The Clerk of the Australian Senate is the head of the Department of the Senate, which is the parliamentary department supporting the work of the Australian Senate. The parliamentary head of the department is the President of 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 related to the exercise of the legislative power of the Commonwealth.
The Clerk's Office is directly responsible for:
In addition, the office exercises overall responsibility for, and quality control of, all procedural and administrative activities of the department.
The longest-serving Clerk was Harry Evans, who served 21 years 1988-2009. During his term, legislation was passed to limit the terms of the Clerk of the Senate and the Clerk of the House of Representatives to 10 years. The change in the law did not affect 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 has accountability obligations for the department to the Senate.