The authors could be doing the 'cherry-picking' here. Before writing this garbage, they obviously didn't give any thought to the fact that choosing 'leadership' over democracy in one or two relatively innocuous areas may lead to undemocratic decisions in more important, dangerous areas connected with our liberty.

Our so-called 'leaders' have had the opportunity - and the warnings - to do something about our water problems for many years. They have not done so, and they now don't have a clue what to do.

It's well past time for them to be listening to the people. Now that they have started to actually consult, things just might get done.

I'll agree that it is a shame that the Toowoomba campaign lost, though I can't support the notion that referendums are a bad idea.

The population of Toowoomba has spoken - most of us believe in error, sure, but that was their decision, and they'll have to live with it.

At present, we have a Federal Government that has shown very little respect to the wishes of the majority - a majority that has been opposed to the sale of Telstra, and I suspect you'll find a majority that has been opposed to Workchoices.

And yet, on these vital issues, the government has run roughshod over the wishes of the people? referendums would have scuttled these propositions long before they became reality.
A government is merely there to enact the will of the people - when they go beyond this they, by definition, are following an agenda of their own.

It is a shame that Toowoomba voted no, but the solution is better education - and not just about this, but a more politically aware population, as you find throughout much of affluent Europe - not to scrap referendums.

Policy choices almost always involve a series of alternatives and trade-offs with other policies seeking funding or resources. By contrast, referenda are essentially limited to yes-no alternatives with little or no capacity to proritise them in respect to other issues. You can't run a country on that basis - cf Californian referenda which regularly support greater spending and lower taxes.

“A government is merely there to enact the will of the people - when they go beyond this they, by definition, are following an agenda of their own.”

TurnRightThenLeft, I don’t agree. Government is there to do the right thing by the people, in the present and in the long term.

All too often, the will of the majority is short-term. Depending on the issue, the will of the people is very likely to be strongly vested in their own interest, which is often not in the best interests of the whole community or nation.

Indeed it is one of the primary roles of government to balance what people want now with what society needs to remain healthy. This means addressing sustainability issues, which governments are notoriously bad at doing. But unfortunately, putting a whole lot more decisions in the hands of majority opinion is not likely to improve that.

However, neither do I agree with the authors that taking some issues to the public is “an abrogation of political leadership”.

Governments do NOT have mandates when they are elected, except perhaps on particular high-profile issues that they campaigned on, and over which a high portion of the populace cast their vote.

I can’t conceptualise a set of rules for taking something to a referendum or not. But some form of balance between the two is definitely required.

The trouble is, without strong guidelines, government is likely to “cherry-pick policy issues and just buck-pass the tough decisions to the people whenever it suits it.”

But then, maybe that’s not such a bad thing.

“Toowoomba made their decision let them live with it”. I agree, but it does create a dilemma, although not a bad thing. People aren't used to making decisions, in the past we had intelligent politicians who built infrastructure for the future, these fools just sell everything, then do nothing but subsidise their friends.

Once people get used to making decisions and how they'll effect them, we'll get better results. The best way would be to have all political candidates document their promises and agenda's, anything outside of that, would go to referendum. Also make them carry out their promises or get sacked with no pension or benefits. It may make the fools think first, or even better, give us some representation that's intelligent, knowledgeable and honest.

Its painfully obvious the current crop of politicians consisting of lawyers, academics, bureaucrats and fools needs cleaning out. They certainly have no idea's or intellect, nor it appears do those supporting them.

Toowomba people have the right to choose or refuse a substance that is intended for their ingestion. No government has the right to mandate a measure that takes away this right.

I agree that the solution is education - if the argument is strong enough, it will convince on its merits. As far as I can tell, recycled sewage is actually cleaner that the stuff currently supplied. To suggest that the poor plebs are incapable of understanding reverse-osmosis is an insult to the intelligence of the public - it's not rocket science and when properly explained, any fool could understand it.

The authors question whether there should be a vote to remove fluoride from Melbourne's water - YES, how would Melbournians vote knowing that their tap water is 'fluoridated' with an industrial waste product known to be contaminated with lead, arsenic and chromium among other nasties?

Parents already have the choice of whether to immunise their children or not, so that question is irrelevant.

Compulsory fortification of bread with folic acid should not go ahead because it restricts freedom of choice for the consumer, stats show that voluntary fortification in Australia has achieved similar results to those seen in the US where it is mandatory. In the case of folic-acid fortification, should an entire population be dosed in order to change the outcome of only of 40 births or less? (stats quoted from FSANZ draft proposal for mandatory fortification of bread with folic acid) This strikes me as remarkably lazy and inefficient policy.

Mandatory measures involving food, water and medication should be subject to referendum where proper access to information is available to all citizens. In matters of bodily integrity the government has no right to make decisions in violation of the rights of objectors.

A democracy requires the participation of the people and I believe that democracy is enhanced by referenda. Limiting public input in democratic procedure to simply voting for a limited choice of candidates every few years seems more akin to rolling a dice these days.

Alchemist, I have a feeling we may have been separated at birth.

"...have all political candidates document their promises and agenda's, anything outside of that, would go to referendum. Also make them carry out their promises or get sacked with no pension or benefits."

This says it all.

There is a fundamental crying need for an overhaul of the tired, corrupt and morally bankrupt version of democracy that we have created.

In theory, a representative democracy will smooth out the peaks and troughs of governance that are created by our natural tendency to short-termism and selfishness. In practice, it passes our individual power to a group of people who blatantly and demonstrably are in business only for themselves.

"More and more, politics is becoming the concern of a small caste. The distance between the political professionals and the normal people never ceases to widen." [attributed to a French sociologist; if he's reading this, my apologies for not finding out who he is, I'd like to shake his hand.]

A direct democracy has its faults too, of course, except in the pure Athenian model that allowed for the execution of public officers who abused their position. Now that was smart thinking.

So we should push hard for an Australian version of the Swiss system, where they have had roughly two referenda a year since federation without too many deleterious side-effects. As Alchemist points out, we should be able to i) hold our elected government to the promises they made in order to get there, under pain of - if not death, then certainly penury, and ii) allow the gaps to be filled by citizen-led, binding referenda.