A quiet revolution in the NSW Parliament or how some unlikely allies found some common ground

There has been a very quiet revolution in the NSW Upper House and this is a little primer on it. These are pretty fundamental changes that I am certain will deliver for the millions of people in NSW who want the State Government to be far more accountable and transparent. You never know, they might even make the place, well … almost … work.

TL:DR

• In our first few weeks back in Parliament the Greens were key to securing changes which are already forcing the government, and Ministers, to release previously secret material.
• To get these changes we have worked with a disparate (and surprising!) coalition of Labor, Greens, Animal Justice and the Shooters. We differ on policy (understatement) but are united on openness and accountability.
• These changes are already delivering better and quicker answers to questions, cutting through rubbish excuses to hide information like “commercial in confidence” and “cabinet in confidence” and forcing information out of the government, expanding budget estimates hearings and more broadly empowering the parliament to work for the community and shine a light on the dark recesses of government.
• Having won the election the NSW Government thought they had the next 4 years in the bag, but we’ve shown already that it’s going to be a very different game in the NSW Parliament, with an Upper House that plans to be a lot more than a rubber stamp.

A short summary of the major changes:

1. We have fixed question time so that Ministers’ answers have to be “directly”, not as previously “generally”, relevant and limited answers to a maximum of 3, not 4, minutes. This is already working with much less waffle and some actual useful information being provided . We might even change its name to “Answer Time.”

2. We have more than doubled the time set aside for budget estimates, that’s when we question Ministers and senior bureaucrats on expenditure and policies. Estimates will now happen twice a year and go as long as necessary to get real answers (send us your questions!).

3. We have delivered non-government chairs to the majority of the Upper House committees including important public accountability and portfolio committees. As a result the ALP has 5 chairs, the Greens 3, SFF 2 and the AJP has two select committee chairs (these consider a single issue). It’s not a complete revolution the Government still has 4 committee chairs and One Nation has 1.

4. Reformed the way Ministers must answer written questions from MPs. We can now place questions on the record any business day and Ministers are required to answer them in just 21 days. Previously answers took 35 days and questions could only be put on when Parliament was sitting. This means we can deliver timely information to the community when they approach us with questions.

5. Delivered fresh powers to committees that allow them to compel the government to produce documents, and agreed on a robust process to ensure these “orders for papers” are properly dealt with. This is an essential power for committees when they are undertaking inquiry work.

6. Changed debating rules to get though a great deal more business on “private members” day. This is the day individual MPs have set aside to propose new laws, to force government to produce documents and to establish matters of principle by notices of motion. Previously the Upper House would complete at most three or four items of “private members business” a week. We are now routinely dealing with a dozen or more.

We delivered these changes in the first few sitting weeks. Since then the non-government majority has continued to hold together to closely review, and where necessary change, a number of critical pieces of legislation and force greater transparency. This has included:

· Making over 20 positive changes to a bill creating a new Disability and Ageing Commissioner including making the Commissioner far more independent and demanding greater funding for disability advocacy groups.

· Saving the Long Service Leave entitlements of hundreds of thousands of public servants when the government had budget plans to slash them by three months.

· Fixing a law on Local Government to shut a loophole that has allowed council staff to run their own council’s elections (a 100 year old problem in local government), and

· Agreeing to a series of orders to compel the government to produce reports, reviews and other documents that they have been refusing to release, sometimes years.

If the Coalition won the election you might be thinking, how has this all happened? After the election the government was reduced to 16 members in the Upper House. To get a majority they require 21 votes. This is a challenge for them. Equally, if the Greens and other non-government parties want to get positive change we need to pull together 21 votes. The good news is this has been happening very regularly since Parliament returned on 7 May.

How do we get to 21 votes? The most common way we have achieved it is with the votes of Labor (14), the Greens (3), the AJP (2) and the Shooters, Fishers and Farmers (2). In fact these parties have all worked together on this parliamentary reform agenda. Sometimes supported by all the other non-government parties, sometimes not.

Another fair question is why are such disparate groups voting together in the NSW Upper House? It’s because we have a joint program of delivering openness. To different degrees we all want to re-empower the Parliament in its ongoing struggle with the executive government. We then worked together, sharing the burden, and delivered it. Sharing the work and sharing the credit between different parties is pretty rare in politics so it’s important to acknowledge this.

There is collective self interest in this too, as the government is opened up to more scrutiny there are more political opportunities to challenge their agenda and deliver for our own different agendas. Of course this is a risk, but then nothing in politics is free of risk.

It’s early days yet and politics is pretty volatile so we can’t predict what changes there may be in the weeks and months ahead. And while we might agree for the moment on procedural reform and more openness, there is still so much of substance that divides the different parties.

The Greens remain the only party that always votes for the environment, that never forgets social justice, demands Treaties, will never water down our gun laws and has a clear legislative agenda to deal with the climate emergency. I believe that all of this is helped by a Parliament that gives answers to the community, shines a light on the dark recesses of government and ultimately empowers more voices than just the Government of the day.

What we have done is far from perfect, but it’s a step in the right direction as we try to make this expensive, powerful and complicated series of meetings on Macquarie Street finally work for people and the planet.