No mention of the decision by the new Jamaican PM, Mrs. Portia Miller to move towards a Republic in the Australian media. Jamaica has been a Commonwealth country with Dominion status for 50 years now and has given notice that they will move towards a Republic.

You can see it here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N489pQS8dMM

Expert Panel on Constitutional Recognition of Local Government,

Department of Regional Australia, Regional Development and Local Government.

Commonwealth of Australia.

Dear Panel members,

This is a submission from a group of people who strongly favour the complete rewriting of the Australian Constitution and the replacement of the federation by a two and a half tier of government based on national and local government levels and a layer of mezzanine type regional councils further explained in a webpage of our website, attached separately.

 While welcoming the proposals and options to strengthen local government by recognising it in the existing archaic Australian Constitution as a step in the right direction we wish to indicate our awareness of the enormous difficulties in the way of amending the existing Constitution. This submission will therefore do three things:

1. Demonstrate this awareness and put it to you that these barriers are related to conditions frequently overlooked or deliberately ignored by the major parties and, perhaps even more so, by the general public and informed commentariat.

2. Respond directly to the options proposed in the Discussion Paper.

3. Attach the page of the Republic Now! website which elaborates on the importance of abolishing the states and strengthening local government, city government and regional mezzanine type local government clusters based on existing Regional Organisation of Councils. While this response extends beyond the terms of reference of your expert panel you do invite additional advice.

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1. BARRIERS TO CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENTS

Some are mentioned in the discussion paper: e.g. the provisions of Section 128. There are several others.

a. The right of initiative to generate a constitutional amendment lies exclusively with the politicians in Australia. That needs to change urgently.

b. The Westminster system is based on two adversarial parties as if there are only two sides of politics. Concurrence between these parties on anything is hard to achieve. The failed constitutional referendums in 1988 demonstrated this abundantly. The advocacy that local government should be recognised in the constitution was seen by the federalists as the thin end of the wedge to centralise power in Canberra. The first failure to do anything about this was in 1974 when Whitlam proposed a referendum to ease the restrictive nature of the section 128 procedure. 

c. The single-member electoral district system that grossly favours the major parties in that it makes it virtually impossible for smaller parties and Independents to get a foothold in the House of Representatives. The C. W. electoral acts of 1918 and 1924 cemented this system in place. The general realisation of this problem is hardly understood by the people, rarely given attention by scholars and in the media. 

Electoral system reform, in particular the introduction of proportional representation would end this situation. Only the Greens have P. R. in their platform. The best form of P. R. is the Open Party List system NOT the Hare Clark system used here for the Senate, the ACT and some upper state houses. This involves a lot of preferencing – and horse trading - that the public rightly distrusts and, again rightly, finds cumbersome.

The adversarial party system is largely result of this electoral system. It ensures that proposals for constitutional amendment need the support of both major parties to be carried. Given the other difficulties this means that very, very few proposals are carried. As a result the inclination, even amongst the politicians, to present amendment initiatives, hardly exists. No proposals have been made since 1977, 34 years ago!! Plainly a ridiculous situation given the archaic nature of the Constitution.  Unless the party system is changed, through electoral system reform, it is likely that the totally ineffectual piecemeal tinkering with the Constitution will continue. Surely this is an appalling prospect. This is what you MUST address surely.

2. RESPONSES TO THE OPTIONS PROPOSED IN THE DISCUSSION PAPER

There is mention of four ideas to be considered. There is also the realisation expressed that local government is a state concern, is not mentioned in the Constitution itself, and is treated by the High Court, naturally, in that fashion. This is another major reason that the replacement of federation, favoured strongly by Republic Now!, must have priority. There is an end to the capacity of a nation to circumvent the Federal Constitution and an end to High Court judges sensibly interpreting clauses written in the late 1890s and guess what the founding fathers might have meant.  Thus the boosting of local government is in itself a major reason why the Constitution has to be REWRITTEN! There are of course NUMEROUS other reasons and I would imagine that the entire expert panel is in fact aware of this.

Yes, Symbolic Recognition nobody could object to that and it may assist the High Court in a small way in borderline cases.

As to Financial Recognition, in practice the most important aspect under the present circumstances for local government, we would support expanding Section 96 as much as possible. Option 2 listed there is the better one in our view weakening the power of states over local government.

As to Democratic Recognition Option 1 is favoured by Republic Now! as it would enhance the democratic nature of local government and weaken state government further.  A case could be made to retain the state power to sack a council for corrupt government, in the interim period before abolishing the states altogether.

