Section 39 of the Constitution of Australia provides that the

quorum A quorum is the minimum number of members of a deliberative assembly (a body that uses parliamentary procedure, such as a legislature) necessary to conduct the business of that group. According to ''Robert's Rules of Order Newly Revised'', the ...

of the

Australian House of Representatives The House of Representatives is the lower house of the bicameral Parliament of Australia, the upper house being the Senate. Its composition and powers are established in Chapter I of the Constitution of Australia. The term of members of the ...

shall be one third of the total number of

members Member may refer to: * Military jury, referred to as "Members" in military jargon * Element (mathematics), an object that belongs to a mathematical set * In object-oriented programming, a member of a class ** Field (computer science), entries in ...

, until the

Parliament In modern politics, and history, a parliament is a legislative body of government. Generally, a modern parliament has three functions: Representation (politics), representing the Election#Suffrage, electorate, making laws, and overseeing ...

otherwise provides. During the Convention debates in Adelaide,

Joseph Carruthers Sir Joseph Hector McNeil Carruthers (21 December 185710 December 1932) was an Australian politician who served as Premier of New South Wales from 1904 to 1907. Carruthers is perhaps best remembered for founding the Liberal and Reform Associa ...

suggested that one third was too high and suggested that a quorum of twenty would be sufficient, but his suggestion was rejected. With the passage of the ''House of Representatives (Quorum) Act 1989'', the Parliament has changed the quorum to one fifth of the total number of members, which with the current House of Representatives size of 150 means that at least 30 members are required for a quorum.

References

{{Constitution of Australia Australian constitutional law

See also

References