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(Continued …)

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In fact, 1989 was the first time that a plaintiff was successfully able to invoke an express guarantee of a civil and political right in the High Court, in that case, s 117.

As Brian Burdekin, a former Australian Human Rights Commissioner, commented in 1994: “It is beyond question that our current legal system is seriously inadequate in protecting many of the rights of the most vulnerable and disadvantaged groups in our community” ».
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He concludes :

« Australian federalism is dysfunctional because it is based on rules that no longer match the reality of how power is exercised in Australia. Based on a Constitution in which the States were to be the master, Australia now has one of the most centralised systems of government in the world.

Our federal system was conceived in the 1890s, the age of the horse and buggy. We are in the mess we are today because our system of government has passed its used-by date. It was created in 1901 and has not been modernised to meet the challenges facing us a century later »
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US Professor William Rich concluded in a 1993 study of the Australian Constitution :

« The unsettling conclusion is that there is a large element of uncertainty in current understanding of Australian constitutional law which shakes the confidence of those who expect the law to protect values of consistency, stability, and predictability. »

http://www.austlii.edu.au/au/journals/UTasLawRw/1993/12.pdf
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You also wrote :

« … you give no comment to the risk of losing control to the elite … »
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I think that goes without saying, ALTRAV. I know no country in the world where government control is not in the hands of the elite. In my humble opinion, it always has been in the hands of the elite and always will be. Even if the so-called “inferior” or “lower classes” somehow manage to take over the political power, either they become the new “elite” or they are quickly ousted.
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Here are some articles you might like to peruse :

http://openresearch-repository.anu.edu.au/bitstream/1885/42078/2/Williams.pdf

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Section_116_of_the_Constitution_of_Australia

http://www.aspg.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/Session-1-Williams.pdf

http://www.naa.gov.au/collection/publications/papers-and-podcasts/australian-constitution/professor-george-williams.aspx

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Banjo:
Finally some courteous civil erudite informed debate and on topic! How refreshing!

Whose interests would be harmed by a root and branch review of our constitution? Which would likely conclude? It was written for another time and place, for us, by foreign folk!

It simply beggars belief that someone born here can somehow, by dint of convoluted complexity, in an now ancient parchment? Is somehow not Australian?!

And or that we would have so few, actual guaranteed in law rights!

And only applicable as a list of rights, one would think? If the thinking of the drafters was limited almost exclusively to drafting a constitution for a recent penal colony/British possession?

What if anything prevents us from simply sitting down and drafting a new and more appropriate one? Replete with a bill of irrevocable rights, which would of necessity include a citizen's initiated referendum. Which could have forced the resisted referendum? That would have dealt with the current ministerial malaise?

Moreover, applicable to this time and this place as it is, rather than how a few elites want it to be?
Alan B

Banjo, staying with what I have written previously, I do however ask a favour of any commentors who may be able to enlighten me as follows; I recall reading in the constitution some time ago, the passage where it stated that the courts were a 'people's court and that the judge was not there to pass judgement but simply to oversea proceedings in the interest of the accused. The part about being judged was 'by a jury of 12 of our piers'. It was not acceptable that the fate of a person lay in the hands of one unpredictable person. So my question is; Why are we 'judged' by one person today, rather than a jury of 12 of our piers? Why was this allowed to happen? I understand it would take up a lot of time and resources to have juries for EVERY trial, but that is the law or at least the way it should be as in the constitution. I find the law almost always acts more like a bully trying to prove a point rather than finding the truth. If the jury option is the norm then I would charge the legal profession with acting outside the law and moving to swiftly incarcerate them all. I'd like some feedback on this one. This'll be good!

We don't need a referendum, all that we need are politicians and their advisers that have a basic knowledge of English and who have read the Constitution.

calwest

Fred on this was much more interesting...

https://fredoneverything.org/diving-days-no-vast-political-importance/....

Is Mise, "We don't need a referendum, all that we need are politicians and their advisers that have a basic knowledge of English and who have read the Constitution"

Agreed. And they do have eligibility requirements spelled out to them, in briefings, document and verbal, by ever-patient public servants.

As has been said many times previously, if only they familiarised themselves with their own responsibilities as well as they run the magnifying glass over ways and means to stretch the envelope on their entitlements.

What about parliament attending to those 'wicked' problems though? Such as housing prices and rents have been forced up by Canberra's Ponzie immigration scheme and Chinese entrepreneurs buying up real estate around Australia. While on that, how many ex-pollies are making hay out of representing foreign billionaires while receiving that golden handshake courtesy of the taxpayer?