The following video segment, from this mornings Estimates, shows Labor firebrand Senator Conroy questioning on Dept (& agencies) projected savings across over 160 regulations, as part of the Govt RTRP.
In this case the regulations under scrutiny were from CASR Part 21 & Part 61..
You will note that Senator Conroy mentions a new standing order in relation to questions that in a Senator's opinion are yet to be adequately answered or that the Senator does not yet want to be put on notice...
Here is that addition to Senate SO26 para(4):
26 Estimates
At the end of paragraph (4), add:
If a senator has further explanations to seek, items of expenditure shall not be closed for examination unless the senator has agreed to submit written questions or the committee has agreed to schedule additional hearings for that purpose.
(Agreed to 25 June 2014.)
Certainly changes the dynamic..
.. when before a Dept/Agency officer could simply defer (obfuscate) a probing question for months and months...
By which time the original QON has lost its impact and many of the AQONs are less than satisfactory in reply and merely more bureaucrat spin...
MTF...
