Pipped at the post

Press, 23 August 1984, Page 1

Pipped at the post

The pre-empting of what is usually the time allowed for private members’ bills was described by the. former Minister of Justice, Mr McLay, as a quick appearance of “unbridled power.” The Rape Law Reform Bill (No. 2) was introduced the day the Opposition had planned to reintroduce the Rape Law Reform Bill it had introduced last December and which had lapsed with the dissolution of Parliament in June. Mr McLay said that only a week earlier the Minister of Justice, Mr Palmer, had said rape reform legislation would be introduced this year but he (Mr Palmer) did not know when it could be introduced because of substantial changes needed. “When we announced we were reintroducing our legislation as a private members’ bill, an urgent Government meeting was held in an effort to ensure that the National Opposition should

get no credit,” Mr McLay said. This complaint, echoed by other National speakers, was refuted by Mr Palmer, who said that the Cabinet legislative committee had decided this bill should proceed because the complex drafting needed was so far advanced. That had been decided a week before Mr McLay had announced that he was reintroducing his legislation. Had the previous Government taken the normal and obvious step of providing for bills to be carried over, the problems of reintroducing bills stopped in midflight would not have arisen, he said. The Minister of Women’s Affairs, Mrs Hercus, criticised the previous Government for allowing the earlier legislation to lapse. “The Opposition talks of its rights to introduce private bills,” she said. “What about the rights of the 140 makers of submissions?”