Ministerial Responses

Where the committee writes to a minister it expects a response to be received in time to be considered by the committee and reported on while the bill is still before the Parliament.

If the committee has not completed its inquiry due to the failure of a minister to respond to the committee's concerns, Senate standing order 24 enables Senators to ask the responsible minister why the committee has not received a response.

The table below sets out the bills for which the committee has requested a response and the response has either not yet been received or has been received but the committee has not yet finally reported on it. If a bill is likely to be subject to debate in the Senate before the due date set by the committee, the committee expects the response to be provided prior to the debate.

Bills listed in red indicate that the response is outstanding.

Publication of ministerial responses

Where it may assist in providing timely scrutiny of bills before the Senate, the committee may choose to publish (in the table below) ministerial responses together with the committee's preliminary comments on those responses, prior to tabling its regular Scrutiny Digest.

All ministerial and other responses are published online with the relevant Scrutiny Digest after tabling. 

Bill Minister Committee comment Response due Response received
Aged Care Bill 2024 Aged Care Digest 13 of 2024 24 October 2024 24 October 2024
Anti-Money Laundering and Counter-Terrorism Financing Amendment Bill 2024 Attorney-General Digest 12 of 2024 03 October 2024 01 October 2024
Communications Legislation Amendment (Combatting Misinformation and Disinformation) Bill 2024 Communications Digest 13 of 2024 24 October 2024 24 October 2024
Criminal Code Amendment (Hate Crimes) Bill 2024 Attorney-General Digest 12 of 2024 03 October 2024  09 October 2024
Migration Amendment (Bridging Visa Conditions) Bill 2023
Migration Amendment (Bridging Visa Conditions and Other Measures) Bill 2023

Immigration, Citizenship and Multicultural Affairs Digest 15 of 2023
22 January 2024*  
Wage Justice for Early Childhood Education and Care Workers (Special Account) Bill 2024 Education Digest 12 of 2024 03 October 2024 03 October 2024

* Revised due date