Billie “As an example - at the moment the Victorian government is unable to upgrade the water infrastructure because one of the five federal authorities that oversee water hasn't approved the spending.”

If the state labor government had not diverted $100 million + a year from the available funds by imposing a “special dividend” on the water companies they own to collect our water rates (check the public accounts available from state treasury), there would be monies available to “upgrade the infrastructure” you speak of.

Blaming federal government for state labor political corruption in the area of financial management of water rates income is a lamentable and pathetic line of reasoning.

I look forward to your challenge to my point billie!

TRTL Crean tried and failed. Krudd will do no better. As for the big business end of town, they have a bet each way anyway, liberal or labor and maybe a dollar on the greens for all I know :-).

If the ALP promoted the “revolution” advocated in Klass Woldring's article, it would snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. Kevin Rudd (along with just about everyone else in the Labor Party) is too clever and too sensible to campaign for a revolution across government, the economy and everything else on the wish list. It's not 1972!

He is staking out a moderate reformist position, and that is why the government is so worried. If you put up a referendum to abolish the states, it would be defeated in every part of the country. Despite the problems of federalism, people would not want to hand even more power to the federal government. Similarly, a referendum to abolish the Westminster system would be overwhelmingly rejected.

Australia has one of the best systems of democracy in the world - a federal balance of power (weakened though it has been by the current Liberals), a strong connection between the executive and the legislature which holds the government accountable, stable government based on a House of Representatives, a Senate elected by PR and thus representative of minorities and normally not controlled by the government of the day, an independent public service and an independent judiciary.

Labor knows all this and it will campaign on reforms to IR, education and the environment, and they will be reforms that make sense to the average person, not a revolution that will drive moderate voters back into the arms of John Howard. One of Labor's biggest problems is a small group of extremists who, objectively speaking, keep working to keep him in power.

"Australia has one of the best systems of democracy in the world"
How so? Isn't democratic rights under attack and being eroded? How much say do people get in their everyday lives, their working life or the social conditions and social safety net? Who speaks for the masses in parliament - no one! Who votes for the downgrading of emergency services and treatment to hospital patients in a system that is already struggling to cope with demands. Nor do we vote for the destruction of essential services and jobs. Nor the destruction of the schools, dental services(what is now left of them)and privatisation of the ambulance system, the cuts to the fire brigades.Whilst taxes have been steadily rising. How is it democratic to drive the majority of the population towards increasing poverty? Whilst the politicians have their pockets in overflow mode.

Whilst reports point to global cancer rates on the increase, the governments move in to privatise and capitalise on chemo-therapy treatments that will bring in big bucks. This entails holding back or denying chemo-therapy treatment in the hospitals. Apart from the government who voted to put the boot into the disabled? Who voted for the loss of lives taking place because of the cuts in hospital wards and specialized staff? Or the many hospitals that have been closed down and given over to the private medical sector or to the real estate operaters. The governments have a strategy and that is to implement a crisis in the health system so they can privatise the health system and keep the taxes. A market is created by a long waiting list and then big money charged. It wasn't so long ago that the mental homes and asylums were closed down and many of the patients thrown onto the streets.
No these attacks are not democratic but authoritarian and take place through a welter of lies designed to cover up precisely, the criminality and disasterous repercussions that are not always immediately apparent! It is not for nothing that the politicians employ those soothing liars known as spin doctors.

Hi there,

Thank you for all your contributions! Just one response to Chris C's concern about putting up reformist proposals that would/might scare off the electorate which he/she assumes to be very cautious and conservative. I do not think that the electorate is that cautious or conservative but it may not be well informed. However, while an electoral strategy to win the election is one aspect of new policies the biggest question after winning the election should surely be: Let us tackle the very many shortcomings of public policy and the constitution robustly. If the ALP wants to win any more elections after the next the range of changes briefly discussed in my article, and more, should be taken up and fast. The piecemeal tinkering should stop. The ALP would have to show that the reformist spirit has recaptured the party. A substantial election victory, a real possibility, would provide the required mandate.

Klaas Woldring

Klaas,

I apologise for misspelling your name in my previous post.

I do think Australians are naturally cautious, and I think that makes sense. That is why the overwhelming majority of referenda to change the constitution have been defeated. Those who want change have to make the argument. Though, with the High Court's interpretation of the external affairs power and the corporations power, we do not need a referendum to alter the constitution any more.

I would like to see Labor adopt some new ideas too (e.g., a referendum instead of a double dissolution to break deadlocks between the Houses, indexing the lower tax thresholds and welfare phase-out thresholds to movements in the minimum wage, works councils), but if it hits the public with The Big List, it will lose. The argument has to be made over time.

Look at the madness of Julie Bishop's proposal for increasing the power of principals to bully, exploit and victimise independent thinkers while paying off the most sycophantic members of staff. This is not a new idea at all. It has been around a long time and has been drip-fed for years. That is why it is being taken seriously, even by the Labor Party. The fact that it has failed is irrelevant. Similarly, good ideas need some time to be accepted.

I do not include the end of federalism and the Westminster system as a good idea.

Johncee 1945,

People get what they vote for. If they don't like it, they can always form their own party and see how many others will vote for them.