The Foundation for National Renewal   The Constitutional Convention of February 1998

Federal Election October 2004: Which Candidates Trust the People?

TRANSCRIPT OF PROCEEDINGS
Wednesday, 4 February 1998
Page 1

  INTERNET BROADCAST 

The Parliamentary and News Network has established an Internet site containing over 120 pages of information. Also it is streaming live its radio broadcast of the proceedings which may be heard anywhere in the world on the following address:http://www.abc.net.au/concon

Full Delegates List

PROXIES TABLED BY THE CHAIRMAN

Convention met at 9.00 a.m.

CHAIRMAN- The proceedings yesterday were difficult to the degree that, on a number of occasions, delegates seemed to find it hard to hear. I had three requests in that respect, the first of which concerns a member of a press gallery who had a mobile on. I call on those in the press gallery who come in either behind the Speaker's chair or in the press gallery to the southern side of the House of Representatives chamber to please switch off their mobiles and comply with the same courtesies as the delegates themselves.

The second is that there were a number of occasions when groups of delegates met within the Convention chamber and made it difficult for those sitting in the Convention to hear the proceedings. I call Mr Gallop- if you wish to have a conference, please do so outside the Convention room.

The third is with respect to microphones. The microphones at the podium are fixed and supposed to be adjusted for all people, no matter how they normally speak into the microphone. Please leave the microphones where they are. There is a booth up in the old ABC studio in the corner. Every effort will be made to try to adjust them so you can be heard. If you are using hand-held microphones, please handle them so they are facing your mouth and they should provide sound so that everybody can hear.

On another two issues, there are a number of papers that are distributed each day. I point out to members that the business we are dealing with is on your Notice Paper each day. For example, if you turn to page 2 of today's Notice Paper you will find reports of the working groups. Yesterday some delegates were not aware that all proceedings of the working groups and recommendations are available to you. If you turn over from page 1 of the green, you will find the full details of the working group reports and resolutions. On the front page of the green you get the idea of the day's program.

With respect to reports of the working group yesterday, we had some difficulty in that a number of amendments were inadequately presented to us. If you have amendments, please make sure they are handed in, in writing and signed by yourself and your seconder, to either of the tabling officers, Mr Barlin or Mr Blick, so that they can then be processed. If we do not have them in that form, it will become extraordinarily difficult for them to be entered into the proceedings of the meeting. There will also be a form available for amendments in the secretariat, if you wish to use it.

With respect to other papers which are distributed, you would all be aware that there is a transcript of proceedings available each day. It has been pointed out to me that there is reference to radio broadcasts and Internet broadcasts on the inside page of the daily transcript of proceedings, should delegates, friends or others in your offices wish to access information regarding the Convention. I am also arranging for all proxies received to be entered in this, together with the name of delegates, so that the persons who are not able to be present and are represented by a proxy, and that proxy and their identity, are available through that means.

The Resolutions Committee is to meet for the first case at 1 o'clock today. As I indicated yesterday when we were dealing with the resolutions, the task of the Resolutions Committee will be to consider those provisional resolutions that are passed by the Convention. Those will be presented back to the Convention in their original form on the ninth day. At that time, the resolutions group will put, by way of amendment in the report it presents, whatever amendments it might recommend. If there are amendments that people wish the resolutions group to consider, they may submit again with a mover and seconder of that amendment to the resolutions group for consideration.

The resolutions group itself will be making no final amendments because it will be for this Convention to consider them. The resolutions group has been constituted so that, if any delegate wishes to amend any of those resolutions passed provisionally, they can submit to the resolutions group their preferred amendment and it will be considered by the resolutions group which will report on the amendment, and consideration will be given to that amendment in due course by this Convention.

Secondly, with respect to resolutions, there has been a request in accordance with our original proceedings for gender balance on the resolutions group. Accordingly, I have nominated Mrs Kerry Jones as the additional member of the resolutions group. The first meeting of the resolutions group will be at 1 o'clock today and members of the resolutions group will be so advised.

With respect to the day's proceedings, we have a very long list of people who have not yet spoken on the principal question. In order to accommodate them, I suggest, if it meets the Convention's convenience, as we are going to deal with the issues both today and tomorrow, we might proceed to the general debate at 3 o'clock this afternoon instead of waiting until 5 o'clock. That will allow a significant number of additional delegates to speak on the principal question. As there is no working group session today, I would hope there might be a somewhat better attendance because, without a working group commitment, this place will be hopefully a little bit better attended. So at 3 o'clock this afternoon we will proceed with the general debate, adjourning the debate on the issues until tomorrow morning, and then we will have the full day tomorrow on the issues.

Dependent on how our speakers list on the issue is going, if delegates feel it is necessary, we might again intrude into part of the consideration of issues tomorrow on the general question. You will recall that delegates have 15 minutes to speak on the general question and are able to address whatever matters they wish. We now move to receive reports from yesterday's working groups. As identified, these are attached to the Notice Paper. Each delegate is able to refer to them and to see exactly what the contents of the various working groups are. We will be dealing with the working groups in the order of their presentation, that is, groups A to F. As the order of proceedings establishes, each working group has been allocated 15 minutes for each report. If the working group wishes, more than one delegate may speak to each working group report, but your time will be restricted to 15 minutes. On the other hand, your rapporteur may take up the full 15 minutes. Debate will then ensue. Each speaker may speak to any or all of the reports.

Again, because there was some confusion yesterday, all reports are being presented. All the resolutions that emerge from those reports are before the Convention. They will be before us today and tomorrow so you may speak on any or all of those working group reports and the Convention itself can deal with them in any way they wish. So it is not a matter of you being restricted to any one of them. I call first on Dr Patrick O'Brien to speak on Working Group A.

