Judicature (Timeliness) Legislation Amendment Bill

Good evening, members, on Tuesday, 9 December. Members, the House is in committee. The House has resolved to recommit the Judicature (Timeliness) Legislation Amendment Bill to the committee of the whole House to consider the Minister’s amendments to clause 4 set out on Amendment Paper 472. This is a limited debate, and all contributions must be relevant to the proposed amendments. The question is that the Minister’s amendments to clause 4 set out on Amendment Paper 472 be agreed to.

The amendments inadvertently agreed to by the committee of the whole House increased the number of High Court judges from 55 fulltimeequivalents to a minimum of 60 fulltime-equivalents and a maximum of 65 fulltimeequivalents. Any decision to increase the statutory cap has a fiscal impact, as cap increases automatically create the authority to pay judicial salaries up to the level of the cap at the rate set by the Remuneration Authority. Judicial salaries are not the only consideration; we need to ensure appropriate physical facilities, courtrooms, and judges’ chambers, etc.

A minimum number of judges is not necessary or desirable. Once a judge is appointed, they stay in office until retirement. In effect, appointments up to a maximum cap are likely to occur in practice, and it’s unlikely that appointments would fall below a minimum. If a minimum number is included, there’s a risk of inadvertently breaching the law if the number of judges dips below the minimum for any unforeseen reason, such as a judge passing away while in office or resigning with immediate effect.

Thank you, Madam Speaker. The irony that here we are—I think the Hon Chris Bishop described this as a snafu. I won’t spell out the meaning of that; I might be breaching some Standing Orders. It’s a mistake. But the irony is the symbolism of it, the symbolism of the fact that we are here at the end of a Friday evening—oh no, sorry, it’s a Tuesday evening, isn’t it!—after four days of quite intense legislation and in urgency, to fix a mistake that was made after the last intense period of urgency, which again shows the problem with considering very serious matters under urgency, ill-prepared. I think the irony, the symbolism, of this is that a lot of the legislation that has gone through in the last four days, and a lot of the legislation has gone through in the last year, will be exactly the same.

Now, Madam Speaker, you’re looking at me quizzically—

Hon Members: Madam Chair!

GREG O’CONNOR: —saying, “What is the irony of it?”

CHAIRPERSON (Barbara Kuriger): No, actually, I just want to interrupt the member—not because of anything the member’s doing, but we ended up in this predicament, as the member said, at the last urgency motion because people weren’t listening. Actually, people are not listening. I call on Greg O’Connor to carry on with his speech.

GREG O’CONNOR: Yeah, well, perhaps those voices were missing when the bill was being voted on last time, so perhaps they maybe are making up for their silence at that time.

But anyway, Madam Speaker—the symbolism that we’re fixing this now. I will be bringing forward two amendments to the Minister of Justice’s Amendment Paper 472—

Hon Member: The Deputy Speaker’s a bit confused.

GREG O’CONNOR: —that I’ll be speaking to, which now—

CHAIRPERSON (Barbara Kuriger): He knows I’m the Chair; it’s just late at night.

GREG O’CONNOR: Madam Chair, there is a lot of noise coming from the opposite side. If they were just to be a little quiet, they may learn something, because, clearly, they made a mistake last time. If you listen, you may prevent yourself from making the same mistake next time—again, the danger of rushed urgency.

But, perhaps, Madam Speaker, maybe it wasn’t a mistake.

CHAIRPERSON (Barbara Kuriger): The problem, Mr O’Connor—

GREG O’CONNOR: Sorry—Madam Chair.

CHAIRPERSON (Barbara Kuriger): Yeah. Yay!

GREG O’CONNOR: Perhaps, Madam Chair—

CHAIRPERSON (Barbara Kuriger): We solved the problem.

GREG O’CONNOR: Perhaps it wasn’t, maybe, a snafu; maybe it wasn’t a mistake. Perhaps there was just a slight bit of enlightenment crept in into that ocean of darkness, that ocean of backward legislation that we’ve seen. Again, the symbolism, the mistakes—because the mistakes, the snafus, that have been made in a lot of legislation will be back here being fixed over the next several years.

But back to my amendment.

CHAIRPERSON (Barbara Kuriger): That would be a good idea, thank you.

GREG O’CONNOR: What I’m hoping is that the same enlightenment—and let’s think, we’re near Christmas. Let’s maybe think that this was not a snafu at all, maybe just a little bit of enlightenment did come through on the Government benches. Maybe it was Greg Fleming, who’s over with the Dalai Lama at the moment. Maybe with the enlightenment he’s learning there, some of that osmosed back here again.

