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The purpoce of cummonsing witnesses is to enable the Council of its committee to invostigate matters of public policy, not private affairo of citizens.
In case doubts sti
linger on the minds of some members of the public, I would like to assure then that under Clause 13 of the bill, a witness summonsed to give evidence or to produce any paper before the Council may rofuse to answer a question or produce any such paper on the ground that it is of a private nature and does not
The President may them excuse affect the subject of inquiry.
the answering of the question or production of the paper.
Further protection is given under Clause 14 (1) which says that a witness is entitled to the same right and privilege AB before a court of Lau, which includes non-disclosure of privileged information like that between a witness and his lawyer, and protection against self-incrimination.
My personal
Concern has been raiced over the power of the President in deciding whether or not a witness may be excused from answering a question or producing a paper,
It appears view is that someone has to decide on such matters. to be a sensible arrangomont for the President to make the decision. The President, who may be elected by Members of the Council in futuro, will be held accountable to Members for his exercise of power and should be trusted to act reasonably. he were to act in a wholly uncooponable way or beyond his powers, then the witheco pay, co I understand the proposed amendment to clauso 24, have zocourse to the court for redress.
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There is a suggestion that some kind of rules
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committee similar to the UK Parliamentary Committee on Privilege should to set up to bandle any complaints witnesses might wish to lodge after giving evidence. Although it is not necessary to write this suggestion into the bill itself, the recommendation morito come consideration in that it would give
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