South Australian Elections:
The push for parliamentary "reform"

by Bob Briton

Unfortunately, many words used to describe political processes have been 
emptied of their real meaning and then taken over by servants of the ruling 
class. In the 1960s, noting an upsurge in public sympathy for revolutionary 
movements, advertisers gave us revolutionary new laundry powder, cars and 
other consumer items. In the latter years of the USSR, supporters of public 
ownership of the means of production were called "conservatives" — the 
privatisers became "radicals".

"Reform" is another such word. In Australia we have had "reform" of 
industry policy and the finance sector, industrial relations "reform" and 
waterfront "reform". The constant in all of these and other "reforms" is 
that they involved a reduction in the living standards, job security and 
access to the decision-making processes for working people.

Now there is a new wave of "reform" stirring in Australia: parliamentary 
"reform". The result of the state elections in South Australian marks its 
arrival as an immediate issue.

Again, it would seem, the political Right has the initiative and, while 
there really is an urgent need for democratic reform of Australia's 
electoral and parliamentary systems, what has been placed on the agenda 
instead is the restriction of democratic participation and the 
encouragement of the most reactionary sections of society.

The king-making role of SA independent state MP Peter Lewis following the 
February 9 elections has brought matters to a head. In return for his 
support of one or other of the major parties to form the state's next 
minority government, he was able to get agreement from BOTH to a program of 
fundamental changes to SA's parliamentary system. As we now know, he chose 
to act on Labor's willingness rather than on the Libs'.

Mr Lewis' now famous compact with the ALP and his "Working Agreement to 
Support South Australian Government" with the Liberals contained 
commitments to a Constitutional Convention with the following desired 
outcomes among others:

* a reduction in the number of lower house (House of Assembly) members from 
47 to 35;

* a reduction of the number of upper house (Legislative Council) 
councillors from 22 to 17;

* a minimum of 69 sitting days for parliament;

* the reconstitution of the upper house as a house of review only — 
without the power to veto legislation;

* after 2010, no members of political parties can become Legislative 
Councillors;

* future appointments of the Auditor General to be ratified by a special 
committee of the Legislative Council,

* an extension of access to government documents under Freedom of 
Information;

* secret ballots for parliamentary officers;

* the introduction of Citizen Initiated Referendum.

The proposals for "reform" are cleverly crafted, giving the impression of a 
commitment to "open government". 

But in reality most of them are based on contempt for the political 
institutions of the state, its representatives and processes.

The steadily higher vote for non-mainstream candidates and the decline in 
the vote of the two major parties reflects disillusionment among large 
sections of the South Australian electorate and, for that matter, the 
Australian electorate.

The measures exploit, in a crude populist way, the common notions that "all 
politicians are the same", "you can't trust any of 'em" and "they're only 
in it for the perks".

In South Australia the thoroughly undemocratic nature of the system has 
been shown by the almost universally unpopular privatisations of public 
utilities, the decline in public services, the increase in their cost and a 
string of scandals such as the secret deals to lure communications 
transnational Motorola to the state.

Peter Lewis is playing this card for all it is worth and it seems he's not 
the only one. Fledgling party South Australia First went to the electors 
with a plan to halve the size of the House of Assembly and to hold a 
referendum on the future of the Legislative Council.

One Nation had Citizen Initiated Referendum as the part of its pitch to the 
people.

For its part, employer group Business SA also recommended removing the 
upper house's power of veto and cutting its numbers among the other slash 
and burn proposals contained in its pre-election Manifesto.

Following the election it seems that everyone wants to reform parliament.

ALP leader Mike Rann wants to bring the arcane and archaic structures of 
governance into the 21st century.

Caretaker Premier Rob Kerin says "as far as parliamentary reform goes, I am 
a bit of a fan of it".

All of this seems at odds to the reported indifference of the major parties 
to the proceedings of a parliamentary committee on the topic last year. 

Even former Liberal Minister and now independent for the seat of Fisher, Dr 
Bob Such, is passionate for parliamentary "reform" up to and including 
Citizen Initiated Referendum.

In view of the fact that this concept keeps bobbing in the pronouncements 
of these right wing politicians, it is important that progressive people be 
forewarned about it.

It is a darling of the right wing and is not likely to go away.

The ACT Legislative Assembly has had to consider the subject twice, in 1995 
and again in 2001. On both occasions it was defeated. But here we go again 
in SA!

