Australia’s Representation Gap: A Role for Parliamentary Committees >>> found by jim

Australia’s Representation Gap: A Role for Parliamentary Committees? By Ian Marsh

This article reinforces the notion that the role of committees is extremely important and the current structure is inadequate

The present committee system provides basic infrastructure, but many of its features fall far short of what would be required. To amplify parliament’s contribution to the broader policy making process, its committees would need to have enhanced standing, roles and powers. The present system is inappropriately structured: committees are insufficiently focused. The present committees work on a shoestring and their staffing is totally inadequate. The incentives for committee work are weak: those with ministerial ambitions may be fearful of taking an independent line. Finally, the use of latent parliamentary powers, particularly in the Senate, to gain attention for committee findings and recommendations is hugely underdeveloped.

Developing the role of parliamentary committees on longer-term issues would be a radical step, since it would involve new parliamentary arrangements outside the immediate authority of the government and the immediate influence of the major policy departments. Those used to adversarial approaches may find an attempt to explore the scope for even limited consensus between the major parties impractical or worse. The idea of routinely probing the scope for even limited consensus between the major parties, at least on guidelines and principles, might instinctively be rejected as giving too much away. Yet this is one key promise of these changes. Of course consensus will be limited, often partial and often unavailable. This is at it should be. But the notion that we are stuck with present ritual adversarialism staunches any possibility of imagining an alternative approach.

In sum, an assessment of the neglect of longer-term issues by the Australian political system is also a study of the way in which the present structure of politics is implicated in Australians’ capacity to choose. The current political system does not provide the setting for sustained review and analysis of long-term trends. There are inadequacies in research, in technical analysis, and in public engagement and consultation. Australia needs to invest in each of these areas if it is to have the capacity to respond to new contingencies and persistent trends in an effective way.

An informed public opinion is the ultimate foundation for wise political choice. There is not now sustained concern for public education, involvement and debate. There is minimal capacity for constructive discussion of strategic issues in parliament. There is little capacity to make transparent the bipartisanship that is so patently present between the major parties. There is little capacity to engage interest groups in the consideration of strategic issues. The net result is a political structure at odds with our real situation and our real needs. The familiar competitive two-party system is now itself a principal obstacle to the capacity of Australians to exercise wise policy choice.