Page 252 - Week 03 - Tuesday, 30 May 1989
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known that Canberrans did not want what was termed self-government. My involvement came after self-government was called. I thought that was not particularly a democratic process and I had heard a report from the Queensland electorate of Barambah that a number of citizens who felt that perhaps they were not getting the representation they wanted would select their own candidate. They did so, and he was actually elected with a 38 per cent swing against the sitting government.
It was some short while after that that the ACT Citizens Electoral Council was formed with a view to electing members who would represent the constituents. Some two or three weeks after that time, in discussions with a barrister who had a marvellous understanding of constitutional law, it became my understanding that the Constitution would not allow self-government to be called for the nation's capital, and at that time I and others determined to form the Abolish Self Government Coalition party.
I think most of the rest of it is history. Some 22 per cent of people registered a vote against self-government. We had over 10,000 votes personally. I think it fair to say that I was elected to do my utmost to abolish self-government. I must say that if there was a motion toward the Assembly today to do so I indeed would vote to abolish it. You can imagine my delight last week when Mr Whalan indicated that the preschool fee was going to be abolished. I thought, "Could this be two in a row?", but perhaps not.
Let us look at the fact of citizens being involved in the governmental process. During the last 100 years there has been a practical method evolved throughout the world that allows citizens a far greater involvement in the legislative process. That method is termed "voters veto". What the veto does is allow the citizens the freedom to veto proposed legislation or repeal existing legislation. If, say, 5,000 people in Canberra signed a petition and presented that to the Assembly, that would compel the Government to put that matter to referendum, perhaps on one day per year set aside for that. The result in a simple majority would then be binding on the Government.
This particular form of democratic process has quite a range of benefits, not the least being benefits to the Government. I think we are all aware that from time to time governments claim a mandate for some particular policy. We are equally aware that at times it seems evident that people do not feel they have that mandate. What the veto would allow is the citizens to have a say specifically on the point they are concerned about through the veto, when they would not have to go to the more severe method of kicking out the Government at the next election. It would be a rather mild way of letting the Government know that in that particular instance it had not read the mind of the electorate correctly.
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