Over to the House of Assembly
It is up to the House of Assembly to determine whether the public will get to hear evidence coming from the sitting of the Public Accounts Committee (PAC).
And today Opposition Leader and chairman of the Committee Mia Mottley laid a special report of the PAC which requested the House’s direction to Standing?Order 61 which stated “that no evidence shall be published in any format”.
Mottley, in laying the document, said there was potential for conflict between Standing Order 61 and the Public Accounts Committee Act which said the evidence of the PAC “shall be heard in public”.
“But for the avoidance of government … going to the lengthy and expensive route of seeking legal opinion, we have determined that we will seek the guidance of the honourable House of Assembly to determine whether this Standing Order can be waived as has been done in the United Kingdom and other Parliaments and if that is the will of the House then the [PAC] evidence can be published; if it is not the will of the House then the [PAC] evidence shall not be published until such time a report is laid in the … House.”
She said the consensus of the PAC was that it would be bound by what the House voted on.
“So at the appropriate time the House will have to take the necessary vote…” (JS)