going to try and sort it out at select committee at a subsequent meeting. She tried to; the member didn’t back down or apologise and stuck to his guns, and therefore the Hon Eugenie Sage wrote another letter of complaint to the Speaker and the Speaker referred it to the Privileges Committee.

The Privileges Committee found it an easy matter to deal with because there was prior guidance from both earlier Privileges Committee hearings but also from a consideration of the Standing Orders that had been conducted by the Standing Orders Committee in 2003. It was clear that Standing Order 243 applies, which says that “The proceedings of a select committee or a subcommittee other than during the hearing of evidence are not open to the public and remain strictly confidential to the committee until it reports to the House.”

The matter really was as simple as it sounds, although there is the occasional clarification of that in the 2003 report of the Standing Orders Committee. For example, if there is a proposal to change the chair or deputy chair of a select committee, that business is, effectively, concluded by the passing of the motion and therefore can be disclosed. But if there is continuing business before the select committee, then that is part of the confidential proceedings that ought not to be disclosed until the committee reports back to the House.

The reasons for this were set out in the Standing Orders Committee report in 2003, and, in summary, select committees are required to inform the House first of their findings—and it’s for the select committee to do that, not for individual members of the committee. Secondly, the ability to discuss issues in confidence promotes constructive dialogue between committee members about legislation and other parliamentary business. We are a unicameral legislature. We are reliant upon select committees doing their best to improve legislation before it, and one of the good things about our select committee model is that, generally, members from all parties cooperate to try and improve legislation at select committee even if they don’t agree with it. So we’ve got to encourage that habit, and that is undermined if individual members of a select committee, for reasons of political advantage, can whip out of the select committee and breach the confidentiality. Closed sessions enable the provision of free and frank advice to the committee—that includes from officials—and premature or selective release of committee proceedings increases the risks of lobbying outside normal processes or giving advantage to particular groups or persons.

The committee in recent weeks has endorsed those views, found that these considerations remain of the utmost importance today and any breach undermines the integrity of select committee processes. So the findings of the committee were to concur with the Speaker’s assessment of the member’s actions. We found that the member’s starting point should’ve been to be aware of the Standing Order. If the member Simon Court was unaware of it or unclear, he should’ve approached the clerk of the committee. When the matter was raised with him by the Hon Eugenie Sage, he should at that stage have read the Standing Order or consulted with the Clerk of the House or the clerk of the standing committee. We noted that it’s the sole responsibility of each member to exercise caution in their public statements and ensure that the important rules against inappropriate and unauthorised disclosure of select committee proceedings are observed.

In conclusion, the committee noted that the member has apologised for the matter and did not recommend any further action. We were grateful to the Speaker for having referred the question of privilege to us and emphasise that it’s a timely opportunity to reinforce to all members the expectations that apply to the confidentiality of select committee proceedings and the reasons that they exist.

Motion agreed to.

I declare the House in committee for consideration of the Natural and Built Environment Bill and the Spatial Planning Bill.