Foundation for National Renewal     The "Model Constitution" Activity

Federal Election October 2004: Which Candidates Trust the People?

1. Having explored some possibilities for the National Executive in Task 11, it would be nice to progress to examining the National Parliament. However, it will first be necessary to coalesce your responses to Task 11.

2. So in this Task we will examine some possibilities for Regional Parliaments. Bear in mind that the system for establishing the Regions will be the subject of a subsequent FNR Task. Suffice to say at this stage that the process would need to be democratic and include some provision for balancing assets and infrastructure. It is also possible that not all Regions would operate in the same way because there could be a wide variation in the number of people in some Regions. So what we are looking for here is your ideas on how an average Regional Parliament might work. The general idea is to establish Regions using natural boundaries, or delineations based on logical socio-economic grounds, and that each Region would encompass, on average, approximately 200,000 to 400,000 people.

3. For the purposes of this exercise, we will assume that the six State, two Territory, and 670 Local Governments will be abolished and that we will have instead somewhere between 50 and 100 Regional Governments. These Regional Governments would be largely autonomous, would have control of approximately 80% of National revenue, and would operate under only broad policy guidelines from the National Parliament. The Regional Parliaments would also exert considerable influence over the National Government in that all Members of the National Parliament would be elected by Regional Parliaments from their Members and these MPs would be required to report to their sitting Regional Parliament on at least two days per month.

4. The first issue we will need to resolve is whether Regional Parliaments should be uni-cameral or bi-cameral. The abolition of State and Local Governments and their replacement by Regional Governments will produce an overall reduction in the total number of politicians from the current 6500 to somewhere between 2250 and 5250. So the question here is simply whether the 40 or 50 MPs in a Regional Parliament should operate in one or two Houses.

5. Central to this issue is the need for checks and balances in the system. There is little doubt that a House of Review does provide a check on any excesses that might occur in a Lower House. This should be balanced against the added expense that is incurred operating two houses of parliament, the fact that a bi-cameral system is more cumbersome, and the frustrations that can be generated when legislation passed by one house is rejected by the other. However, of even more importance is the blurring of accountability that occurs when a Senate forces amendment of legislation (as occurred with the introduction of the GST).

6. The second issue to be resolved is the 'modus-operandi' of the Parliament. There is little argument with the concept that the agenda of a parliament should be under the control of the elected members of that parliament. The question for us to resolve is whether the management of the business of a parliament should be handled by an ever-changing procession of elected members or whether it would be better handled by permanent staff. That is, the Chairman (or Speaker) of the House would be a professional public servant in the same way that the secretaries, Hansard recorders and so on, are professionals.

7. Under a professional system of management, the first session of parliament each week or each month would be a debate of the agenda during which the Members would decide on any changes that should be made to the agenda in the light of contemporary events. Thereafter, the business of the parliament would be orchestrated by a professional chairman using the basic rules of, say, N E Renton's "Guide for Meetings" modified, if considered necessary by the Parliament, by way of 'Standing Orders'. My personal view is that parliamentary proceedings would be enhanced by the abolition of much of the hocus-pocus that currently hinders the efficient conduct of parliamentary business.

8. The third issue we should decide is whether our Regional Parliaments should be arranged in the current adversarial manner or whether it would lead to better governance if the parliament was arranged as an open forum in which all members held equal rights to speak and uninhibited rights to vote as their conscience (or their electorate) dictated.

9. And the fourth issue for our consideration is whether or not the voting in our Regional Parliaments should be open or secret. The advantages of secret voting include the argument that, because the vote of each member is kept secret, he is free to vote as he thinks fit without fear of reprisal or condemnation by those who would have preferred him to vote the other way. Against this is the argument that an open (and published) vote by members of our parliaments allows the public to judge the performance of their representatives. Such openness is considered essential to the proper functioning of the right to recall so important in achieving accountability.

10. Coupled with the fourth issue is whether or not Regional Parliamentary sittings should be open to the public. Those who argue for open and transparent government for the People, by the People; propose that all sittings of our Parliaments should be open to the public. While it is conceivable that some sittings of a National Parliament dealing with matters of National security, etc may best be conducted without the rest of the world being privy to our considerations, it is difficult to imagine any such justification for secrecy in a Regional Parliament. However, such situations could arise so perhaps a mechanism to facilitate this ought to be included in our constitution. One suggestion is that a Regional Parliament should need the concurrence of the Regional Supreme Court or perhaps even the High Court before conducting any session in secret.

11. Last but not least is the need to consider whether or not the Regional Executive should be chosen from the members of our Regional Parliaments or whether the Executive should be permanent public servants in the Health Dept., Welfare Dept., etc, as discussed in Task Eleven. It is considered that your response to this question will be the same as your response to Task Eleven. However, in case you consider there should be a difference in the method of selecting the Executive in the Regions, this question is also asked in the following questionnaire.

12. Please answer the following questionnaire. Your response by the end of April would be appreciated.

13. Should Regional Parliaments be uni-cameral or bi-cameral? ______________

___________________________________________________________________

14. Should the business of Regional Parliaments be conducted by professional administrators or by Members elected by the Members of the House? ___________________________________________________________________

15. Should our Regional Parliaments be arranged in an adversarial manner as at present with 'government' and 'opposition' benches or should the arrangement be as a 'round table' or plenary forum? ___________________________________________________________________

16. Should voting in our Regional Parliaments be secret or open and published? ___________________________________________________________________

17. Should our Regional Parliaments conduct their business in secret or in open session? ___________________________________________________________

18. Should there be provision for Regional Parliaments to conduct closed sessions? ___________________________________________________________________

19. Should the concurrence of the Regional Court or the High Court be required before closed sessions are conducted in our Regional Parliaments? ___________________________________________________________________

20. Should the Executive of Regional Governments be chosen from elected Members of Parliament or from the ranks of the Public Service with a proviso that members of the public could also be chosen if the Parliament decides no suitably qualified person is available in the Public Service? 

___________________________________________________________________

21. Please express any other views you may have on the question of Regional Parliaments.

·=============== ===============·

Last updated: 3 May 2006