Secret and confidential

The Parliament (Integrity of Members) Act, passed in 1973, requires parliamentarians to declare their assets, liabilities and income on an annual basis but it does not allow the people who elected them to have access to these declarations.

Section 6 of the Act states: "Every member and every other person having official duty under this act, or being employed in the administration of this act, shall regard and deal with all information, declarations, letters and other documents, and all other matters relating to a statutory declaration, as secret and confidential, and shall make and subscribe a declaration to that effect before a justice of the peace".

According to the act: "Every person required under subsection (1) to deal with the matters specified therein as secret and confidential who at any time communicates or attempts to communicate such information or anything contained in such declarations, letters, or other documents to any person other than a person to whom he is authorised under this act ... shall be guilty of an offence and be liable on summary conviction ... in a Resident Magistrate's Court to a fine not exceeding $500,000 or to imprisonment for a term not exceeding three years or to both such fine and imprisonment".