Professor PATRICK O'BRIEN- On a technical point, for some reason or other the provision for dismissal was left out, so we are getting the sheet amended. There is a slight proofreading change that has to be made which I do not think would amount to an amendment, but I would have to be guided by the chair on that. It is simply a technical error in the proofreading. For some reason or other, the dismissal procedure was not included on the working paper that was produced. Mr Jonathan Harms, who is assisting our group, is attending to that now. I will not read through the detail of it, but I will talk very quickly to the principle, which I think is important.

It was the unanimous opinion of the working group that the process of nomination is in many ways as important as, and in some ways more important than, the actual process of election, because whoever controls the nomination process really has great influence over who shall get appointed to any position. This applies whether it be parliamentary committees or whatever.

People familiar with history will know that Joseph Stalin, before he became the monster we know of, built up his power in the Bolshevik party from 1921 to 1927 when he got rid of Trotsky, simply because he was the chairman of what you might call the central committee of the party. The other Bolsheviks did not think that was an important position. They thought Stalin was a bit of a dill, that the chairman was not very important and that Lenin and the others- Kamenev and Zinoviev- were the really important guys; but Stalin outsmarted them. He appointed his mates to the various other committees of commissars and controlled the agendas of the meetings. He finished up as No. 1.

The process of nomination is vital. We believe that the process of nomination should be as direct as possible and should be open to public inspection- hence our criticism of the other models, whether it be Mr McGarvie's model or that presented by the ARM. If the Prime Minister nominates, he just picks a name out of a hat and there is no open inspection. We do not know what the process is. He is not answerable to anybody. He chooses whomsoever he wishes, and then two-thirds of the parliament approves or disapproves the nomination. We say that it has to be open to public inspection.

There was some discussion of a model I put up on constitutional amendments that I had proposed and circulated, which provided for a very direct form of nomination based on petition, but the meeting felt- and I agreed- that, if we are going to move to an elected president, a system of direct nomination with a filter might initially serve the best purpose.

After all, if we are to move to a republic, all provisions will have to be carefully reviewed because we cannot fully predict what the consequence of the removal of the Crown from the Constitution will be in terms of the balances of power. Over time, people might decide to move to an unfiltered form of election. In the United States of America, that is precisely what happened. Originally, it was done by the electoral college and then it became the winner-takes-all system we have today.

What we have proposed is that any citizen who is qualified to vote- and we have referred to sections 34 and 44 of the present Constitution- will be eligible to nominate. We have proposed a sort of large council of people, drawn from a variety of public institutions and quasi-public institutions, who will act as some sort of filter. But any citizen can nominate, and we provide for that using Clem Jones's model, reducing the number from 30 to 20. Anyone who gets a vote of 20 people of this large representative body of people will get a nomination.

We have also made a provision- that is on page 2, at point (d)- that a petition of one per cent of qualified Commonwealth electors nominating a single candidate may cause that candidate to be added to the ballot in spite of the presidential nominating council, subject to a veto by two-thirds of the council. That provides for direct nomination. It would be quite unfair, from our perspective, if you must provide that. That could become the basis of a more direct form.

As to election, that will be direct once the candidates are nominated. The point about this filter council is that its deliberations and the reasons that it gives must be public and open to inspection. There are varieties of alternatives. I know that another group is proposing a similar method, with slightly different content. All that we are proposing is that this proposal be put to the Resolutions Committee for consideration, suggestions and/or amendments.

We are not desperately wedded to any particular model, but I think this model would satisfy many of the unfounded fears that some people in this assembly have expressed. It broadens the process. I believe that we are honour bound to involve the people. It is a step towards greater empowerment of the people. As I have indicated on many occasions here and elsewhere, a republic without greater involvement of the people in the decision making relating to who shall occupy the most powerful and highest office in the land is not a democratic republic. Again, I think it is very important.

I do not know whether this will satisfy everybody, but I think it is a start and we have to make a start. As I indicated, things will have to be reviewed down the track, but it is a beginning. If the people of Australia, our compatriots, choose at some date to remove the filter and to have direct nominations, then I think that should be done. Clem Jones's model, which we have generally supported, has various exclusion clauses relating to serving politicians and the like. We refer to that.

One point I would make- which I wanted included in the proposal but my colleagues did not, although some thought it was a good idea- is that it is my belief that any delegate to this Convention, be he or she elected or nominated, should be excluded from occupying the post of president or head of state of Australia, at least for the first two terms. I think that is necessary to indicate that the delegates here do not have a vested interest in filling the position.

As to dismissal, I think that generally the United States process of impeachment and dismissal has worked effectively. Three alternatives came up before our group. The first was dismissal on a petition of citizens; and that was rejected. The second was by a two-thirds majority vote of both houses of the parliament. However, by consensus, we finally came down in favour of that idea that a head of state may be impeached for breaches of the Constitution or serious criminal offences, on indictment of the House of Representatives by an absolute majority vote. The Senate would try the case, and proof of criminal activity may be remitted to the High Court for trial. If the head of state is indicted successfully, he or she shall lose their position and be ineligible for any further term of office. That is the principle. I conclude by saying that, as you know, we are wedded to the empowerment of the people to a direct form of nomination, and we have provided this filter in order to provide some sort of initial means by which community groups and public officials can be involved to satisfy the fears of people here and people in the community about a more direct forum. In the end, the people of Australia would have to decide whether they wanted to move to a direct form of nomination and election or retain this system, or any variation of it.

CHAIRMAN- Mr Bruce Ruxton. Are you a member of that working group?

Mr RUXTON- I want to speak against that diatribe.

CHAIRMAN- You cannot at this stage, I'm afraid. I call Dr Geoff Gallop to present Working Group B's report.

Previous Day
Next Page

·=============== ===============·

Last updated: 21 October 2000