Committees
House of Representatives Infosheet
No. 4Revised December 1998 This Infosheet concentrates on House
of Representatives committees and joint committees on which Members of the House
serve. The Senate also has an extensive committee system to which much of the
following comment is relevant. Page menu : Why have committees?
| Types of committees | Membership
| Support services | Powers of committees
| Investigatory committees in operation | Lodging
a submission | What happens at a public hearing? | Private
meetings and hearings | Less formal proceedings | Committee
reports | House of Representatives committees - 39th Parliament
| General purpose standing committees | Joint
committees - 39th Parliament
Why have committees?
A parliamentary committee consists of a group of Members or Senators (or both
in the case of joint committees) appointed by one or both Houses of Parliament.
The purpose of parliamentary committees is to perform functions which the
Houses themselves are not well fitted to perform, such as carrying out inquiries,
hearing witnesses, sifting evidence, discussing matters in detail and formulating
reasoned conclusions. This kind of work is more effectively carried out by small
groups of Members. A further advantage of committees is that several of them can
operate at the one time, which enables many more matters to be dealt with. Committees,
by concentrating on specific tasks or subjects, also offer the benefits of specialisation.
Through its committees the Parliament obtains information from the Government
and is able to receive advice from experts on the matters under investigation.
Public input is also important. Committee inquiries bring Parliament to the
people by promoting public awareness and debate on matters being considered by
the Parliament. Through its committees Parliament is able to be better informed
of community problems and attitudes. Committees provide a public forum for the
presentation of the various views of individual citizens and interest groups.
As well as serving to inform Members on various issues, committees can contribute
to better administration and policy making through their reports and recommendations.
Even if a committee's recommendations are not implemented directly, the information
collected by the committee and its reasoned conclusions are not necessarily ignored
by the Government, and may also have a wider value to the community. An important
function of committees is to scrutinise government activity. Committees may oversee
the expenditure of public money and they may call the Government or the public
service to account for their actions and ask them to explain or justify administrative
decisions. 
Types of committees Committees can be
categorised in several ways and a particular committee may fall into more than
one category.
Standing committees are committees
appointed for the life of a Parliament and they are usually re-established
in successive Parliaments. They have a continuing role.
Select committees are appointed as
the need arises, for a specific purpose, and thus have a more limited
life which is normally specified in the resolution of appointment. Once
a select committee has carried out its investigation and presented its
final report, it ceases to exist.
Joint committees draw their membership
from, and report to, both Houses of Parliament, enabling Members and Senators
to work together on the same matter.
Statutory committees are those established
by Act of Parliament, that is, by statute. All existing statutory committees
are joint committees.
Domestic or internal committees are
those whose functions are concerned with the powers and procedures of
the House or the administration of Parliament.
Investigatory committees are those
with investigatory powers. Generally speaking the term is used to describe
all committees other than the Main Committee and domestic or internal
committees (although some internal committees, such as the Privileges
Committee, may also have an investigative function).
General purpose standing committees
are investigatory or scrutiny committees, appointed at the commencement
of each Parliament to inquire into and report upon any matters referred
to them by the House or a Minister, including any pre-legislation proposal,
bill, motion, petition, vote or expenditure, other financial matter, report
or paper. Between them the nine general purpose standing committees of
the House cover most government activity, with each committee covering
a particular spread of subjects and thus a number of related government
departments and authorities (because of the role of the Joint Committee
on Foreign Affairs, Defence and Trade there is no general purpose standing
committee covering these subject areas). Annual reports of government
departments and authorities and Auditor-General's reports are automatically
referred to the appropriate committee for any inquiry the committee may
wish to make.
Legislation committees are committees
whose function is to consider bills as part of the legislative process.
The House of Representatives does not have dedicated legislation committees.
However, a bill may be referred, for an advisory report, to a standing
committee which specialises in the subject area of the bill. The committee
can call witnesses and receive evidence relating to the bill and can recommend
action to the House, although it cannot amend the bill itself.
