David Norris (Independent)

That is helpful, as were the contributions from colleagues on the Government benches. Senators Brady and Fitzgerald indicated that this would often be an informal situation involving some discussion. I envisaged a printed report or some form of written record.

The Minister's response that there is nothing to prevent the chairperson making such a report available worries me. I expected that this would be virtually automatic. I suggest the Minister considers tabling her own amendment requiring the chairperson to make it available to the rest of the board. I have sat on a number of boards and would be unhappy if information was withheld because it is impossible to make proper decisions in such circumstances.

The Minister's response that the chairperson may make a written report available opens up the strong possibility that it may not. I would be unhappy serving on a board where I was asked to take positions and make decisions on matters where I did not have full disclosure of the information, especially a document as significant as a consultant's report. If, as seems possible from the Minister's response, such a report could be withheld from members of the board how can it possibly function efficiently?

None of us are so full of ourselves as to insist on acceptance of our own amendments but I would like to see the issue addressed. If the Minister shares my view that members of the board would not be in a position to act responsibly if they did not have full information — there may be an adequate reason why she does not — she might include a phrase to that effect. The Minister's reference to the status of the group being enhanced by the report being presented to the chairperson is a good point but the chairperson should in all but the most exceptional circumstances, of which I have not yet heard examples, make a printed report available to all the members of the board.