Matter of Privilege

Matter of Privilege, Speaker's Statement

The SPEAKER (11:01): Before I call Mr Clerk, I would like to make a statement with regard to the matter of privilege involving the Premier in relation to the ICAC SA Health report. I make the following statement with regard to the matter of privilege raised by the member for West Torrens in the house on 4 December. However, before addressing that matter, I wish to outline the significance of privilege as it relates to this house and its members.

Privilege is not a device by which members or any other person can seek to pursue matters than can be addressed by debate or settled by the vote of the house on a substantive motion. I have referred to the test of McGee in Parliamentary Practice in New Zealand as a good benchmark. Generally speaking, any act or omission which obstructs or impedes the house in the performance of its functions, or which obstructs or impedes any member or officer of such house in the discharge of his or her duty, which has a tendency to directly or indirectly produce such a result may be treated as contempt and therefore be considered a matter of privilege even though there is no precedent of the offence.

I refer to the matter raised by the member for West Torrens in relation to the answers provided to the house by the Premier on 3 and 4 December concerning his responses to questions on the Independent Commissioner Against Corruption report into SA Health. More specifically, the Leader of the Opposition asked the following question to the Premier in the house on 3 December:

My question is to the Premier. Now that the Independent Commissioner Against Corruption has delivered his report on SA Health, will the Premier now provide him with the resources that he has requested to conduct a full investigation into the state's largest public sector agency?

The Premier replied:

Yes, the Leader of the Opposition is right. This is the largest public sector agency, and we thank the commissioner for the report, which he delivered to the government last week, which has now been tabled in parliament and available for all to read. I myself am about two-thirds of the way through this report…

The member for West Torrens in raising this matter of privilege stated the following to the house:

Today in question time in his previous answer, the Premier told the parliament that the government had ample time to read the report and that the intergovernment task force was released after the report had been considered.

The member for West Torrens alleges that the Premier has deliberately and intentionally misled the house as his answer to the question asked by the leader on 3 December is inconsistent with this answer to a question on 4 December.

The member for West Torrens has subsequently provided me with an email wherein he articulates his complaint more thoroughly by identifying the inconsistency between that part of the Premier's first answer, where the Premier said, 'I myself am about two-thirds of the way through this report,' and the Premier's second answer on 4 December, which the member for West Torrens quotes in his email as follows:

We had ample time to read the report. It was only around 60 pages, plus appendices. I read the report and formed the opinion that the best way to inform the government to take action on the contents of the report was to establish an interagency task force…

The inconsistency, as I read the member for West Torrens' complaint, is that on one hand the Premier is stating that he had read 'about two-thirds' of the report, while on the other, the Premier says, 'We had ample time to read the report.' The inconsistency is that, in the opinion of the member for West Torrens, the two statements do not reconcile.

Having examined the additional information provided to me by the member for West Torrens, together with the relevant Hansard from 3 and 4 December, I do not see enough of an inconsistency between the two statements to establish a prima facie case of privilege. While the Premier's first answer refers to his own progress in reading the report, his subsequent answer, where he says, 'We had ample time to read the report,' can readily be understood to be a more inclusive description of a collective reading of the report, rather than relating to each and every individual who may comprise the collective.

Further, the Premier's subsequent response that 'I read the report' does not of itself indicate the extent to which the Premier had read the report. As such, it cannot be said that it is that inconsistent with his earlier answer. Therefore, on the evidence available to me, it is not clear that a prima facie case has been made out that would amount, or be intended or likely to amount, to an improper interference that would generally be regarded as tending to impede or obstruct the house in the discharge of its duties.

Therefore, in the Chair's opinion, this is not a matter of privilege for the reason I set out above. In the Chair's view, the matter could not genuinely be regarded as tending to impede or obstruct the house in the discharge of its duties. Therefore, I decline to give the matter the precedence that would allow the member to immediately pursue the matter; however, my opinion, as always, does not prevent any member from pursuing the matter by way of substantive motion.