The amendments that I’m presenting here today are actually to ensure that the another snafu is not made and that the Minister’s amendment doesn’t end up with the reduced number and a shortage of judges that clearly has brought about the need for this amendment in the first place. One of my amendments talks of actually a range of judges from 60 to 69. Now, 69 might sound like a quite a large number, but if we applied the proportionality of the population growth since the last time we increased the number of judges, which was in 1984—sorry, it was actually in 2004—it’s a 30 percent population increase. That is why we would now need 69 judges at least.

Of course, there is a need for those judges. If you listen to Justice Winkelmann, in her report, she made it clear about the pressure the courts are under. In fact, Douglas Brown, one of the High Court barristers, also talked about the fact that two judges will make very little difference to what is required to make the court work.

CHAIRPERSON (Barbara Kuriger): Greg O’Connor.

GREG O’CONNOR: So, Madam Speaker, speaking to my second amendment—Madam Chair?

CHAIRPERSON (Barbara Kuriger): Yes, I did call you again.

GREG O’CONNOR: Speaking to my second amendment—

CHAIRPERSON (Barbara Kuriger): Madam Chair.

GREG O’CONNOR: —if that proves too much, perhaps, for the Minister, perhaps we could go to 65, which is my second amendment. We could perhaps go to 65, a compromise—again, because we’re getting near Christmas, a compromise mightn’t be a bad idea.

We do need more judges. As I said in my second reading speech, we look at crime statistics—crime statistics can be manipulated all sorts of ways. Every Government is guilty of this—bringing forward the stats, if this is down, just by changing categories; there’s various ways it can be done. But one thing you can’t hide is the bodies. If we have a look at the crime stats but we actually have a look at the category A offences, which are murder, attempted murder, and manslaughter, they are going up. They now represent 76 percent of new cases. Whatever else is happening in the crime sector, whatever helps in the criminal statistics sector, have a look for where the bodies are.

The other place that the amount of work that’s being required, the workload in the High Court, is actually also in the insolvency area—of course, as well as the bodies of people that have been left around, the bodies of a lot of companies that are going broke at record levels. That is being also reflected in the insolvency numbers that have been heard by High Court judges.

Right now, we’re very short of High Court judges, not only by two—in fact, as I say, statistically, we could go to 69. My second amendment says let’s have a compromise; let’s make it up to 65. It doesn’t mean we have to have 65. It may be when we get this high, when we get the spike in murders and manslaughters that we have at the moment, we can actually increase the number of judges and then not replace retiring judges or judges who leave the profession for any reason.

So here we are. I’m now going to hope that same enlightenment, and we’ll say it was enlightenment that we saw, that saw the Government members vote for my last amendment not three weeks ago—perhaps that same enlightenment can now permeate through and we’ll see that vote. I recommend that my two amendments be voted on, or at least one of them. Then we will end up with a situation—an enlightened look at the justice system from across the floor, and we will end up where we need to be, in this case. I’m recommending those two amendments.

I’m going to take a call from Dr Lawrence Xu-Nan, because he needs some practise in speaking to Amendment Papers!

I only have two amendments, Madam Chair.

CHAIRPERSON (Barbara Kuriger): And I know how brief you can be.

Dr LAWRENCE XU-NAN: I actually wanted to check with you, Madam Chair. I want to acknowledge the previous speaker, Greg O’Connor, and particularly the previous amendment that has had the committee’s support, in terms of increasing the number of judges to 65. But I want to check with a couple of quick-fire questions, if that’s OK, to the Minister of Justice.

I guess the first question is when that amendment was voted on, did the Minister actually consider just accepting the amendment, because it’s something that we know, and the High Court judges and the Chief Supreme Court Judge Dame Helen Winkelmann has said—that we need 25 percent more judges because of the increase in our population? Did the Minister actually consider to simply keep the number of judges to 65?

Yes, we considered it and we decided not to.

Thank you for that response, Minister.

The second question is: the Minister of Justice has mentioned in terms of the physical aspect—I do understand that judges are a huge imposition in terms of the budget. But, again, is that something that the Minister has considered as part of a supplementary budget, to bring up the 65, again, considering the need that is asked by the Minister? Has the Minister considered putting in a supplementary budget here for that?

No.

