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A Pox On Both Houses

An Unusual Argument for the Abolition of Undemocratic Government

Peter Costello and company might be having a go at the States to get some attention, but they are now saying what everyone else is thinking. It is time to fix Australia’s Commonwealth-State arrangements. Ironically, for these changes to take place there will have to be significant constitutional change. Yes, the Australian Constitution must finally be updated to reflect a nation rather than a reluctant coalition of British colonies.

Despite the various colonies best efforts, the power to tax has given the federal government the whip hand, and in this sense, we have almost completed one stage of the necessary change. However, the significant advance on this "change for the better", is one that takes us into the realm of making a better democracy, not just a better federation.

I believe that it is necessary to reform the Australian system of government. I am speaking here as myself, Dr. Chesterfield-Evans, not as a spokesperson for Australian Democrats policy, although I will be very strongly pushing for this campaign to be taken up by my party.

Democracy is Change
It is my opinion that the democratic credibility of legislatures should be judged on the extent to which they allow more people to have more say in the way their lives unfold. A good government, in these terms is one that makes it possible to hear and recognise as many voices as possible.

In perpetuating a two-party system of government, we have effectively reduced the many voices of the Australian public to whispers that cannot be heard over the allegations of policy stealing. Given the amount of dissent on the Liberal and Labor parties’ back benches, it is also clear that the views expressed by party policy positions does not even cover the positions of those in the party rooms, much less those of the wider community.

By contrast, the extremely positive reaction of the public, to the level of debate in the recent “conscience” vote on the Therapeutic Goods Administration bill (RU486), is reflective of people’s desire to see the discussion of policy go beyond the party room and the party line. This was truly democracy in action. Many people expressed an interest in seeing much more of it. With some serious thought and action on electoral reform we could be doing just that.

Building one, big, democratic house
One thing that the Australian public seems very clear about is the ridiculous number of politicians we have accumulated. I believe it is possible to get better results from far fewer politicians, and I have been looking at where we would start cutting out the ‘fat’ in New South Wales.

New South Wales has close to 200 representatives. That’s 93 politicians in the lower house of state parliament, 42 in the upper house, and 62 in Canberra. We could start the process by combining the 50 federal electorates into 10 regional electorates, each of which would elect 5 members, who would take on the role of state government.

Each member would have portfolios to manage, and there would be no Opposition endlessly carping that they could do it better. There would also be no Cabinet making secretive decisions behind closed doors, for the greater glory of the party. No secret factions, no public grandstanding or blame shifting - merely government taking on their respective responsibilities. Every politician, a working politician! What a refreshing change.

What can we lose by changing the way we vote?
When I say ‘change the way you vote, I’m not asking you to switch parties, I’m asking you to support a voting system that will give us more diverse voices in government and more satisfaction that our differing opinions will be included in the discussion.

Using the right electoral system, we can have a much bigger say in how government is formed, and I am taking a number of developed democracies as my model. Argentina, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Luxembourg, Mexico, New Zealand are just the most developed nations using proportional representation rather than ‘majority’ government. If we want more democracy we need to be moving away from a voting system that delivered 100% of the power to parties which collected only 52% of the votes.

We’re further along than we think…
We must go boldly in our thinking, and I do not believe that there is any reason to avoid getting on with it…after all we’ve been talking about it for over 15 years now.
In 1990 the Economic Planning Advisory Council published a discussion paper that discusses the Commonwealth-State overlap of functions and regulations. The foreword to the paper states:

"The dividing line between Commonwealth and State jurisdictions has become increasingly blurred over time, particularly with the trend away from general grant funding towards specific purpose payments, which are subject to Commonwealth supervision and monitoring."

While both Federal and State governments have acknowledged a need for rationalisation, neither has been willing to specify which aspects of control they would be willing to give up. This long-term position has been very much in evidence this year, but I believe that it is high time to have this conversation in full. None of this is new.

We are not starting a new project in asking for a more coherent, accountable, transparent, and most importantly more democratic style of government, we are merely recognising that we are at another decision point in the long journey towards greater democracy. Everything points to it.

Yours,
Dr.Arthur Chesterfield-Evans M.L.C.(ACE)