Thread: Australian Politics.

Here's the definition of federal government from the .gov.au website to chew on....

The legislature, also known simply as parliament, is made up of democratically-elected representatives from around Australia.
These representatives meet at Parliament House in Canberra to discuss legislation and make laws for the benefit of the nation. The issues that they can make laws on are defined by sections 51 and 122 of the Constitution.
The Commonwealth Parliament comprises two separate chambers:

• the House of Representatives (or 'the lower house')
• the Senate (or 'the upper house')

The House of Representatives has 150 members, each representing a different area of the country ('electorate'). Each electorate has roughly the same number of registered voters within its boundary, meaning that states with larger populations have more electorates and therefore more representatives in the House.
The Senate is composed of 76 members. Unlike the House of Representatives, membership of the Senate is divided evenly between the states. Each state has 12 senators, and the Northern Territory and the Australian Capital Territory have 2 senators each. The Senate was established this way to ensure that the larger states could not use their majority in the House of Representatives to pass laws that disadvantaged the smaller states.
The Constitution is silent on the role of political parties in parliament. It does not make any reference to a government party, an opposition party or minor parties, or to roles like Prime Minister and Leader of the Opposition. These are conventions that have been adopted to assist the smooth operation of the legislature.

HH.

I like this bit...

The Constitution is silent on the role of political parties in parliament. It does not make any reference to a government party, an opposition party or minor parties, or to roles like Prime Minister and Leader of the Opposition. These are conventions that have been adopted to assist the smooth operation of the legislature.

Based on this we could get rid of the political party system without requiring a change to the constitution. You would then make each MP Independant and require alliances and collaboration across MPs to drive through change.

Unfortunately I think this would be a little chaotic and there is a need for "leaders" to bring people together otherwise nothing will get achieved.

On the flip side of that the current MPs are so consumed by self interest and re-election that they stab each other in the back (within parties) to try and ensure survival rather than channelling that energy into delivering change that benefits the country and its people.

This I think is the biggest challenge how do we motivate politicians to work towards beneficial change and delivery rather than focusing the majority of their effort on political survival?

HH.

Partyless parliments to a greater or lesser extent have happened. Australia's first few PM's were neither liberal nor labor. Thing is parliments and similar bodies tend towards parties/coalitions/allegences because combining voting power helps the individuals within the group achieve their agenda. It also happens to lead to stability, but I suspect that's a result not a motive.

I keep a copy of the constitution at home and it's available online. Unfortunately it's hard reading for a non lawyer but it's worth a look. There are many unexpected (for me) things in it. New Zealand is specifically mentioned as a potential state in the federation for example. The only right it explicitly garantees is free trade across state lines, which is why such things as pornography and gun law differences between states are virtually unenforcable. Of course it also says explicitly that only the federal government can levy taxes and look how effective that is....

Interesting thoughts Damian, so how do you propose that these councillors get elected?

Each party puts up a number of candidates, up to 15 or whatever, the party with the most votes gets all 15 candidates? Or would we for the first time in our history have a true democracy and have proportional representation?

Wont comment, I've run out of Stematil

Yes, in theory there is no need for political parties as monolithic entities. The person who can form a government would be invited by the monarch to form a parliament. he/she didn't even have to have a majority of parliamentarians behind him/her. They just had to make it work. If they couldn't someone else would be asked.
The party system has short-circuited this process to a great extent and advertising with its massive costs has done the rest.
Cheers,
Jim

I'm all for monarchy's or dictatorships myself. The problem with elected govt is they have one thing on their mind for 3/4 years, getting re elected. No long term plans or major works, if there's no immediate political gain to be had, then only build a 2 lane tunnel.

Obviously I don't really support a dictatorship but I'm sure you get my point.

Looks like the Gullard has put the cat among the pigeons Australias first female prime minister,can't make a bigger mess of things than the blokes ,or can they?

Originally Posted by Big Shed

Interesting thoughts Damian, so how do you propose that these councillors get elected?

Each party puts up a number of candidates, up to 15 or whatever, the party with the most votes gets all 15 candidates? Or would we for the first time in our history have a true democracy and have proportional representation?