OK. If the Minister of Justice considered it but didn’t consider putting in a supplementary budget, then what was the decision-making process for the Minister to bring it back here, then? Because if the Minister—OK, actually, another good question for that. Did the Minister have a conversation with the Minister of Finance to see if there’s any wiggle room on the Budget for us to have five more judges, which is much needed? No? OK. I see that the Minister has decided not to respond to that question. That’s fine. I can just keep on asking a few more questions and then go on to my amendments, understanding that the Minister has also had a very long day yesterday. But, as people can see, I still think that we are having a great time and I’m still super energetic, so I think we can go on for another day if we really want.

CHAIRPERSON (Barbara Kuriger): Not with the scope—not with the scope.

Dr LAWRENCE XU-NAN: Not with the scope. OK.

CHAIRPERSON (Barbara Kuriger): Not another day.

Dr LAWRENCE XU-NAN: This is a test to see how far I can stretch this particular scope.

CHAIRPERSON (Barbara Kuriger): Not much further.

Dr LAWRENCE XU-NAN: But, anyway, I do want to speak to my amendment. I guess the first thing is that when we are looking at this, I do actually want to acknowledge—I think it was the original Amendment Paper 443that the Minister put forward that increases the judges. In the original judicature bill, it was 55 to 57. Then the Minister has put in—and it’s something that I think we supported as well, that brought it up to 60. Clearly, the budgetary consideration was there to bring it up from 57 to 60. It is disappointing, I guess, in some ways, that the Minister has decided not to do that.

But I do think that my amendment, very much like the previous speaker, Greg O’Connor, has mentioned, is something that is much needed. Rather than the compromise that Greg O’Connor’s amendment made, I actually just said that we should just go back and replace 60 with 69, and in the amendment to clause 4(2), replace “59.5” with “68.5”, because this is something that the court themselves have asked for. We are going to be seeing an increased number of cases, etc., particularly going up to the higher courts. I feel like some of the bills that have been passed this week might see an increase in the capacity or the need for the higher courts, particularly the High Court. I do think that it’s important for the Minister to consider our amendments, either mine or Greg O’Connor’s.

My second amendment is actually just to kind of give a little bit of leeway in understanding that the Minister did say that the budgetary implication was a consideration. In that case, let’s not simply go all the way in the first year. My second amendment is that we should be looking at maybe 65 on the day of the commencement date, and maybe on the first anniversary of the commencement date bringing it up to 69. Then in the amended clause 4(2), we’re looking at 0.5 less than that, noting that when we’re looking at fulltime-equivalents (FTEs) and distribution of judges, we’re not going to get a perfect number of FTEs at 60 or 65 or, indeed, 69. The second part of the amendment is to replace “59.5” with “64.5” on the day of the commencement date, and “68.5” on the first anniversary of the commencement date. I think both of those two amendments, as well as Greg O’Connor’s amendment, deserve some attention from the Minister.

But I guess the other question I have, finally, for the Minister is: if the Minister isn’t going to accept any of our amendments, I do wonder what is the Minister going to say to the judges and the judiciary system, who, obviously, now have been very excited by the prospect of having their number of judges increased to 65, just to have their Christmas present being taken away from them as a result of the Amendment Paper 472?

I will say, “Thank you for your service to the country.” to the judges.

I move, That debate on this question now close.

The question is that Greg O’Connor’s tabled amendments to the Minister’s amendments set out on Amendment Paper 472, relating to increasing the maximum number of High Court judges to 65 be agreed to.

The question is that Greg O’Connor’s tabled amendments to the Minister’s amendments set out on Amendment Paper 472, relating to increasing the number of High Court judges to between 60 and 69 be agreed to.

The question is that Dr Lawrence Xu-Nan’s tabled amendment to the Minister’s amendments set out on Amendment Paper 472, relating to increasing the maximum number of High Court judges to 69 be agreed to.

Dr Lawrence Xu-Nan’s tabled amendment to the Minister’s amendments set out on Amendment Paper 472, relating to increasing the maximum number of High Court judges in two stages is out of order as not being in the correct form of legislation.

The question is that the Minister’s amendments to clause 4 set out on Amendment Paper 472 be agreed to.

Thank you all for turning up.

Mr Speaker, the committee has further considered the Judicature (Timeliness) Legislation Amendment Bill and reports it with amendment. I move, That the report be adopted.

Motion agreed to.

Report adopted.

This bill is set down for third reading next sitting day. That concludes urgency. The House stands adjourned until Tuesday, 16 December.

The House adjourned at 11.40 p.m. (Friday)