Answers to Questions

Parliamentary Executive Salary Increases

In reply to the Hon. C. BONAROS ().19 March 2024).

The Hon. T.J. STEPHENS: On 19 March the Hon. Connie Bonaros directed a question to me concerning the salaries of the Clerks and Deputy Clerks of both houses of this parliament. I provide an account of the processes involved in the determinations.

In 2022 the Clerks and Deputy Clerks prepared and presented a joint submission to the Presiding Officers of both Houses drawing our attention to, and requesting our consideration of, the then unsatisfactory position regarding the salaries and conditions of the executive officers of the two Houses of the South Australian parliament.

For more than 20 years the Clerks and Deputy Clerks of the two houses had been the lowest paid in Australia and were continuing to fall further behind all other jurisdictions.

The Clerks of the South Australian parliament were remunerated at a level below that of the Deputy Clerks of all other Australian jurisdictions except for Queensland and the ACT.

Similarly, the remuneration of the Deputy Clerks were by a significant margin, the lowest in the country.

The Speaker and I agreed that the situation placed this parliament in a vulnerable situation and needed redressing. The Speaker and I jointly made the decision to provide an offer to the Clerks and Deputy Clerks that sought to re-establish the three-state average (Victoria, Western Australia and Tasmania) benchmarking that had been applied to the Clerks and Deputy Clerks salaries in the 1990s as a way of restoring the relativities and standing of the Clerks and Deputy Clerks of this parliament with their counterparts around the country. This process reflected the process that had been undertaken in the 1990s.

As the Clerks are officers of the houses, the JPSC did not and should not have any role in the determinations.

Previous setting and adjustments for remuneration of the Clerks and Deputy Clerks have not been reported to either house by the respective Presiding Officer and so there was no decision to initiate that practice.

While the initial offer to the Clerks and Deputy Clerks included the provision of annual reviews of the remuneration of the Clerks and Deputy Clerks to account for movements in the three-state average, no adjustments have been made since the initial offer. The Clerks and Deputy Clerks have stated that they welcome the referral of their remuneration to the Remuneration Tribunal.