The bottom third shows excerpts from bill definitions. Bills become Acts of Parliament and therefore laws, which are administered by government departments. Making a law in the Australian Parliament This fact sheet explains the law-making process in the Australian Parliament. View with description and copyright information. Slide 1 details. Path of a bill A bill can only become a law if it is passed by a majority vote in the Senate and the House of Representatives.
Origins of bills Bills can start in different ways: A government department may advise its minister about a specific problem that exists. The minister may then arrange for a bill to be drafted to fix the problem.
Community groups, businesses or lobby groups may be interested in changing or improving a specific area of Australian law. They can approach members of parliament with suggestions for bills. Political parties have their own ideas about how Australia should be governed. In Parliament, parties introduce bills which aim to put their ideas into action. The Parliament can set up a parliamentary committee to examine a current issue. If the issue requires action, the committee may suggest that a bill be introduced.
History The law-making process used in the Australian Parliament comes from the practices of the British Parliament, developed over many centuries. The usual path of a bill. Parliamentary Education Office peo. In the House of Representatives a bill goes through the following stages: 1st reading—the bill is introduced to the House of Representatives. House committee optional stage —public inquiry into the bill and reporting back to the House.
Consideration in detail optional stage —members discuss the bill in detail, including any changes to the bill. The bill is passed in the House of Representatives and sent to the Senate.
In the Senate a bill goes through the following stages: 1st reading—the bill is introduced to the Senate.
Most bills generate support and opposition from a variety of groups. Find out who these groups or individuals are by calling the author's office where lists of the letters and phone calls received on each bill are kept. A good strategy is to align yourself with the groups that hold your position and work together to talk to the members of the committee BEFORE the bill is heard. Keep your letters and discussions with the legislators short and to the point.
When testifying before the committee, first state your name and the organization that you represent or indicate that you are a concerned citizen and state where you live. The Members of the committee will be interested to hear what you have to say and usually do not grill individual citizens who testify in the same way that they do lobbyists.
Keep your testimony short and to the point. If the bill has a fiscal impact or a state cost, it will be heard in either the Senate or Assembly Appropriations Committee. At this point, you should inform the Members of the committee why you support or oppose the bill based on a fiscal argument. The finance committees are concerned about fiscal impact and not policy considerations. Members of the fiscal committees read these analyses before they vote.
These analyses are available on the Internet. If you believe that the numbers or the fiscal impact of the bill are not correct as reported in these analyses, you should prepare your written comments before the committee meets. Your written material should be available to pass out to the committee Members at the hearing where you present your testimony.
Third Reading is the last stage that a bill goes through in the house of origin before it passes to the second house to go through the committee process all over again.
On Third Reading, the author presents the bill for passage by the entire house. Most bills require a majority vote it must pass by 21 votes in the Senate and 41 votes in the Assembly , while urgency measures and appropriation bills require a two-thirds vote 27 in the Senate, 54 in the Assembly. At any time during the legislative process the bill may be amended, either in committee or on the Floor. After the amendments have been submitted to the author, the bill goes to another printing to reflect the changes that have been made.
The Senate or Assembly History records the dates when a bill has been amended. Amendments can be substantial or technical and may affect your position on the bill. Amendments should be followed very carefully. Senate, and the President. Laws begin as ideas. These ideas may come from a Representative —or from a citizen like you. Citizens who have ideas for laws can contact their Representatives to discuss their ideas. If the Representatives agree, they research the ideas and write them into bills.
When a Representative has written a bill, the bill needs a sponsor. The Representative talks with other Representatives about the bill in hopes of getting their support for it. Once a bill has a sponsor and the support of some of the Representatives, it is ready to be introduced. In the U. Only Representatives can introduce bills in the U. House of Representatives.
When a bill is introduced in the U. House of Representatives, a bill clerk assigns it a number that begins with H. A reading clerk then reads the bill to all the Representatives, and the Speaker of the House sends the bill to one of the House standing committees.
When the bill reaches committee , the committee members—groups of Representatives who are experts on topics such as agriculture, education, or international relations—review, research, and revise the bill before voting on whether or not to send the bill back to the House floor.
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