The Main Committee is a committee
established to be an alternative venue to the Chamber for debate of a
restricted range of business (i.e. the second reading and consideration
in detail stages of bills, committee and delegation reports, and papers
presented to the House). It is not an investigatory committee and cannot
hear witnesses or take evidence. More detail may be found in Infosheet
No. 16 — The Main Committee and Infosheet
No. 7 — Making laws.
Membership Most Members of Parliament,
except some of the principal office holders and Ministers, serve on committees—even
the Speaker is a member of certain committees. All Members are members of the
Main Committee (although only some of them would be participating in its proceedings
at any one time). Other committees vary in size and may have as few as seven and
as many as 32 members. They are normally composed of Members from the various
parties or independent Members in proportion to the numerical strength of each
group in the House. Thus government members form a majority on each committee.
In practice each committee is chaired by a government member and has an opposition
member as deputy chair. The members of each committee are selected or elected
within the political parties and their names are then put forward by the respective
party whip. Independent Members may be nominated by the opposition whip or, in
some cases, may nominate themselves to the Speaker. Committee work is an important
part of the duties of a Member of Parliament and generally makes considerable
demands on a Member's time.
Support services The secretaries of
each committee of the House and some joint committees are officers of the Department
of the House of Representatives, which is responsible for providing support staff
and other facilities. Other joint committees are staffed by the Department of
the Senate.
Powers of committees Committees have
considerable powers, usually delegated to them by the House(s) appointing them.
Laws establishing some committees also have particular provisions on these matters.
To enable them to carry out their functions effectively, investigatory committees
are normally given power to summon persons to give evidence and produce documents.
To support and enforce such powers, each House is able to punish offences
which interfere with the work of its committees. A person summoned to appear before
a committee but who refuses to attend, or a witness who refuses to answer a question
or produce a document, or who lies to or misleads a committee, may be punished
for contempt by reprimand, fine or imprisonment. A person attempting to influence
a witness or to prevent a witness from giving evidence, or persecuting or injuring
a witness for having done so, would also be guilty of contempt, but may also be
prosecuted under the provisions of the Parliamentary Privileges Act. Committee
proceedings are 'proceedings in Parliament', and therefore 'privileged'. Members
and others participating, such as witnesses giving evidence, are thereby protected
from being sued or prosecuted for anything they may say during such proceedings.
Written evidence received by a committee is similarly protected. The powers
of committees to compel the giving of evidence and the rights of witnesses to
be protected ensure that committees are able to get comprehensive, factual and
truthful information.
Investigatory committees in operation
An investigatory committee usually starts an inquiry by advertising its
terms of reference in the press and inviting submissions. Persons or organisations
known to be interested in the subject or thought to have specialist knowledge
may be approached direct to make submissions. An analysis of existing material
on the subject matter of the inquiry is made by the committee secretariat and
information is usually sought from the relevant government departments or agencies.
Having considered the written submissions received, committees proceed to formal
hearings to which witnesses are invited to appear and answer questions. Public
hearings are often held away from Canberra in State capitals and regional centres.
Committees may also conduct inspections at places of relevance to the inquiry.
After examining all the evidence, a report is prepared setting out the committee's
conclusions and making recommendations. This report is presented to the House,
or to both Houses in the case of a joint committee. On occasions some members
of a committee do not agree to all recommendations in the report and they may
add a minority or dissenting report. Depending on the scope of the subject
matter, inquiries may take only a few days, or may last many months when wide
community input is required.
Lodging a submission It is open to
anyone to lodge a submission with a committee on the subject of an inquiry. A
submission should state clearly the name and address of its author and, if relevant,
of the organisation the person represents. Submissions should be typed, if possible.
As committees are restricted by their terms of reference in what they may
consider, submissions should be strictly relevant to the terms of reference. However
it is quite acceptable for a submission to be directed to a specific aspect of
the terms of reference, rather than the whole. A committee's terms of reference
are usually advertised at the start of each inquiry, but copies of it and any
necessary clarification may be obtained from the secretary to the committee.
All submissions are acknowledged. Once a submission has been formally received
by a committee, it becomes the property of the committee and may not be published
or disclosed elsewhere without the committee's authorisation. Any uncertainties
in this area should be clarified with the committee secretary.
