Legislative Council Standing Orders
Legislative Council Standing Orders
(1) The Council may appoint a Select Committee.
(2) A motion for the appointment of a Select Committee will state the object of such committee.
A Select Committee will consist of not less than five nor, without leave of the Council, more than ten Members.
The quorum of every Select Committee will be fixed at the time of appointing such committee.
(1) Notice will be given in the Council of the names of the Members that are proposed to be appointed to committees. Notice is not required of a motion for the appointment of Members if that motion immediately follows a resolution that has established a committee.
(2) Members may be discharged from attending a Select Committee, and other Members added, after notice has been given.
(3) A list of Members serving on Select Committees must be published in the Notice Paper.
Prior to the commencement of any other business, every Select Committee will elect one of its Members to be the Chair of the Committee and one of its Members to be Deputy Chair.
If the Chair and Deputy Chair are absent from any meeting the Members present may appoint any one of their number to be Chair for that meeting.
(1) A Select Committee may not sit while the Council is actually sitting unless specifically empowered to do so by the Council.
(2) A Select Committee may adjourn from time to time and from place to place.
(3) If a quorum of Members is not present within half an hour after the time fixed for the meeting of any Select Committee, the meeting will lapse and the next meeting of the committee will be called by the Chair.
(4) If at any time during the sitting of a Select Committee the quorum of Members fixed by the Council is not present, the Clerk of the Committee will call the attention of the Chair to the fact, who will suspend the proceedings of the committee until a quorum is present, or adjourn the meeting to some future day.
Minutes of proceedings must be taken of each meeting of a Select Committee and must record —
(a) the names of the Members who attended each meeting;
(b) every motion or amendment proposed and the name of its mover; and
(c) the divisions and the names of the Members voting for each side on a question, which must also be included in the committee’s report to the Council.
(1) In a Select Committee all questions will be decided by a majority of Members present.
(2) The Chair of a Select Committee can vote only when there is an equality of votes.
A Select Committee may send for persons, documents and other things.
Select Committee deliberations will always be conducted in private.
(1) Unless otherwise determined by the Select Committee, a transcript will be taken of all formal evidence.
(2) The name of the Member asking each question of a witness under examination by any Select Committee will be shown in the transcript of evidence.
(1) Unless the Council or the Select Committee otherwise determines, all evidence will be taken in public and may be published immediately.
(2) The committee may authorise the publication of any documents, papers and submissions presented to it.
(3) The committee may take evidence in private.
(4) Evidence not taken in public and any documents, papers and submissions received by the committee which have not been authorised for publication will not be disclosed unless they have been reported to the Council.
Where a Select Committee lapses or ceases to have legal existence before it can report to the Council, the evidence can be considered by any other committee appointed in the same or next Parliament inquiring into the same subject-matter.
A Select Committee may report on its deliberations and present its minutes, evidence or other documents from time to time.
The Chair of every Select Committee will prepare the draft report for consideration by the committee.
(1) The draft report will be printed and circulated to Members of a Select Committee.
(2) The report will be considered paragraph by paragraph or groups of paragraphs and a question put “That the paragraph [or paragraphs] or the paragraph or paragraphs (as amended) stand part of the report”.
(3) A Member may move amendments to a paragraph at the time it is under consideration.
(4) After all paragraphs and appendices (if any) have been considered, the question will be put “That the draft report (or the draft report, as amended), be the Report of the Committee”.
When requested to do so by one or more Members of a Select Committee, the committee will include with its report to the Council a minority report.
The report of a Select Committee will be tabled in the Council by the Chair of the committee and may be ordered to lie on the Table.
(1) A Select Committee may appoint a sub-committee of two or more of its Members to inquire into and report to the committee upon any matter which the committee is empowered to examine, but may not take evidence unless the committee so decides in relation to each proposed witness.
(2) At a meeting of a sub-committee two Members constitute a quorum.
(3) The Standing Orders apply to a sub-committee in the same manner as they apply to a Select Committee.
(4) A sub-committee will report to the Select Committee as soon as practicable on each matter referred to that sub-committee.