The senior Law Officers – Attorney-General McClelland and Minister for Justice O’Connor – don’t appear to be aware there is a major, six-month long inquiry into the Classifications (that is, censorship) scheme under way in the Senate. Instead the Lower House pair have told SCAG (see item below) that they are referring a new censorship inquiry to the Australian Law Reform Commission. Go figure!
Dumb or Nasty…you choose
Just how dumb are the Australian Attorney-General Robert McClelland and the federal Minister for Home Affairs and Justice, Brendan O’Connor?
Plenty, it seems. Or, possibly, they’re just plain nasty.
The communiqué following their occasional gabfest, the Standing Committee of Attorneys-General, released after the meeting held on 10 December 2010, says:
The Operation of the National Classification Scheme: Ministers agreed on the need to reform the National Classification Scheme to accommodate and better anticipate technological and other development. Ministers agreed to the Commonwealth referring the matter to the Australian Law Reform Commission.
It would seem neither McClelland or O’Connor, Ministerial Members of the Lower House of the Australian Parliament, knew on Friday 10 December that:
On 16 November 2010 the Senate referred the following matter to the (Senate) Legal and Constitutional Affairs Committee for inquiry and report:
The Australian film and literature classification scheme…
And there follows a list, from (a) to (o), of the various ins and outs of the Classification (censorship) scheme which are to be looked at in detail by the Legal and Constitutional Affairs References Committee of the Senate.
The Senate inquiry is a full-on examination, scheduled to take more than seven months and reporting on 30 June 2011.
It is, in fact, one of two swansong referrals to the Senate Legal and Con. References Committee, agreed to “on the nod” by the parties in the Senate, including the Labor Party, of which Mr McClelland and Mr O’Connor are members. The referrals are the personal work of Senator Guy Barnett (Liberal, Tasmania), who is the Chair of the Legal and Con. References Committee (Note: not chair of the main Senate Legal and Con. Committee – that’s the inestimable Senator Trish Crossin, Lab, NT).
“Swansong” refers to the fact that Senator Barnett is “retiring” as a Senator on 30 June 2011 after nine years, a victim of the swinging nature of politics and voting in the island state. He has managed to successfully achieve referrals – to the references committee he heads – on two of his main hobby-horses as his final contribution to the Parliament and Australia.
I’ll bet you’re wondering what the other swansong referral from Senator Barnett is?
It’s an inquiry into the Australian Law Reform Commission (referred 23 Nov) …that’s the body to which McClelland and O’Connor are referring the Classification Scheme.
Now, either McClelland and O’Connor are so nasty that they would begrudge Senator Barnett his final ‘tour de force’ on matters of major personal interest to him…or, they are just plain dumb, and don’t know what’s happening in Parliament.
You be the judge.
– Bill Rowlings, CEO