AUSTRALIA: NSW Candidates Push for Participatory Democracy

Union militant to contest local elections

Alex Bainbridge, Sydney
6 September 2008

Source: http://www.greenleft.org.au/2008/766/39547

For construction union delegate Howard Byrnes, who is standing for the Socialist Alliance in the Marrickville council elections, the struggle over the privatisation of electricity, the alarming scientific news about climate change, and Labor’s cuts to services and wages have provided opportunities to talk up the need for a democratic, working-class party.

“Workers, including Labor Party members, are really angry at NSW Labor’s mad push to try to sell off the electricity service, and go for the ferries, lotteries, rail maintenance and prisons as well”, Byrne told Green Left Weekly. “All this has an impact on local councils because most ALP councillors will give in to their mates in state parliament, we can be sure of that.”

Until 2004, Marrickville council was dominated by the ALP under the leadership of the developers’ friend, Barry Cotter, who is now retiring. But when the Greens and independents won four seats each, Labor, with four councillors, wasn’t in the same strong position.

Byrnes said the ALP council candidates’ attempts to portray themselves as “local” and somehow different to the state ALP politicians will fall flat. “Their slogans — ‘fresh team’, ‘new approach’ — are hardly convincing when the ALP councillors have displayed the same arrogance as state Labor MPs. They are removed from the problems faced by ordinary workers, for whom local public services such as child-care, housing and transport all need a massive funding boost.”

Byrnes, a father of four, knows the difficulties of surviving on a modest wage. “Our assets have to remain in public hands”, he said. “Workers built this country and our taxes should pay for services to families and communities. Local governments should do a lot more to make the state government listen.”

The Greens, who may get another councillor elected, have been promoting their record in Marrickville, including cleaning up the Cooks River, more native bush projects, and introducing car-share parking spaces and traffic calming measures. They are also campaigning against developer donations.

A slander sheet titled “Report Card”, which was authorised by retiring councillor and ALP MLC Penny Sharpe and distributed to Marrickville households, accused the Greens of being financially irresponsible and blocking funds to roads, parks and streetscapes.

Also on the Socialist Alliance ticket for North Ward are long-term activists Jill Hickson and Pip Hinman, both of whom stood for council in 2004. The Socialist Alliance will preference the Greens, then Labor.

“We are campaigning for people’s power: for participatory democracy, not just representative democracy”, Hinman told GLW. “For instance, councillors should be subject to recall, the community should have a real say in how the budget is spent and there should be scope for a local referendum on any issue if 10% of residents want it.”

From: Australian News, Green Left Weekly issue #766 10 September 2008.

Australia: W.A. Politics Leaves the Public Cold

This piece from the state of Western Australia calls for more direct democracy to be brought to that state in the form of initiative and referendum in an attempt to bring more democracy and to diminish voter alienation. It is interesting to note that in order to back up his argument the author cites not the more typical examples of where initiative and referendum are functioning effectively, such as Switzerland, but instead points to the U.S.A. where it is practiced at the state level in many states, but not the federal level. People unaware that practices of direct democracy do exist at the state and local level in the U.S.A. typically think of the U.S. as being a republic with a representative democracy through and through. Where it does exists in the U.S. initiative and referendum is indeed functioning well, and we as always advocate it's implementation at the federal level as well. - Editor

Politics leaves the public cold



Opinion: 12-June-08 by Joe Poprzeczny

Source: http://www.wabusinessnews.com.au/story/2/63684/Politics-leaves-the-public-cold

The Carpenter government's bungled handling of the lobbying sector and the opposition's failure to suggest constructive reforms suggests Western Australia's major parties are unlikely to ever offer a steady stream of competent public policy administrators.

And that's almost certainly because the party machines attract and cultivate individuals who not only lack basic administrative skills, but show no desire to learn and master them.

None of the party machines truly values individuality, preferring instead to constantly emphasise party loyalty, that is, follow leaders who simply criticise the other side.

