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     legislatures

This page considers the basis and operation of the Australian legislatures.

     elections

For an overview of electoral law across Australia see the 2003 Australian Electoral Law: A Stocktake (PDF) by Graeme Orr, Bryan Mercurio & George Williams

     privilege

Absolute privilege protects the making of statements in the course of parliamentary proceedings and in the official reporting of those proceedings. It thus covers statements in Hansard and parliamentary papers.

Absolute privilege is enshrined by the federal Parliamentary Privileges Act 1987 (PPA) and equivalent State and Territory legislation.

It does not cover statements made by members of parliament outside the legislature and a feature of Australian politics has thus been calls for MP to repeat claims outside the safety of "coward's castle".

For the Australian regime see in particular Enid Campbell's Parliamentary Privilege (Leichhardt: Federation Press 2003).

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