Many years ago we had a system to elect senators that gave all the seats to the group with the most votes. Lead to a big disparity between the balance of senate and reps seats. Probably wouldn't create instability in a single tier system like these councils.

Or we could have a system like that which elects the senate now, where you need ((no of councillors)/(number of voters))+1 to win a seat then votes over that number are redistributed to second preference by proportion of total votes for that candidate and so on until the seats are filled.

Or you could have preferential voting like the lower houses, or first past the post.

Personally I favour wards with first past the post.

Democracy doesn't provide satisfying or efficient government. It produces a compromise that everyone can live with, or is supposed to. The preferential voting system best achieves that outcome, but as always the quality of representation you get is reliant on the electorate being engaged.

Be aware that my personal opinions are not always in step with accepted political theory. One of the most glaring examples of this is popular democracy. Those who study politics discard it, I don't. I believe popular democracy is perfectly viable.

The big issue for me is high resolution representation. I believe very strongly that if we had strong local government and less distraction by the higher level of government we could make Australia what Australians want it to be, one locality at a time. I believe that part of the reason the key players in th electorate are disengaged is that they feel unable to really affect outcomes at state and federal level, and that our current local government is so ineffective that no one bothers to pay attention to them. I believe that if we had strong relevant accountable local government Australia would get better instead of worse. Closeness to candidates also undermines the party system.

These are precisely the reasons the major political players don't want reigonal government. It works for the people, not for vested interests (to use the popular term).

Originally Posted by notenoughtoys

I'm all for monarchy's or dictatorships myself. The problem with elected govt is they have one thing on their mind for 3/4 years, getting re elected. No long term plans or major works, if there's no immediate political gain to be had, then only build a 2 lane tunnel.

Obviously I don't really support a dictatorship but I'm sure you get my point.

This is a really strong point of course. (forthcoming elections, not dictatorships) Everyone, especially the media, want nescafe solutions when the reality often is that policies often don't come to fruition for a longer time period than the gap between elections. The benefits of economic policies usually fall into this category and are reaped by the next government.
The problem isn't just politicians with an attention span that doesn't see beyond the next election but the electorate themselves (not us far-seeing individuals of course) who can't see through the hype and understand what is possible and what is a sensible time frame.
Cheers,
Jim

Originally Posted by acmegridley

Looks like the Gullard has put the cat among the pigeons Australias first female prime minister,can't make a bigger mess of things than the blokes ,or can they?

Also the first non-married PM and probably the first atheist PM as well..

But all that is nothing as it does not make you better or worse...

Deputy PM's don't get the same scruitiny as PM's. She's managed to look pretty good until now but I will be interested to see how she goes from here.

Wikipedia amazes me. Within seconds of the announcment the pages were updated.

RC unfortunately a lot of stuff that has no bearing on how good you are at the job gets thrown into the mix at election time. Our system is neither policy nor performance driven, it's perception driven and that is directed by media and politicans in concert.

The head of the AWU was on Lateline last night claiming the Education revolution as a Gillard win.

I think the whole thing is a disgusting example of politicians being focused on nothing else except re-election, it sickens me to see them stabbing each other in the back just like the Liberals did to Turnbull, the whole system isn't worth a #### and neither are any of the participants.

HH.

I won't dispute your assessment of politicians, but I would point out that the PM's position relies on concensus, he is not a president, and when incumbent PM's get rolled in aus it's invariably because they have pushed their supporters beyond the limit. Opposition leaders also.

Turnbull afronted a lot of strongly held positions of a lot of coalition members and failed to get traction in the polls into the bargain. Rudd was famously exclusive of not only caucus but the ministry bar the gang of 4. You ignore and humiliate people long enough and they will stop being your friend. Add poor polls and your toast...

They are not nice and this isn't atypical, but it's not baseless either. Fraser's machinations in the 60's and early 70's were harder to justify, as were the too and fro between Howard and Peakcock in the 80's, and, well, how far do you want to go back

I wonder if Gillards foreign birth will come into it ? BTW she's the second athiest PM, Hawke...