RANN GOVT UNACCOUNTABILITY HIGHLIGHTED

Liberal Leader Rob Kerin has accused the Rann Government of flouting the procedures of Parliament and attempting to minimise the amount of scrutiny it is subjected to during Question Time.

This follows unprecedented scenes in Parliament today when Rann Government Minister Karlene Maywald asked Police Minister Kevin Foley a Dorothy Dix-type question about the Loxton police station.

“Not only does this government fail to answer legitimate questions put to it by the Opposition: it is now trying to use up Question Time asking questions of itself,” Mr Kerin said.and that “Question Time has traditionally been the opportunity for the Opposition of the day to ask questions of the government, and while we expect Dorothy Dixers from government backbenchers, we don’t expect members of the Cabinet to be quizzing each other.

He said that “Precedent over more than 150 years in the South Australian Parliament and hundreds more years in Westminster dictates that Ministers don’t ask questions of each other. It has never happened before. If a minister wants to know something, he or she only has to ask his or her colleague during Cabinet or at any other time when they are standing or sitting in the same room. They shouldn’t be wasting time in Parliament."

“And the Speaker should provide the evidence on which he based his ruling today that ministers should be able to take up Parliament’s time asking questions of each other.”

Mr Kerin said today’s Question Time fiasco followed a decision by the Speaker yesterday that Ministers need not be censured for providing misleading statements to Parliament during Question Time so long as they don’t impact on legislation, adding that “Parliament is spinning out of control because of the government’s contempt for it and the Speaker’s failure to make Ministers accountable for what they say and do,”

“The people of South Australia deserve better than that.”

Media release here