Earlier this week one of the Bills used to trigger the double dissolution election passed the senate with amendments and the next day went back to the House who passed it in the same form as the Senate. It was then sent to the Governor-General who assented into law yesterday.
This Bill is the Fair Work (Registered Organisations) Amendment Bill 2014, which the Government attempted to pass in the same form three times in the 44th Parliament.
We have now had seven double dissolution elections and this is only the third where a trigger Bill has been passed after the election.
So what is a trigger Bill and why does this matter?
Section 57 of the Constitution outlines how to resolve a disagreement between the two Houses of Parliament. If the House of Representative passes a Bill and the Senate rejects it, then the House waits three months and passes the Bill in the exact same format and the Senate again rejects it. The Bill becomes a trigger for a double dissolution of both Houses of Parliament. See the start of section 57 of the Constitution:
Section 57 Disagreement between the Houses
If the House of Representatives passes any proposed law, and the Senate rejects or fails to pass it, or passes it with amendments to which the House of Representatives will not agree, and if after an interval of three months the House of Representatives, in the same or the next session, again passes the proposed law with or without any amendments which have been made, suggested, or agreed to by the Senate, and the Senate rejects or fails to pass it, or passes it with amendments to which the House of Representatives will not agree, the Governor‑General may dissolve the Senate and the House of Representatives simultaneously. But such dissolution shall not take place within six months before the date of the expiry of the House of Representatives by effluxion of time….
So the Registered Organisations Bill, the ABCC Bills and a couple of others that were eventually discarded, had been through this process in the last Parliament and had been rejected at least twice in the same format by the Senate.
The Prime Minister then visited the Governor-General to ask him to dissolve both Houses of Parliament. All the Senate seats became vacant. We then went to an election on 2 July and those living in a State contributed to voting for 12 Senators rather than the six at a normal half Senate election. Some are saying that because of the reduced number of votes required to gain a Senate seat, we have ended up with a rather large crossbench in the Senate.
By gaining a majority of seats in the House of Representatives, the Government was returned to power. So after the election the next part of the Constitutional method to resolve a disagreement between the Houses kicked in:
Section 57 Disagreement between the Houses
….If after such dissolution the House of Representatives again passes the proposed law, with or without any amendments which have been made, suggested, or agreed to by the Senate, and the Senate rejects or fails to pass it, or passes it with amendments to which the House of Representatives will not agree, the Governor‑General may convene a joint sitting of the members of the Senate and of the House of Representatives….
After the double dissolution election the House passed the Registered Organisations Trigger Bill. It was then sent to the Senate where they deliberated until 2am on Tuesday morning. Finally with messages sent to Members of the House, the Government agreed to the amendments the Senate made to the Bill and it was passed. The following day the Bill was passed back through the House of Representatives, as a Bill must pass both Houses in the same format before it can become law.
This means that the Prime Minister does not need to ask the Governor-General to convene a joint sitting. Yet. The other trigger Bills to recreate the Australian Building and Construction Commission might not pass the Senate and the Prime Minister may still ask for a joint sitting. The final part of section 57 of the Constitution describes a joint sitting:
Section 57 Disagreement between the Houses
….The members present at the joint sitting may deliberate and shall vote together upon the proposed law as last proposed by the House of Representatives, and upon amendments, if any, which have been made therein by one House and not agreed to by the other, and any such amendments which are affirmed by an absolute majority of the total number of the members of the Senate and House of Representatives shall be taken to have been carried, and if the proposed law, with the amendments, if any, so carried is affirmed by an absolute majority of the total number of the members of the Senate and House of Representatives, it shall be taken to have been duly passed by both Houses of the Parliament, and shall be presented to the Governor‑General for the Queen’s assent.
Only one double dissolution election since federation has resulted in a joint sitting of Parliament and that was the Whitlam Government in 1974.
What happened at our other double dissolution elections?
We’ve now had seven double dissolutions since federation and only three have resulted in the trigger Bills being passed after the election. The Government lost power after two of the double dissolutions and the trigger Bills were discarded after the other two.
The first double dissolution in 1914 was triggered by a union Bill that a Commonwealth Liberal Government who had a tiny minority in the Senate could not pass. The election resulted in the Government losing power.
The second double dissolution wasn’t until 1951 and was triggered by a Commonwealth Bank Bill that the Menzies Government was unable to get through the Senate. After the election the Government returned to power with a majority in the Senate and was able to pass the Bill in the normal way.
In 1974 the third double dissolution occurred, with the Whitlam Government having accumulated six trigger Bills that had been held up by a hostile Senate. The Labor Government was returned after the election, but without a Senate majority. As such, Prime Minister Gough Whitlam requested that the Governor-General convene a joint sitting and all six Bills passed. This is the only time a joint sitting of the Houses has occurred in the history of our federation to break a deadlock between the Houses.
The 1975 Constitutional Crisis is the fourth and most famous double dissolution. The Whitlam Government, still facing a hostile senate, had built up 21 double dissolution trigger Bills when the Opposition decided to block supply of the Budget Bills in the Senate. The Governor-General John Kerr dismissed the Government and caretaker Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser asked Kerr to call a double dissolution using the Labor triggers. The Fraser Government was elected and as they had previously opposed all of the trigger Bills they did not reintroduce them after the election.
By 1983, the Fraser Government had built up 13 trigger Bills and asked the Governor-General to dissolve both Houses of Parliament simultaneously for the fifth double dissolution. Unfortunately for Fraser, the Labor Opposition Leader Bill Hayden had resigned his role just hours before the writs were issued for the election. The very popular Bob Hawke was elected Leader of the Opposition five days later and went on to win the election for Labor.
Our sixth double dissolution was called in 1987 and the trigger Bill was the introduction of the Australia card. Labor, led by Bob Hawke were returned to Government, but were still without a Senate majority. While the Government did have the numbers to pass the Bill in a joint sitting, the unpopular (and possibly flawed) Bill was abandoned.
And then we have the latest double dissolution with the disagreement between the Houses being resolved on one of the trigger Bills and there’s more to come on the other two Bills.
The Government’s success in passing the Registered Organisation Bill has meant that the percentage of time trigger Bills have passed after a double dissolution has risen up to 43%. In 28.5% of double dissolutions the Government lost power while another 28.5% resulted in the Government discarding the Bills.
With the disagreement between the Houses of Parliament about the Registered Organisation Bill being resolved, this double dissolution has been successful.
