Clerk of the Australian Senate

The Clerk of the Australian Senate is the head of the Parliamentary Department of the Senate, which is the parliamentary department supporting the work of the Australian Senate. The Clerk is responsible to the President of the Senate who in turn is responsible for the department to the Senate.

The Department of the Senate provides the Senate, its committees, the President of the Senate and senators with a broad range of advisory and support services.

The Clerk is directly responsible for:

  • provision of high quality procedural and constitutional advice to senators in respect of the operations of the Senate and its committees
  • provision of secretariat, advisory and administrative support to the Procedure Committee and the Committee of Privileges
  • production, amendment and updating of Odgers' Australian Senate Practice
  • production and dissemination of material relating to the work of the Senate and its committees to the widest possible audience
  • corporate leadership of the Department of the Senate
  • secretariat services for the Inter-Parliamentary Union.

In addition, the office exercises overall responsibility for, and quality control of, all procedural and administrative activities of the department.

Since 1999, the terms of the Clerk of the Senate and the Clerk of the House of Representatives have been limited to 10 years. The change did not apply to the incumbents.

The Department of the Senate is not part of the Executive Government of Australia, being instead responsible to the President of the Australian Senate, who in turn is responsible for the department to the Senate.

Clerks of the Senate
# Name Term in Office
1Edwin Gordon Blackmore CMG1 April 1901 – 30 June 1908
2Charles Broughton Boydell1 July 1908 – 31 December 1916
3Charles Gavan Duffy CMG1 February 1917 – 27 August 1920
4George Henry Monahan CMG28 August 1920 – 31 December 1938
5Robert Arthur Broinowski1 January 1939 – 30 November 1942
6John Ernest Edwards1 December 1942 – 20 July 1955
7Rupert Harry Colin Loof CBE21 July 1955 – 14 August 1965
8James Rowland Odgers CBE16 August 1965 – 8 August 1979
9Roy Edwards Bullock OBE9 August 1979 – 15 July 1981
10Keith Oscar Bradshaw29 October 1980 – 15 July 1982
11Alan Ritchie Cumming Thom16 July 1982 – 15 February 1988
12Harry Evans17 February 1988 – 4 December 2009
13Dr Rosemary Laing5 December 2009 – 8 March 2017
14Richard Pye9 March 2017 –

The longest-serving Clerk was Harry Evans, who served 21 years.

See also
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