Cabinet solidarity means never having to say you're sorry

On Wednesday, Ministers of the Norfolk Island Government successfully moved to reduce their exposure to parliamentary scrutiny by fifty percent, effective forthwith.

This decision, coming at a time when the economy is in tatters and with the Finance Minister signaling even more difficulties ahead through accelerated losses from Norfolk Air and the knock on effect of this throughout the community, is regrettable.

Let’s not forget that Executives and MLA’s have recently secured, roughly, a fifty percent pay rise and that Assembly meetings last, on average, 4 to 5 hours. The Assembly now plans to meet not 4 weekly, but 6 weekly.

The Chief Minister proposed the change and put forward the motion for the reduction seemingly because the workload generated by the 4-weekly cycle of meetings was too much for the Executive and the service. Also, that the workload associated with taking forward the new Commonwealth/Norfolk agenda was causing difficulties, hence the change.

I’m sure that most of us would agree that there are serious challenges ahead. But, by the same token, it is reasonable for the community to expect that the Executive in particular will rise to the occasion and if that means more work, so be it. The Administration also needs dig a little deeper.

It would be apparent to anyone who reads the Assembly notice paper, or who listens to the Assembly, that the proceedings of the 13^th Assembly have been dominated by questions without notice and questions on the notice paper. It is also apparent that the government of 13^th Assembly has no legislative program to speak of. Hardly surprising when it appears not to have defined any real agenda for itself other than one of reacting to events as they unfold.

Meetings on a 6 weekly rotation will potentially see an even longer question time with more questions on the notice paper and therefore the Assembly, the legislature, will have little ability to progress a legislative program or legislative reforms in areas such as Immigration, Social Security, Public Sector and GBE re-structuring.

At Wednesday’s meeting the Executive members, the Ministers, “Cabinet” as they are now collectively described, were overshadowed by the performances of their backbench colleagues and perhaps it is this reality beginning to bite that is driving the desire for less parliamentary exposure. The debate in relation to Telecommunications was the most “spirited” that has been held in the house for some time and most of the action came from the backbench.

By comparison the input of the Executive could only be described as dismissive, disingenuous, defensive or, in the case of the Finance Minister, disinterested.

Mr King’s at times rather colorful turn of phrase owed more to the Paul Keating school of street fighting adversarial politics than to our allegedly consensus style of government as he tried to goad the executive members into contributing to the debates. One can’t help thinking that the NIG’s new paradigm is, “Cabinet solidarity means never having to say you’re sorry”.

In the context of the “debate” on the 6-weekly meeting cycle, it was somewhat surprising that Madam Speaker did not take the opportunity to enter the fray and defend the role and the relevance of the parliament given her obvious passion for the form, if not the function, of parliamentary democracy. Still, they do say that politics is the art of compromise.

In the final analysis, the Executive, in choosing to go to ground, does itself a serious injustice. In choosing to be less accountable to the people it shows a deplorable level of commitment to the leadership role and trust that we have placed in them.

I guess we just need wait and see if the NIG Executives will follow Joh Bjelke-Petersen’s example and “feed the chooks” through backslapping “information” sessions on Radio 2NI, squeezed in between the weather, the keno results and lost and found.