Citizen's Initiated Referendum (CIR) is an idea which has been pedalled 
around Australia — especially rural and regional Australia — for many 
years by far right groups like the League of Rights.

It sits alongside their various conspiracy theories (they maintain that 
Jews and Fabians are the main enemies of Western society, for example) as 
an article of faith.

Clearly, Alexander Downer wasn't the only conservative politician to go to 
the meetings of this far right group and hear about CIR.

CIR, as it understood in Australia, would involve the mounting of a 
petition in favour of certain legislative changes in a state or federally. 
If a fixed proportion of the electors (say 1%, 5% or even 10%) sign the 
petition, the government is bound to hold a plebiscite on the issue.

If the majority of voters support the proposition, the government is then 
obliged to legislate accordingly.

In Australia, a referendum is a device to alter the Constitution, so a 
better term might have been "citizen triggered plebiscite".

Models already exist in other countries. Switzerland has it, as does 
Finland, some provinces of Canada and some states of the US. Even though it 
has been used in some instances to pass some legislation not to the liking 
of some conservative forces — a ban on battery hens in Canada, more 
tolerant euthanasia legislation in Oregon and so on — it remains a weapon 
of choice of the political Right.

In California it has been used to force its people to even greater worship 
of the national flag and to enshrine English as the lingua franca (as if 
the latino community needed reminding of their second class status).

From the era when Ronald Regan was Governor, there is Proposition 13 which 
forbids ANY tax increases being imposed by the State Legislature. If 
California gets into financial trouble, it is unable to increase taxes for 
corporations or anybody else, so they have to sack public servants, sell 
public assets, incur debt or combinations of all three.

It is this type of "blunt instrument" policy that the Right expects and 
gets from CIR. It has been described as law without government, without 
compromise and without ongoing discussion or adjustment.

Many fear that the mechanism could be used by majorities to violate the 
rights of minorities in a more egregious manner than currently happens. The 
overseas experience confirms these fears.

The Right is apparently convinced that its networks and resources are up to 
the job of using CIR to further its ends. No doubt it would be a very 
costly thing to mount a campaign — a petition with over 20,000 signatures 
in the ACT example and then the publicity leading up to the plebiscite.

In the US it has been found that victory in a CIR vote goes to the biggest 
spender in 78 per cent of cases.

Could you imagine the amounts that could be found to fund a campaign to 
further restrict Aboriginal people's land rights in Australia, for example?

While CIR sounds like an exercise in direct democracy, it is in fact an 
extension of the current system that favours monied groups those supported 
by the mass media and excludes a significant proportion of the community 
from the political process. It sidelines and weakens the role of elected 
parliaments.

It could be used as a means of weakening the role of the Senate, 
particularly of smaller parties and independents, by pursuing a rejected 
matter outside of parliament.

Progressive forces must take some of the initiative back and put its 
alternatives before the current snake oil finds too many duped customers.

The Communist Party initiated some discussion of Australia's electoral 
system in 1996 with a booklet called Proportional Representation — A 
More democratic Voting System.

In it, the Party suggested that electorates should be increased in size and 
that they be represented by several members of parliament. This is the 
basis of the Hare Clark system in Tasmania and the Multi Member Electorate 
system in New Zealand. 

This type of system has the potential to achieve the opposite of what the 
Peter Lewis', SA Firsts and Business SA's of this world want. It would 
increase the chance that those voters wanting an alternative to Lib/Lab 
politics would have representation in the lower houses of parliament as 
well.

Currently, the results of the various state and federal elections show that 
these votes make up between 25 per cent and 30 per cent of the total. 
However, those citizens have either no representation in the lower house or 
a few independents at best. This is clearly undemocratic.

The discussion should deal with other injustices in the current 
arrangements. The funding of election campaigns, for example, which serves 
to reinforce established and often already well funded organisations.

The requirement for parties to lodge the name and addresses of their 
members with the state and federal electoral commissions should be 
challenged. The provision of broadcast time to candidates, the maintenance 
of compulsory voting, the reduction of the voting age should also be the 
subjects of a community-wide discussion.

And most important of all there is a need to build a mass movement of left 
and progressive forces and elect a government of a new type which 
represents the interest of the people.

It is time for progressive forces in society to get off the back foot on 
these issues. Otherwise, South Australians might be only the first to 
suffer the consequences of "parliamentary reform" arising from some 
backroom deal.