The final aspect “Recognition through Federation”, while almost a contradiction in terms, naturally is to be supported under the current restrictive circumstances. It was most deplorable that the Rudd Government opted for “cooperative federalism” instead of the replacement of federation. This had failed in the past. Amazingly, the opportunity with seven ALP Governments in place was passed up. It was not even of the agenda of the Australia 2020 Summit but the delegates brought it up themselves as an important issue!  

However, is incorrect to say that Australia has “three levels” of government even though there are certainly areas of cooperation between federal, state and local government in practice – some of them of dubious constitutional validity. Local government is a second level of state government constitutionally and unless that changes the restrictions of federation will continue to bedevil local government.  Your paper makes mention of several forms of cooperation that have already been declared invalid constitutionally by the High Court.  

Nevertheless, the steps proposed in your paper deserve support. Inclusion of measures suggested there, to be included in a Referendum or Plebiscite proposals, should be pursued.  If passed but knocked back by a High Court decision subsequently it can only result in further pressure to rewrite the constitution altogether. 

3. ATTACHMENT OF A PAGE OF THE REPUBLIC NOW WEBSITE

This is the page that deals with local government and our Association’s view of it. It goes further than the above but you have asked for additional input beyond your terms of reference.

Republic Now supporters are MAXIMALIST republicans in that they see the need for much wider reform than merely the replacement of the Head of State. We are trying to answer the essential question: What kind of Republic? That is really the more important issue, which has been avoided by the major parties as well as the Australian Republican Movement. Indeed it is one reason why the ARM has failed to inspire the public sufficiently. We recommend that our website be studied by your panel. There are many aspects that would need to be dealt with in a Strategic Plan for constitutional change and a process to go with it. The Government has no such detailed Plan. We must be looking towards other organisations and/or minor parties, such as the Greens and possibly others, to present such a Strategic Plan as well as a Process. Republic Now! has a blueprint in place and we are happy to promote it wherever and whenever the opportunity present itself – like in this submission.

Klaas Woldring, Ph. D. (UNSW), M. A, (Syd), BA (UNISA)

Convenor, Republic Now Association Incorporated,

A/Prof. (Political Science & Management), Southern Cross University (ret)

http://www.republicnow.org.

http://www.republicnow.org/local-government-role/  (Page attached to submission)

It is nonsense to say that the system has served Australia well. Quarry Australia may have served Australia well but that may come to an end sooner or later. We need to improve on the quality of our politicians URGENTLY. The best people are not in our parliaments, indeed most of them wouldn't want to run as candidates for the major parties. Is this a healthy situation? The 3.25 m people who didn't vote in the 2010 federal election didn't think so, probably many more than that figure but they voted for Independents and for the least objectionable major party candidates. Surely, Australia can do much better than that.

Klaas Woldring

May 2, 2011

• Comments 42

In most other representative democracies a number of parties seek co-operation to form majority government. It is refreshing to gain just a glimpse of that in Australia now with the hung federal parliament but unless there's concerted action to change the electoral system we may soon be back in full adversarial mode.

Australia's two-party system is increasingly dysfunctional. It cannot even achieve parliamentary majorities where they exist and are badly needed, such as the wrangle over dealing with climate change, where carping about the carbon tax replaces real debate about policy, and the mining super profits tax, which was diluted after a concerted advertising campaign by mining companies.

With no imperative to seize or keep power, these measures would most likely have passed through parliament by now. In quite other areas, for instance constitutional reform, Australia's two-party system is a huge cause of stagnation because the major parties need to agree on amendment proposals for them to be carried by a referendum. And this rarely happens.

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There is a better way. The European model of proportional representation is co-operative, rather than adversarial in nature. The task of the voter is very easy: with just one vote, the person marks their preferred party and, at the same time, a preferred candidate on its list of candidates. This system is known as the ''party list''.

Candidates need to achieve a quota to be elected. The system results in multiple party parliaments and coalition government. Apart from being co-operative, it also ensures diverse and democratic representation. There are no byelections, pork-barrelling or horse trading on preferences behind closed doors. Counting votes is fast.

And it would be a simple system to introduce, requiring a change in the Commonwealth Electoral Act 1918. No constitutional amendment is required.

In Europe, 21 of 28 countries use proportional representation, including Austria, Belgium, Cyprus, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Luxembourg, Malta, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, and Switzerland.

