What is being criticised as a fault is actually a strength of our system of government. Contrary to maudlin sentiment being expressed (including the faux sentiment from 'KRudd's' detractors), it was good to see the government members in both houses replacing a PM who had lost the confidence of parliament and from all accounts, a major section of the electorate.

It is time that PMs were held accountable and there is something Shakespearean in the tragic downfall of Mr Rudd because it was all of his own doing. Whatever crossed his mind to go it alone for a 'Big Australia'? He had no mandate and it should have been obvious to anyone who spend some time in the electorate that infrastructure was being severely strained and many people are straining under ramped up government taxes and fees, along with higher energy and water charges. What was he thinking of?

Public service mandarins do well in the bureaucracy because they can largely control their environment and critics are treated as performance management problems.

Perhaps now there will be more focus on the team and making use of all member's skills, even backbenchers. Halving the PM's department would be a good step forward. The trend towards a small executive group of the PM and a few anointed ones making most government decisions must be reversed. Perhaps Julia Gillard will take heed of that, but if she like any other PM should be held quickly to account too.

It is said that the cheapest parliamentarian costs over a million dollars a tear to keep, but no-one is certain how much, although there are 350+ public servants making sure the pollies get their pay and entitlements. Why shouldn't policitians be accountable and why shouldn't we expect immediate responsiveness and value for money from each and every one of them? Unfortunately the parliament is not always as good in ensuring that as it could be. If there is a problem that is it.

Last week I was chatting to someone online and it felt terrible to say, 'today in my country there was a political coup. We now have a new leader.'

Thank you for raising the topic of our unelected leaders. Incidentally the Premiers of Victoria and NSW have neither been electorally endorsed either.

Your suggestions to rectify this political blight, using examples from Britain and Canada is constructive and welcome.

Pubic participation for election of party leaders is a sound idea that would be a great boost to this flimsy democracy.

Sarah,
I think if a system of public voting for a party leader were introduced it would encourage an even more presidential type of electioneering rhan we are currently seeing. Rudds demise shows what can happen when a party elects a show pony instead of a working horse that leads a team. A government is a team, or should be, but in recent times the emphasse has been on the party leader and if he comes across good on TV and we hear little from Ministers that run the various portfilios. There is far too much concentration on the leader.

How is the current PM going to change much, as policy decissions should be made by the parliamentry party, not one person.

If you are serious about strenghtening our democracy then have a critical look at compulsory preferential voting.

While you are at it, consider the implementation of Constituants Initiated Referenda (CIR)

But you see both these reforms take power from the politicians, so to get them is very unlikely.

Cornflower misses the point of this article I think. The article does not criticise appointment of the PM by parliamentary caucus. What the article does do is to recognise that such a criticism is prevalent in the community, any cursory of political commentary over the last week highlights there is a large section of the community who feel excluded by what had taken place. And in a democracy the people are entitled to feel that way if they choose, and entitled to choose how their system works. Cornflower is entitled to think that what we have is fine (and to voice that fact and try and convince others of it), but if enough people disagree with him than it should change, that is democracy.

However, what the article is really about is criticising that, through all of the criticism of Rudd's replacement, all of it was directed at Ms. Gillard or various prominent people in the ALP. The criticism was basically that it was those individuals who had done the wrong thing, they shouldn't have exercised their powers even if they had them. But at no point was there any public commentary along the lines of "I'm unhappy with the system that allows this, and I think we should therefore change the system". None at all, that is incredible!

This highlights how Australians really are a defeatist bunch, who would prefer to consider themselves victims of people's actions rather than take ownership of what they perceive as a problem and start talking about ways of fixing it. This article only talks about election of political leaders by some form of election as a means of breaking this defeatist attitude and saying "hey, if you don't like it there are alternatives, but you'll only get them if you start talking about them". It is not, in fact, necessarily advocating for them.

There is so many things wrong with the way we vote in this country I'd go WAY over word count if I described it all in detail;
But some quick fixes (randomly laid out, with many different options.

Scrap parliaments, have directly-elected ministries of each field OR Make a carbon-copy of the swedish, Swiss or Austrian parliaments instead- which are more democratic and clearly more workable and successful.
Either way, Westminster is rubbish.

Abolish local reps- they should all come from a single nation-wide pool for ANYONE, ANYWHERE to vote for.

Remove compulsory preferencing and numbering from ballot papers

Abolish compulsory voting.

Second- implement binding CIR, exactly the way the Swiss do. This would also allow calling early elections.

Of course, it would require a gigantic attitude shakeup, voting for parties that might actually care about this kind of thing, and most importantly, for the many ignorant people who can only think about Westminster vs US Democracy vs some socialist autocracy to get an education.

