HANSARD
SITTING CALENDAR
SEARCH
LIVE BROADCAST
Hansard Dynamic Member Index
House of Assembly - Fifty-Fifth Parliament, First Session (55-1)
2022-07-07 Daily Xml
Contents
Xml

Parliamentary Procedure

Speaker's Statement

The SPEAKER (11:36): Before I call the Clerk, I wish to make a brief statement in relation to the relevance of answers. During question time, points of order are frequently raised under standing order 98 concerning the relevance of answers by ministers. The rules requiring answers to be relevant—and the time available to answer—encourage more concise and direct answers to questions without notice. The standing orders have required answers to be relevant since 1858 and time limits for answers were imposed in 2012.

What does relevance mean in the context of standing order 98? As members are aware, standing order 98 is broad and provides:

98 Rules applying to answers (125) Amended Nov. 2017

(a) In answering a question, a Minster (sic) or other Member replies to the substance of the question and may not debate the matter to which the question refers.

(b) During the period for asking Questions without Notice an answer to a question must not exceed four minutes. The Speaker has discretion to extend the time for a Minister or other Member's answer if the answer is interrupted.

Members will appreciate that whether a question is relevant turns on whether, in its proper context, a minister has replied to the substance of the question.

The Practice of the House of Assembly, often referred to as Blackmore's, follows very closely the practice in the House of Commons. Blackmore observes in relation to this matter:

An answer should be confined to the points of the Question, with only such explanation as is necessary to render the answers intelligible.

This is not, in my considered view, the practice that has now developed in the House of Assembly although, with great respect to Blackmore, it may be the practice in the Commons. I will return to this point.

First, I wish to record the practice as I understand it in other places, including the House of Representatives, the Parliament of New Zealand and the parliaments of certain other Australian states. House of Representatives standing order 104 concerns the form and content of answers and provides:

104 Answers

a) An answer must be directly relevant to the question.

b) A point of order regarding relevance may be taken only once in respect of each answer.

c) The duration of each answer is limited to 3 minutes.

I understand that the words 'directly relevant' were introduced by amendment in 2010 and were likely intended to further narrow the scope of permissible answers. As well, answers are limited to three minutes, shorter than the four minutes contemplated by the standing orders in the House of Assembly. Whatever the proper construction to be given to words 'directly relevant', it is certainly a stricter formulation than mere substance, which is the touchstone in the House of Assembly. Additionally, the Clerk of the House of Representatives has observed:

The requirement for direct relevance has given Speakers greater authority in what has long been a difficult area. However, the vast majority of points of order raised during Question Time continue to be on relevance.

It is also true that the vast majority of points of order raised during question time in the House of Assembly continue to be relevance or, in the context of our House of Assembly standing orders, raise the question of whether the answer responds to the substance of the question.

The parliament of New Zealand has devised a test for relevance in relation to answers. Standing order 396 requires that answers or replies meet the following criteria:

396 Content of replies

(1) An answer that seeks to address the question asked must be given if it can be given consistently with the public interest.

(2) The reply to any question must be concise and confined to the subject matter of the question asked, and not contain—

(a) statements of fact and the names of any persons unless they are strictly necessary to answer the question, or

(b) arguments, inferences, imputations, epithets or ironical expressions, or

(c) discreditable references to the House or any member of Parliament or any offensive or unparliamentary expression.

It goes on to provide:

(3) Replies shall not refer to proceedings in committee at meetings closed to the public that have not yet been reported to the House or, subject to Standing Order 116, to a matter awaiting or under adjudication in, or suppressed by an order of, any New Zealand court.

Of course, there is an argument that an increase in the number of rules concerning the content of answers might produce an increase in the number of points of order, rather than improve relevancy.

In the Victorian Legislative Assembly, all answers to questions are required to be direct, factual and succinct and not introduce matter extraneous to the question. Moreover, answers must not debate the matter to which the question relates. However, the relevant standing order also provides that a minister shall have discretion to determine the content of any answer.

It is not unusual for apparently simple and direct questions to give rise to complex and multifaceted answers. In answering a question, the minister must consider what facts or background information are relevant and provide that information without entering into debate. How ministers go about answering questions is largely up to them, and members cannot stipulate how they must reply (for example, by insisting on a yes or a no answer), nor can the Speaker require a reply to be couched in one form rather than another.

I turn to the proper construction to be given to the term 'substance' under standing order 98 in the House of Assembly. At the outset, I observe that there is a difference between answering the substance of a question and the adequacy of the reply and that there is a tendency for points of order to be raised which concern the adequacy of the reply rather than the question of substance.

The role of the Speaker is to rule in accordance with the standing orders and precedence. If an answer does, in some way, go to the substance of the question, under the present standing orders, it is in order. What amounts to the substance of the question is a subjective judgement and without an amendment to the standing orders, will remain one. An answer will be more likely to engage with the substance of a question if it ventilates matters which lie close to the heart or the pith of the question. However, as McGee observes in Parliamentary Practice in New Zealand:

Questions often have more than one leg to them. If this is the case, members cannot demand that a reply addresses every leg of their question. The Minister has the latitude to address one or other of the legs of a question and ignore others.

In the House of Representatives, Speaker Smith has taken the approach in ruling that an answer that relates to one part of a question is directly relevant—an approach not dissimilar to other recent Speakers, such as Jenkins and Burke.

As well, it is the frequent practice of members to seek leave of the house to introduce further facts to explain their questions. Leave is most usually given so long as such additional content does not include argument or opinion which might be characterised as debate. Where extra content is included, it is not unreasonable to provide the minister with the opportunity to provide a fulsome answer to all or any part of the question and this would be well within the scope of standing order 98.

Finally, while it is the Speaker's role to ensure standing orders are adhered to, whether a reply answers the question satisfactorily, either in the questioner's view or even in any objective sense, is a matter for political discourse. Question time allows issues to be raised. It does not necessarily resolve them. The Speaker's interpretation of whether a minister is answering the substance of a question is based on the established practice of providing latitude to ministers in their answers and in accordance with the broad nature of standing order 98.

PARLIAMENTARY BUSINESS
MEMBERS
GET INVOLVED
ABOUT PARLIAMENT
VISIT
LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL
HOUSE OF ASSEMBLY
CONTACT