It's always about factions, wheeling and dealing for personal gain, and other careerist considerations that so easily sneak in ahead of what's good for WA.

The predominance of such over-arching and stultifying characteristics has meant those who value good governance and despise such behaviour avoid politics.

So many talented individuals prefer instead to make money in the private sector and embark on hobbies and other interests.

Compounding this is the easily ignored tendency by politicians to high-tail parliament for other careers following relatively brief terms in government.

Here one must name names.

Consider, firstly, the Liberal side.

Why did such relatively young men as Barry MacKinnon, Bill Hassell, and Richard Court, leave parliament when they did?

One doesn't have to be Copernicus to realise that, if they'd remained, their party would today be begging them to be leader.

And if any of these had been leading their party to the February 2004 election - which Labor won by just more than 1,000 votes - that man would now be premier.

Nor can the Labor side be ignored.

State Scene has no doubt that if former deputy-premier Mal Bryce, one-time senior Labor minister Keith Wilson, or former Labor leader Ian Taylor, were still MPs, they'd be exceptionally strong contenders for executive posts.

So, here are six individuals with well over 100 years of parliamentary and administrative experience. Both individually and together, they could offer markedly better governance and public behaviour than we're presently receiving.

Yet all departed the political scene well ahead of time.

Why?

Is it because the MPs' superannuation is too generous?

Is it because experienced MPs get thoroughly sick and tired of the low standard of political participation in their respective parties which, unfortunately, are now subsidised by taxpayers, thereby making them even less responsive to voters?

Is it because our entire parliamentary system of governance is stale, uninspiring and not truly democratic?

State Scene suspects it's all these plus several other less obvious reasons.

Surely it's time those controlling our dilapidated party machines got together and launched an informal - non-taxpayer funded - inquiry into this crucial question.

If that's not done, WA will continue to bungle along in the way it's been doing for decades, lurching from one administration to another. Then, after each four- or eight-year period, voters are forced to revert to a former unresponsive dilapidated team now manned by more inexperienced individuals.

And so on, and on.

For that reason, State Scene has urged that parliament should look at introducing a far greater degree of democracy right across public life.

Starting at the top, this would mean electors having at least a confirmatory vote on who becomes governor, after which Buckingham Palace would be asked to give its nod if Australia remains a monarchy.

This could be done with premiers continuing to nominate governors but the chosen individual would not take up the vice-regal post until after there had been a binding state-wide confirmatory referendum.

Such a procedure would compel premiers to seek out people acceptable to a majority of voters at the ballot box.

If a nominee failed to attract 50 per cent plus one vote, the premier would need to go back and try again.

We also need to thoroughly overhaul the way judges are appointed.

Presently, attorneys-general get a bright idea on who they'd like to put onto the bench and that's basically it - that person becomes a judge.

Why aren't such nominees compelled to face an upper house judicial committee where they're thoroughly quizzed before their nomination is confirmed or rejected by a vote of the entire Legislative Council?

That's how US Supreme Court judges are appointed.

If that happened here many of the ongoing silly, indeed, quite outrageous, decisions our judiciary hands down would more likely be expunged.

Too many judges are living on cloud nine.

Unfortunately, our upper house is too lazy and unimaginative to opt for this reform.

And there's also a desperate need to infuse greater voter involvement into lawmaking in general.

The only way to do this is by adopting Swiss-system direct democracy, which subjects politicians to constant oversight by voters.

All legislation that would be passed by the parliament under such an arrangement would firstly sit on the lower house's table for 100 days before being sent to the governor for Royal Assent.

During those 100 days, between 3 and 5 per cent of electors would be required to sign a petition calling for a state-wide binding referendum to decide the bill's fate.

State Scene's guess is that this would probably spark two or so referendums a year.

Such a direct democratic procedure would firstly force politicians to be in regular consultation with voters in ways they've never done, in an attempt to avoid a referendum on a particular bill being called.

Such close and ongoing voter consultation would automatically lead to better and more responsive law making.

