Members

Members, Accommodation Allowances, Speaker's Statement

The SPEAKER (14:12): Before I move to questions without notice, I refer members to the papers I have just tabled comprising House of Assembly country members' accommodation allowance claim forms for the period 1 March 2010 to 30 June 2020. For those who choose to peruse the claim forms, note that there are a number of recently resubmitted claim forms. I can inform the house that I have included the resubmitted forms together with the original claim forms into the compilation of all claim forms received in the interests of transparency.

I would like to remind members of my ruling made in the house on 30 June wherein I indicated that questions asked of members regarding claims for country members' accommodation allowance are out of order. I went on to quote Speaker Such from page 3909 of Hansard of 9 November 2005 to the effect:

I remind members to have a look at standing order 96, which precludes members from asking a question of a member unless they hold a position such as minister, chair of a committee, or something like that. Public business is not the same as public interest.

I will be holding the line on this rule should questions be asked on country members' accommodation allowance claims. As I have also advised the house, I have written to the Auditor-General to ask him to consider commissioning an audit of the country members' accommodation allowance, and I have also asked him to also consider suggesting ways to make the claiming and the reporting of allowances more transparent; and, of course, I am not precluding any member from making any substantive motion in the usual way.

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS: Sir, may I ask for a point of clarification?

The SPEAKER: You may.

The Hon. A. KOUTSANTONIS: In the documents you tabled, did they include expenditure claimed by the Leader of the Opposition and the Deputy Leader of the Opposition over the last 10 years?

The SPEAKER: As to the matter of the Leader of the Opposition and the Deputy Leader of the Opposition, I am aware, for members' benefit, that the member for West Torrens has asked me whether I would consider publishing similar allowances for the Leader of the Opposition and the Deputy Leader of the Opposition also for 10 years.

I have to be honest, the staff here have been working tirelessly for probably a couple of weeks now to furnish these documents and obviously make the necessary redactions for the reasons provided, so I am open to consider them. At this stage, it has been physically impossible to produce that level of information, but I am certainly open to providing it at a future date, and perhaps I will come back to the house when I have an update on that.