Where new constitutions were introduced in the past few decades, proportional representation was mostly adopted and often enshrined in the constitutions themselves such as in Portugal (1974), South Africa (1996), almost all of Eastern Europe (1991) and New Zealand, with more than 80 per cent of these systems being ''party list''.

While the Australian Greens have proportional representation as a policy, they have been quiet on calling for a review of our voting processes, despite it being in their interest given the party is grossly under-represented in lower houses.

A simple examination of the problems in our current system shows why we need that kind proportional representation.

- There is a serious lack of diversity in the House of Representatives. The 2009 Electoral Reform Inquiry's first Green paper explained correctly that diversity has increased greatly in Australian society since 1945, yet this is hardly reflected in the Parliament. But the second Green Paper  deliberately encouraged only piecemeal tinkering in the way of system reforms.

- The single-member district system has resulted in frequent boundary changes, a costly and often controversial process; pork barrelling; little economic development or government assistance in ''safe'' seats. Costly byelections are a by-product of this system. In proportional representation (using the open party list system) casual vacancies are filled by the next on the list at the previous election.

- The highly undesirable system dominance of the two major parties would end, replaced by a search for common ground.

- The lack of democracy in representation would be remedied. Currently with single-member electoral districts candidates are often elected on the basis of only about 40 per cent of first preference votes. The other 60 per cent are in fact not represented in their own electorate.

- The two-party system and compulsory voting forces the major parties to pitch their policies at the ''middle ground'' (about 20 per cent plus of voters). Not surprisingly 3.25 million Australians avoided to vote in the 2010 election.

- Proportional representation or a variation of it would also improve the percentage of women in parliament as shown in the Scandanavian countries, and also New Zealand, Germany, Iceland, Argentina and South Africa.

- The existing regime is also biased against migrant candidates and indigenous people. There is now a high percentage of the population of non-English speaking background of both first and second generation.

The introduction of proportional representation would change the political culture of this country for the better. It is a fairer system, more democratic, simpler for the voters, easier to count, less expensive and it provides diversity, flexibility and new ideas in our parliaments.

Klaas Woldring is a former associate professor of Southern Cross University and Convenor of Republic Now Association Inc.

• What is the difference between preferential voting in Australia and proportional representation in the Netherlands? Many Australians have great difficulty distinguishing between the two systems. That is partly because in the Australian Senate, which IS elected on the basis of proportional representation (Hare-Clarke system), the option under the line is a preferential system. However, most countries using proportional representation actually use the Open Party List System. This means that a voter, with one vote only can choose for any of the parties offering themselves, usually several, with just one vote which can also indicate which particular candidate on that party's list is preferred.  Now as to the difference between preferential voting in a LOWER HOUSE SEAT in Australia and the system in the Netherlands is that only one candidate can be elected in a single-member district and in 95 plus % of all cases that will be a candidate of a major party, whether or not that preferential vote in optional. In proportional representation you vote in MULTI-MEMBER ELECTORATES and candidates are elected on the basis of a quota which essentially means the number of votes in that multi-member electorate divided by the number of seats. This is what creates real diversity not the ILLUSION OF  DIVERSITY as in Australia and believed to be democracy!. It is not democracy. What we have here is a two party tyranny. Proportional representation, in a nutshell, means that parties will get seats in proportion of the percentage votes cast for them. FAIR? Absolutely! And a great attraction for voters who are now turning away from voting in droves!!  An unfair system we have now but the major parties basically refuse to reform the current system because they are the principal beneficiaries of it. 

Seats in:  Lower House, Senate and E.U.   LH  S  E

Freedom and Democracy (VVD, Rutte)       31,14, 3
Labour Party (PvdA, Cohen)          30,14, 3
Party for Freedom (PVV, Wilders)       24,  0, 5
Christian Democrats (CDA, Verhagen)       21,21, 5
Socialist Party (SP, Roemer)           15,11, 2
Democrats 66 (D66, Pechtold)          10,  2, 3
Green Left (GL, Sap)              10,  4, 3
Christian Union (CU, Rouvoet)    5, 4, 1
Reformed Political Party (SGP,VanderStaay)   2, 1, 1
Party for Animals   (PvdD, Thieme)                2, 1, 0
Indep.  Senate Fraction  (OSF, ten Hoeven)   0, 1, 0

____________________________________________________________________________________

Avoiding meaningful action on constitutional change seems to have become the stock in trade of major party politicians. The republic has been removed from the public policy agenda, replacing federation has again been obviated by means of "co-operative federalism" and now indigenous recognition in the Constitution has been referred to a committee.

