Pericles

You obviously have no idea what it was like to try to find and up-date the law not long age before the internet existed. It was done by physically going to the Government Printing Office, buying the relevant Acts and later amendments, cutting out the repealed provisions, and pasting in the new amendments – literally with scissors and glue! This was called ‘getting your Act together’. This ritual had to be repeated any time you needed to rely on the Act or Regs.

It is far easier now with online technology to find updated law than it ever was, so you appear to be making objections based on nothing but idle sniveling. While this may satisfy, or delight, your intellect, it does nothing to tarnish the lustre of my wonderful new Constitution sir.

Besides, the difficulty of finding the law was never held to be any impediment to the sovereignty of *politicians*; so I see no reason why the much greater ease of doing it now should be any impediment to the sovereignty of *the people*.

The fact that you, in your abysmal ignorance of meeting procedure, think it would not be ‘practical’, is irrelevant. It is in practice the procedural foundation of Westminster democracy, not only in the legislature, but in the courts and administration as well.

By the logic of democracy, if the people decided to make votes known, or transferable, who are you to decide beforehand that they may not?; especially since, if the current representatives decided so, you would have no standing to stop them whatsoever.

What if a person decided to sell his vote? Well there’s nothing stopping him from selling it now. In fact if anything, it is easier now to vote using someone else’s name. All you’ve got to do is ‘vote early, vote often’.

Enforcement? Appointments? Governor.

The argument that the people are ‘a load of old cobblers’ is against democracy itself. Maybe they are. But the river cannot rise higher than its source. The ‘representatives’ can’t be in any better position, whether they do or do not represent the people.

as it stands, this proposal fails for no other reason than its contempt for women, manifest in the
denial that women and men make distinct contributions to decision-making wrapped in the male
author's derogatory banter towards women.
men who claim to speak on behalf of women forfeited credibility a century ago when women were
granted franchise.

Peter Hume,
Sorry to rain on your parade but, it does need a lot more thought.
So, in your mind, the fact that I have a computer and the internet my vote is more important, than er those who don't have internet. That would include the people next door and the people across the road, and much of Australia's outback?
We can't get ADSL 1 reliably and I'm in suburbs, ADSL 2 isn't even being considered by Telstra only copper exchange.

Then there's the secure line bit, when we develop one perhaps we can consider it.

What you are suggesting would (maybe) suit the people in or around Cities, that have the time or smarts to think of the questions let alone the answers e.g. Who is going to disseminate the information necessary to make an intelligent/informed decisions.

Do you really want people to have access to all of the defence information, diplomacy...?

I don't want the departments and the ministers to have more power than now. Let alone the likes of some super smart and manipulative extremists, business , special interests.

Your suggestion for laws and law changes would swamp the the system with ill-informed self interested requests.

Voluntary anything in Australia tends to mean the dedicated and the 'hard cases' not necessarily a true democratic reflection.
50%+1 of say 56% (23% of the population) isn't a democratic mandate it's an invitation for more corruption from vested interests/minority interests, able to afford media access.

How is a person who lacks competence or ignorant of how, what to do to with personal issues with government, with no local representative? Most of the reps electoral office time is taken up with these issues.

BTW: Up to date legislation with expert commentary is available in most academic libraries and/or publishers like CCH .

I humbly suggest that we fix the system we have, and not run off and half do, make one that is worse

Examinator
Yes there would need to be some public provision to enable everyone to access the law-making website. Perhaps each Post Office could have internet stations.

But when we consider the current costs of the palace of Parliament and all its hangers-on; and when we consider the high likelihood that the cost of government in general would fall under the new arrangement; it would be worth it.

So today’s technology is secure enough to tax us and to bank on, but not to let us vote?

Passing a law would require fifty percent of the entire electorate whether or not they voted on the proposal, not just of those who voted on it. 23% would never suffice.

The opportunity for abuse by vested interests and self-interested requests is much greater now than it would be under the new arrangement, because it would require fifty percent of the population to approve, most of whom would have to pay for the snouts in the trough.

As it is now, a small handful of people in private party meetings and preselections get to decide whether the entire population should pay a new tax, or pay for the politicians to bribe their pet favourites with benefits paid for by everyone else. What’s preferable about that?

Your objections assume business as usual. But it wouldn’t be, precisely because the thought experiment itself, proves that most political activity today does not in fact represent the will of the people at all. On the contrary, it actively misrepresents and exploits them.

No matter how unrepresentative such a direct democracy would be, it would never be anywhere near as unrepresentative as the status quo.

Neat sidestep, Peter Hume.

>>It is far easier now with online technology to find updated law than it ever was, so you appear to be making objections based on nothing but idle sniveling<<

We were discussing the making of laws, not the finding of them.

But it does raise an intriguing additional point. Do you believe that all Australians qualified to vote are able to fully understand the laws of the land? If so, you might like to explain why so many of us need to consult lawyers, for anything remotely legalistic?

>>The fact that you, in your abysmal ignorance of meeting procedure, think it would not be ‘practical’, is irrelevant.<<

It may well be irrelevant to you that your proposals are impractical - which they patently are, as I have pointed out - but their impracticality will prevent them from ever being adopted.

So much for "the lustre of [your] wonderful new Constitution sir."

>>if the people decided to make votes known, or transferable, who are you to decide beforehand that they may not?<<

That's deliberate misrepresentation of my observation. I merely pointed out the chaos that would ensue by making that transferability instant, without limitation, against each new amendment, that any citizen could propose, at any time.

I absolutely agree that it should be allowed. But the fact that you cannot see the impossibility of this process in action speaks volumes for your preference for neat-and-tidy theories over reality.

Talking of misrepresentation...

>>The argument that the people are ‘a load of old cobblers’ is against democracy itself.<<

It is your proposal that is a load of old cobblers, not the people.

http://www.worldwidewords.org/qa/qa-cob1.htm

>>No matter how unrepresentative such a direct democracy would be, it would never be anywhere near as unrepresentative as the status quo.<<

That is only true in theory.

If your suggestions result in no new laws being passed, due to the total impossibility of the proposal/amendment/50% scenario working at all, would this be a good, or a bad thing?

And would that be "representative", or "unrepresentative" of the will of the people?

I agree quite a lot with your proposals, Peter;

Our government is a shambles- anachronistic, inefficient and with very little accountability and representation.

Firstly I think Parliament should be abolished and simply replaced with separate and largely independent ministries of each field of governance- each with separate candidates all directly elected by the public (who have access to CIR to use at any time they choose to override them- in ANY field of governance, policy or law).
In this context a head of state, whose job it is to regulate any excesses or corruptions in other fields (and enforce broader representation on the individual ministries to ensure no minority interests dominate- MIGHT actually have a purpose- otherwise, abolish it and keep the money.

Voting SHOULD be voluntary in all forms, and will go forward regardless of how few people show up; So long the access to voting is fair and easy- if 10% are the only people that could be bothered showing up- tough for everyone who was too lazy- at least apathy will play less a part.

States- should simply be split up into new lines- actually representing the people and climate- sovereignty could go either which way.

Judiciary- sounds good.

How republican are republicans- my guess- the majority of republicans haven't put an ounce of thought into such proposals- the wishy-washy symbolism is the only focus.