There is no way one could tell me that the system is fine when my voting right stops short of electing one guy who lives near me whether I like him or not, who will elect his party (or less clearly, lack thereof if independent), and the PARTY that gets the most votes among the Parliament votes for the actual ministers- each accountable only to a few thousand of their local constituents, to rule the entire country- and not even be required to form a coalition so that the people the remaining 70% of the country actually voted for do nothing but warm seats and get paid insane wages to do so.

My only issue with the coup is that it was bloodless, so the dead may raise again, not enough of a solution for me personally.

Sarah, mere powerless observers, more like corum seeking sheeple as exampled by the Monty Python dialogue below.

Reg.. You're right. We could sit around here all day talking, passing resolution, making clever speaches, it's not going to shift one Roman soldier.
Francis.. So let's just stop gabbing on about it, it's completely pointless, and it's getting us nowhere.
PFJ.. Right.
Loretta.. I agree. This is a complete waste of time.
[Judith runs in, paniced.]
Judith.. They've arrested Brian.
PFJ.. What?
Judith.. They've dragged him off. They're going to crucify him.
Reg.. Right. This calls for immediate discussion.
Jud:ith.. What?
Rebel1.. Immediate.
Rebel2.. Right.
Loretta.. New motion?
Reg.. Completely new motion. Eh, That, ah. That there be, ah, immediate action,
Francis.. ah, once the vote has been taken.
Reg.. Well, obviously once the vote has been taken, you can't act on a resolution 'till you've voted on it.
Judith.. Reg, for God's sake, let's go now, please.
Reg.. Yeah, yeah. Right, right. In the, in the light of fresh information from ah, sibling Judith.
Loretta.. [Who's taking notes.] Ah, not so fast, Reg.
Judith.. Reg, For God's sake. It's perfectly simple. All you've got to do is to go out of that door now, and try to stop the Romans nailing him up. It's happening, Reg. Something's actually happening. Can't you understand!
[She rushes out in a rage.]
Francis.. Ooh. Ooh dear.
Reg.. Hello... and a litle ego-trip for the feminists.
Loretta.. What?
Reg.. Ah, oh, sorry, loretta. Aah. Aah, read that back, would you?

We form hierarchies to direct the cause, and we become” them”. The only true revolution is the whole country sticking their heads out the window and yelling "I'm as mad as hell and I’m not going to put up with it anymore".

Excellent conclusion Sahra John. "The real reason why reform has not been seriously considered by Australian political parties is that people don’t demand it. Ultimately, people get the government they deserve and expect, and if we want a better standard of politics, it is incumbent on us to go out and get it!"

And regarding Freedom of Speech, I wonder why my index page wont load. [photo Cape of Good Hope SA]. You know I am rather worried about the media, Google.com.au and all the filtering within government that is going on.... I am quite concerned about the spin, the polls and the way the "local" voice has been taken over by a certain sector in the mainstream.... In terms of Google search I believe it is not half as good as it used to be.

It is getting increasingly difficult to discuss anything about anything as a voter without being seen to be against one party or another. Not good for open democracy. Not good for education or opening critical thinking which is required before we can make an educated vote.

The problems are becoming so complex... overlapping it is a lot to handle if you are a concerned voter.

http://www.miacat.com/

The miacat.com index page now loads, it was my fault, and reflects the problem of working with open source software. So grateful to have it but it buggers your text sometimes and tricks you on some of the loading options. I tell you this just because sometime ago, during APEC before last and other times [similar] my page had been hacked. Not this time though. It is about the transparency.

As I said, Sarah John, some good points in your article and I hope after this leadership spill there will be heated discussion on the quality of our voting system.

Politics is hard enough without this kind of caper going on. I demand a clean-up and that politics becomes more honest and safer to be part of. Politics appears to do more to divide us then help us resolve issues.... at present.

www.miacat.com

This is a good article with some good suggestions, but I must agree with Cornflower - I am more encouraged by these recent events than discouraged.

What seems to have been overlooked in the debate surrounding Rudd's demise is the real reasons for it. I think partly this is because it's assumed that the decision was poll driven, or a cynical election ploy to instill a fresh face and wipe away the sins of the past. I think there's an element of this, but also more fundamental concerns within the Labor Party itself.

A large part of the reason why Rudd lost the confidence of the caucus was due to his style of leadership. The evidence is plentiful, and I won't waste space listing it all, but what it amounts to is the image of a man who micromanaged and exerted a strict and narrow control over the mechanisms of Government. This is within the context of a political landscape that has increasingly seen a centralisation of power within the executive. Our Democratic institutions are designed precisely to avoid this - and they have been eroding steadily since Whitlam took office. This 'coup' was encouraging because it showed that the intention of our Democratic system - a disbursal of power across Parliament - still remains, despite wider trends.