The parliamentary Community Support and Services Committee today released its report into the Public Trustee (Monitoring and Advisory Board) Amendment Bill 2021 (the Bill).
The report recommends that the Bill be passed with the following amendments:
- New section 117ZD (Appointment Board Members) be amended to add another Appointed Board Member to the Board, with lived experience, increasing the number of Board members by one.
- Under new section 117ZD, subsection (2), the Minister must appoint at least five, but not more than six, appointed Board members.
- Under new section 117ZD, subsection (3)(a), in appointing the Board members, the Minister must ensure that at least one Board member has lived experience with impaired decision-making capacity, either in regard to themselves or others.
- New section 141B should be amended to ensure a separate annual report of the Board be provided to the Minister and tabled in the Queensland Legislative Assembly.
While these recommendations do not extend to the governance structure that Queensland Law Society recommended in its submission, the committee has recognised the need for an additional Appointed Board Member to balance the large number of Government appointments, and an added oversight mechanism that the Board table an annual report.
Brooke Thompson is a Queensland Law Society Policy Solicitor.
One Response
Public Trustee Bill.
What value is an appointee who has impaired decision making ability?