What happens at a public hearing? The
hearing of evidence by committees usually takes place in public and such meetings
are often attended by members of the general public and by media representatives.
The chair usually opens a hearing with a brief statement of its purpose and
background and outlines the procedures to be followed. Proceedings commence with
the first witness or witnesses being called to the committee table. Witnesses
may be required to make an oath or affirmation that they will tell the truth.
The witness then sits at the table and is asked to identify himself or herself
and to state the capacity in which he or she is appearing before the committee—for
example, as a representative of a particular organisation or as a private individual.
If witnesses have supplied a written submission to the committee, they may be
asked what part they played in the submission's preparation and if they desire
to amend it. Before being questioned, witnesses are usually invited to make a
short statement to the committee. Usually the committee chair first asks a series
of questions before calling on other members, in turn, to ask any other questions
they might have. A witness or member of the committee may object to a question
but the committee can insist on it being answered. Only members of the committee
may question a witness. A transcript of evidence taken at public hearings
is prepared by Hansard and is normally published.
Private meetings and hearings Committees
meet in private in order to discuss the progress of their inquiries, consider
evidence, reach decisions and take votes, and to agree on their reports. Witnesses
may request that their evidence be taken in camera, that is, in private, and that
documents submitted be regarded as confidential. Such requests are usually, but
not necessarily, granted.
Less formal proceedings On occasions
committees may decide that a less formal form of proceedings will be more appropriate
to their purposes, and may hold informal discussions, public meetings (as opposed
to hearings), seminars or workshops. Such means may be used to conduct preliminary
discussions at the beginning of an inquiry, to obtain general community views
on a matter, or to test with particular groups or individuals preliminary conclusions
that the committee has reached. Informal proceedings can be very valuable
to a committee in giving direction to an inquiry but they do not attract parliamentary
privilege and the information so gathered does not have the status of formal evidence.
Committee reports Although a committee
report may be presented at any time when other business is not before the House,
a period is reserved on sitting Mondays specifically for presentation and debate
of committee reports. Committee reports may also be referred by the House to the
Main Committee for debate. Except in the cases of the Main Committee and committees
concerned with the work of the House in a domestic sense, committee reports usually
recommend government action—for example, the introduction of legislation,
a change in administrative procedures or review of policy. Such action is the
responsibility of the Executive Government rather than the Parliament. The
Government responds to such committee reports by way of a prepared response to
the House. In recent years it has been government policy to respond to a report
within three months of its presentation to the Parliament. The Government may
accept, or partially accept, a committee's recommendations, and announce its intention
to take certain action. Some recommendations may be rejected, while the Government
may announce that it wishes to give further consideration to others. An advisory
report on a bill is presented in the same manner as other committee reports. If
the Government accepts changes to the bill recommended by the advisory report,
these are incorporated into government amendments moved during the consideration
in detail stage (see Infosheet No. 7 — Making laws.)
In the case of a bill referred to the Main Committee for consideration, the
'report' of the Committee consists of a copy of the bill certified by the Clerk
of the Committee together with schedules of any amendments made by the Committee
and any questions which the Committee was unable to resolve. Such a report is
presented and dealt with as an additional stage in the legislative process, prior
to the bill's third reading (see Infosheet No. 7 — Making
laws and Infosheet No. 16 — The Main Committee).
A list showing the membership of each committee and giving information
on their current inquiries is published towards the end of each issue of the House
of Representatives Notice Paper.
House of Representatives committees—39th Parliament
Domestic or internal committees -
Members' Interests -
Privileges -
Procedure
-
Selection -
House (usually meets jointly with an equivalent
Senate committee) -
Library (usually meets jointly with an equivalent
Senate committee) -
Publications (usually meets jointly with
an equivalent Senate committee)
General purpose standing committees
Joint committees—39th Parliament
Joint statutory committees Joint standing committees
Suggestions
for further readingHouse of Representatives Practice, 3rd
edn. A.G.P.S., Canberra, 1997. pp 583–676. Last updated: 3 December
1998
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