Canberra - Governance

Governance

Outside Canberra, the Australian Capital Territory has no settlements larger than a village. The Australian Capital Territory Legislative Assembly performs the roles of both a city council and territory government. The assembly consists of 17 members, elected from three districts using proportional representation. The three districts are Molonglo, Ginninderra and Brindabella, which elect seven, five and five members, respectively.

The Chief Minister is elected by the Members of the Legislative Assembly (MLA) and selects colleagues to serve as ministers alongside him or her in the Executive, known informally as the cabinet. Whereas the ACT has federally been dominated by Labor, the Liberals have been able to gain some footing in the ACT Legislative Assembly, and were in government for just over eight of the Assembly's 21-year history, mostly during a period of six and half years from 1995 and 2001, when Labor won power. At the 2004 election the Australian Labor Party, headed by then Chief Minister Jon Stanhope, won nine of the 17 seats and formed the ACT's first majority government, but after the 2008 election was forced into minority government with the Greens.

As almost all of the ACT's population lives in Canberra, political trends for both areas are closely aligned. The ACT was given its first federal parliamentary representation in 1949, when it gained a seat in the House of Representatives, the Division of Australian Capital Territory. The ACT member could only vote on matters directly affecting the territory. In 1974, the ACT was allocated two Senate seats. In 1974, the House of Representatives seat was divided into two.

A third was created in 1996, but was abolished in 1998 because of changes to the regional demographic distribution. Both House of Representatives seats have mostly been held by Labor, usually by comfortable margins. Labor has polled at least seven percentage points more than the Liberals at every federal election since 1990, and their average lead since then has been 15 percentage points. The ALP and the Liberal Party of Australia have always held one Senate seat each.

The Australian federal government retains some influence over the ACT government. In the administrative sphere, most frequently this is through the actions of the National Capital Authority which is responsible for planning and development in areas of Canberra which are considered to be of national importance or which are central to Griffin's plan for the city, such as the Parliamentary Triangle, Lake Burley Griffin, major approach and processional roads, areas where the Commonwealth retains ownership of the land or undeveloped hills and ridge-lines (which form part of the Canberra Nature Park). The national government also retains a level of control over the Territory Assembly through the provisions of the Australian Capital Territory (Self-Government) Act 1988. This federal act defines the legislative power of the ACT assembly.

The Australian Federal Police (AFP) provides all of the constabulary services in the territory in a manner similar to state police forces, under a contractual agreement with the ACT Government. The AFP does so through its community policing arm, ACT Policing (Australian Capital Territory Police).

People who have been charged with offences are tried either in the ACT Magistrates Court or for more severe offences, the ACT Supreme Court. Prisoners were held in remand at the Belconnen Remand Centre in the ACT but usually jailed in New South Wales. The new prison, Alexander Maconochie Centre, was officially opened on 11 September 2008 by Jon Stanhope, the Chief Minister. The total cost for construction was $130 million. Courts such as a Small Claims Tribunal and a Family Court exist for civil law actions and other non-criminal legal matters.