While support for such recognition of indigenous Australians can be gauged immediately and proven overwhelmingly in a plebiscite, a more pressing issue is how can Australia renew its antiquated governance framework altogether? The Constitution is demonstrably archaic and no longer a living document. If the Gillard government approached that much broader issue with a panel of citizens, including a few progressive constitutional lawyers, her government's place in history would be assured. If the political will was there, such a panel could tackle the Republican issue at the same time and present a strategic plan and process within six months.

Do Australians wish to endure another 110 years of ineffectual piecemeal tinkering with this costly, undemocratic and inflexible document? The last minor adjustment was in 1977, two years after two state premiers ignored convention and appointed senators opposed to the Whitlam government to Senate positions vacated by ALP members, effectively giving the Fraser-led Coalition the numbers to block supply. The Whitlam government was then sacked by the governor-general, John Kerr.

A sovereign people can rewrite its Constitution at any time. That is the essence of its sovereignty. The people's representatives should live up to that need when required. That is their role and long overdue task.

There are plenty of understandable reasons, however, why politicians shy away from major and even minor constitutional change. One is, of course, that the record is dismal, just eight of 44 proposals passed, and let's not mention all the proposals over the years that failed to get bi-partisan support. Governments want to avoid another failure but surely this procrastination is not getting the nation anywhere.

Another impediment to change is that the people themselves have no power to initiate amendments and the process of successful amendment is, therefore, dependent on agreement between the major parties – which is rare in the Westminster adversarial context. In reality, the Constitution is frozen in time and is only amended very occasionally, often of necessity, by at times dubious interpretations of High Court judges. They have to decide, "creatively", what the founding fathers may have meant with certain clauses meaningful around 1900 but not now.

Very few commentators seem to realise that the two party tyranny, which voters are beginning to reject at last, is itself a major factor that has prevented the updating of the Constitution since 1910. This situation was cemented with the Commonwealth electoral acts of 1918 (preferential voting) and 1924 (compulsory voting). After that, minor parties and independents rarely achieved representation in the House of Representatives.

The amendment clause, Section 128, not only reserves the initiation power to politicians but also immeasurably strengthens the federal compact as for amendments to pass, it requires majorities in a majority of states (in addition to a national majority). Many proposals failed on this requirement. Attempts to change this, for example by the Whitlam government, from at least four our of six to three out of six, failed.

The nature of federalism has changed dramatically since 1900, and even more since WWII, with many well-informed voices arguing that Australia needs a new government structure. This was even anticipated by prime minister Alfred Deakin in 1902 and more fully explained in 1942 by Law Professor Gordon Greenwood. Donald Horne in 1977, again, made a well-argued plea, after the constitutional debacle of 1975, that Australia had to rewrite its entire Constitution.

The federal government now receives some 82 per cent of consolidated revenue and has major responsibilities in many crucial public policy areas. A new structure should increase effective decentralisation rather than concentrate more power in Canberra. Many community groups and local government associations have already discussed this. It requires a sensible transitional process to dismantle the six states and strengthen local government and regional auxiliary structures. Different models are available but require much more articulation by scholars and the media and, of course, political action by major parties. Neither of them have a strategic plan of action or plan for a popular decision process by means of intermediate plebiscites and subsequent referendums.

After a strategic process of appropriate consultation the existing Constitution can be replaced with one new package, even via the existing Section 128. Instead of continuing to waste time on adversarial point scoring over minor issues our representatives should embark on long overdue action.

Avoidance, escapism and procrastination need to be replaced by political will and action. Australians need a living document, a Constitution that is meaningful to the citizens of today, and owned by them. Yes, we can and yes, we should, and yes, we must!

The ABC is running a competition to generate views on the Constitution.

How to enter the Constitution Challenge:

The Constitution is a living document but does it still define Australia and what it means to be Australian? Tell us—in 50 words or less—whether you think our Constitution is still the nation’s blueprint to guide us through the 21st century.

Make it quirky, make it fun, rhyme it, rap it, tell it straight. Constitution Day: Have Your Say.

The competition opens on Wednesday 12 May and closes at 5pm (AEST) on Monday 31 May.

Republic Now is "telling it straight" - a no beating about the bush approach in 50 words:

No, the Constitution is an archaic, dysfunctional document. Updating is no longer an option. It needs to be rewritten. Republic Now! advocates a strategic plan to develop a new Constitution involving extensive participation by the people through plebiscites and referendums. This can be examined on our website <http://www.republicnow.org>