There would undoubtedly be instances where the required number of citizen signatures would trigger referendums, which would be good since the adjudication would fall upon the people to democratically decide what would or would not be the law of the land.

Among other things, this would mean our dullard party machines could join the fray to compete for support for laws.

Suddenly these dull entities would begin becoming more relevant instead of remaining inward-looking conspiratorial and careerist machines.

Variants of direct democracy exist in a large number of American states.

Direct democracy places and keeps elected representatives in a secondary or a more responsive role permanently since bills deemed, initially by a minority of voters, to be unacceptable could come to referendum involving all voters.

Not widely known in Australia is the fact that voters in 18 American states have the right to bring on constitutional amending initiatives; voters in 21 American states have the right to actually initiate laws that politicians either refuse or don't think of enacting; and voters in 24 American states can veto laws politicians seek to impose upon all electors.

Direct democracy transforms voters into bosses - with politicians having a secondary but still important role to play.

The absence of all this was recently noted by an Australian academic who wrote: "Australia's party system still echoes the dying call of the old European class wars.

"Too many ALP branches are private clubs dedicated to the production of endless resolutions deploring everything (or expressing woolly solidarity with phony liberation movements).

"And many Liberal party meetings, so rumour has it, resemble Masonic lodges dedicated to the interests of local small business people.

"No wonder most Australians (other than property developers and union functionaries) avoid [political] parties like the plague."

Oh, how true.

Senator On-Line: Australia's Internet Based Direct Democratic Party

An initiative is underway in Australia which has led to the creation of a new political party called Senator On-Line. The party is unique in that it is the first internet based party in Australia, and it seeks to elect representatives to office who have pledged to vote according to the will of the people, and not their own personal views. this will be achieved by an internet based popular poll being held for each bill brought before the parliament. The result of the poll will determine the way the Senator On-line senator votes on the bill, effectively creating a mixed direct/representative democracy in which the senator is merely a proxy representative executing the expressed will of the people. The Senator On-line party was officially registered and participated in the 2007 Australian election receiving over 8000 votes even though they entered only 2 months before the election. This bold experiment, if it succeeds, should certainly lead us to consider the possiblity of a similar initiative being implemented in the U.S.A. as a transitional step towards a more direct democratic system. - Editor

Senator On-Line is Australia's Only Internet Based Democratic Political Party

Source: http://www.senatoronline.org.au/

Senator On-Line is not aligned to any other political party… it is neither Liberal nor Labor.

Senator On-Line (‘SOL’) is a truly democratic party which will allow everyone on the Australian Electoral roll who has access to the internet to vote on every Bill put to Parliament and have its Senators vote in accordance with a clear majority view.

How did SOL go in the 2007 election?

Senator On-Line was approved shortly before the 2007 federal election was called. Senate counting continues and given we had only around two months to develop public awareness, spent no money on newspaper or TV advertising, we've received over 8000 votes nationally so far - a reasonable result and better than the national votes for four other parties.

We had over 1000 people who registered with us in the two months and emails offering support are continuing to roll in. We look forward to contesting the next election.

JOIN IN THE ELECTION COMMENTARY AND COMMUNITY DISCUSSION ON:

http://www.youtube.com/senatoronline
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=5343394525
http://www.myspace.com/senator_online
http://www.bangthetable.com/senatoronline

When a SOL senator is elected a web site will be developed which will provide:

1. Accurate information and balanced argument on each Bill and important issues


2. The vast majority of those registered on the Australian Electoral roll the chance to have their say by voting on bills and issues facing our country


3. A tally of all votes which will then count in Parliament


4. Each person on the Australian Electoral roll will be entitled to one vote and only be allowed to vote once on each bill or issue.


5. SOL senators will have committed in writing to voting in line with the clear majority view of the SOL on-line voters.


6. Senator On-Line will enable broader community involvement in the political process and the shaping of our country.

If you like the concept, please register your details and tell others about SOL.

This is the pre-election website. To find out what will be available when SOL wins a Senate seat click here.