Back in November, I wrote about the Senate’s decision to use the final two sitting weeks to trial new procedures for Question Time, with the aim of making the process more relevant and effective. In short, questioners were given an extra supplementary question, Ministers had less time for their initial answer (2 minutes instead of 4) and there was a requirement that the Minister’s answer should be “directly relevant” to the Question.
Even when I was in the Senate I found it hard enough to justify the time to listen to the mostly pointless and tedious point scoring that passed for Question Time, so I must admit I couldn’t bring myself to listen in very often to listen in on what the impact of the new rules were. But reading through some of the Question Time transcripts in Hansard afterwards, I can’t see much indication that the trial rules provided much of an improvement.
ABC Radio National’s National Interest interviewed Labor Senator Annette Hurley and Liberal Senator Alan Ferguson (who has been the one pushing hardest for reform) to get their views about how well the trial rules had worked. You can read the transcript here (h/t to the Democratic Audit). In short, the Labor Senator thinks they haven’t improved things at all, and the Liberal thinks they have, at least to a degree.
The key problem is not really the length of time to ask or answer questions, but the inability to get the question answered. Personally, I think Alan Ferguson’s original idea of giving some advance notice of questions, combined with providing an ability for the President to sit the Minister down if they persistently refuse to answer a straight question, is the sort of thing that is really needed.
As the Senate only agreed to trial the different approach until the end of 2008, they will revert to the stardard approach when Parliament resumes in February. It will require a new resolution agreed to by the Senate if there are to be any more changes in Question Time procedures. Technically the Liberals could do this without the agreement of the government, if they could convince enough of the minor party and independent Senators to support them. However, making these sorts of changes in a permanent way are usually (although not always) made only when there is consensus amongst both major parties.
3 Comments
Yes I noticed a difference while listening in the car over that period. There were twice as many questions with half the amount of answers! What is tiring is that politics is becoming all about the parties and their tug-o-war and not about real government accountability or the needs of the people. The other issue you touch on is the one of notice. Why not give notice so that there is no excuse for a meaningless answer? Some of the questions are complex or not directly the portfolio of respondent and all we get is more wasted time and waffle. Even just staying on the point would be an improvement.
Wouldn’t it be far simpler and truly a process for accountability if the speaker was not from the majority party of the house? They could determine if the answer was ‘directly relevant’ to the question and force the minister to adequately answer it.
It is a bloody waste of time otherwise (except for when it can be later used to show X has misled parliament). I just don’t get it, an opposition must get so frustrated that the minister isn’t answering the question, then when they form government they forget about how frustratingly useless the whole process is.
Tilso
Its true that each time the President is elected by the Senate (Speaker in the House of Reps) has always (at least since the two party system solidified) come from the party in government, even when – as at present that party neither commands a majority or is even the single largest party.
In theory the Libs could have tried to do a deal with Fielding and Xenophon and tried to keep the Senate President’s role. However this is one of those conventions that both major parties seem determined to stick to.
However, I really don’t think it would solve the problem much. Because the Senate Presidency is normally only chosen when Senators elected in the previous election takes their seat (that is, the first sitting after July 1 following the previous half-Senate election, not straight after the election like in the Reps), there have been occasions where the government has changed at the election and the President has been from the Opposition party for six months or so.
This is what happened after the most recent election, when the Lib’s Alan Ferguson stayed President for the sittings in the first six months of 2008, even though Labor was in government. It didn’t improve the answers much – as the President always says, they can draw a Minister’s attention to the question and they can even rule the Minister is not being relevant, but they cannot force the Minister how to answer the question or tell them what to say.
Maybe if the President had the power to sit the Minister down if they presistently refused to answer the question, it might improve things a bit. But when it all boils down to it, if someone is determined to avoid a question, they will. Short of injecting them all with some sort of truth serum, I’m not sure how you can force them to answer, regardless of who sits in the Presiden’ts chair.
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