ACT opposition to call for select committee to examine COVID response

Opposition Leader Elizabeth Lee will move a motion in the Legislative Assembly calling for the committee to investigate any health, financial and other matters related to the government's response.

The ACT Legislative Assembly will sit on Thursday for the first time since early-August. A number of matters will need to be considered around delays to the parliament's sitting calendar and the territory's budget.

A select committee into the ACT government's COVID-19 response was developed last year during the first lockdown. Ms Lee will call for the new committee to comprise two members nominated by Labor and the Greens and two members nominated by the Liberals.

"We are currently in a position where ordinary citizens have been required to put enormous faith in government decisions," Ms Lee said.

"These government decisions, we acknowledge must be made in the face of a once-in-a-generation global health pandemic, can cannot be an excuse for a cover to diminish our strong democratic values."

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The ACT Humans Rights Commission called for the committee to be re-established in a letter to Ms Lee, Chief Minister Andrew Barr and ACT Greens leader Shane Rattenbury.

"Recognising that significant public health restrictions will remain necessary for some time to come yet, we urge the ACT Legislative Assembly to reconvene a select committee to monitor the issues, impacts and measures arising from the current outbreak," the letter said.

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