Update 17 August 2022: The Commonwealth Government has completed its 2021-2022 review of the Legislation Act 2003. NSWCCL continues to hold the view that the recommendations of the committee could have and should have gone much further. Read our blog post here.

NSWCCL has made a submission to the Review of the Legislation Act 2003. 

It is extremely concerning that the Government has chosen - in the wake of the powerful arguments made in the Committee report on the overreach of exemptions to disallowance - to double down on the notion that the Executive should have untrammelled powers to rule by decree without parliamentary oversight.

In particular, and as a key example, the Government rejected the Committee's interim recommendations 5/6/7/8 and 9 that determinations made under the Biosecurity Act 2015  that affect such fundamental liberties as the right to leave the country, should be subject to disallowance.

The Government's justification that it must exempt such powers from disallowance because of the need for "urgent and decisive action" is utterly unacceptable and flies in the face of our constitutional order. It is precisely when the stakes are high and the effects of Executive action on individuals is so far reaching that our parliamentary representatives must exercise their oversight function. 

More information: read our full submission