Independents for Canberra will seek to formally prevent the same person from being both chief minister and treasurer concurrently in the next Legislative Assembly.

Party leader Thomas Emerson said the group was responding to community concerns about the concentration of power in the Chief Minister’s office and would seek to make the change if it held the balance of power after the October ACT election.

“It is well known that very little happens in the ACT without the say-so of our current chief minister, who is also the treasurer,” said Emerson.

“Other Labor-Greens ministers seem to have little capacity to challenge ‘the Chief’.

“We’ve recently heard from the Greens environment minister that the cabinet is unwilling to deliver a more ambitious environmental policy. When the minister responsible for the environment can’t actually deliver better environmental outcomes, Canberrans are rightly asking, ‘Who is the cabinet, exactly?’

“Allowing the leader to also hold the purse strings risks threatening the integrity of our democracy.

“Canberrans want to be participants in a living democracy, not spectators to a perpetual power-sharing arrangement. People want to see an open debate where a genuine contest of ideas is not only possible, but encouraged.”