Referendum 2013 Local Government/Federal Government

I will be voting NO, and would encourage all ASF members to do so.

I have not been informed as to it's tenets, meanings or implications.

If you don't know what a referendum is about, my advice is vote NO.

gg

Correct me if I am wrong,but my understanding is that it is to recognise local government in the constitution in order that they can get direct funding from the Commonwealth.
Is this correct?Not sure?Are there other benefits from this recognition?

chiff said:

Correct me if I am wrong,but my understanding is that it is to recognise local government in the constitution in order that they can get direct funding from the Commonwealth.
Is this correct?Not sure?Are there other benefits from this recognition?

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With this being a Gillard initiative, one can only wonder what the real agenda might be. Not likely to be good for the country going by her history so far.

If she had been a trust worthy PM, I might take a closer look, but under these circumstances, I am concerned there would likely be stuff in the fine print and in legal gobbledegook that gives too much power to someone/somewhere.

Garpal Gumnut said:

I will be voting NO, and would encourage all ASF members to do so.

I have not been informed as to it's tenets, meanings or implications.

If you don't know what a referendum is about, my advice is vote NO.

gg

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Alternatively, you could investigate its tenets, meanings and implications (as you put it).

Then you might make an intelligent decision.

Or do you not investigate stocks either, before making decisions on them?

Paccioli said:

Alternatively, you could investigate its tenets, meanings and implications (as you put it).

Then you might make an intelligent decision.

Or do you not investigate stocks either, before making decisions on them?

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A reasonable point Paccioli, and as I am sure you do, I investigate and flag to the two Mrs Gumnuts who still speak to me, major investment decisions.

I have not seen one word from the ALP Government on this Referendum, the reasons for it, it's tenets or consequences.

I see no reason to vote yes for it. It is insulting to me that the Government has not explained such an important change.

gg

The last thing we need, is to entrench local government in the constitution - one day we may hope to see a restructure of Australian governance, maybe regions based on meaningful geographic lines, and a central govt.
No states, as such.
No councils, as such.

And secondly, how dare these stuffed shirts inflict this irrelevancy upon us, when there are rather more meaningful questions that ought to be put to the Australian people, like
"Do you support same-sex marriage?" for example?
This is not the thread to debate the merits of that proposal, the point is that's the sort of question that should be put to the populace, not left to the "conscience" vote of parliamentarians.

I advocate a write-in addendum to merely ticking the NO box: "<moderate expletive beginning with P> OFF!"

Exeunt right, muttering ...

Purple XS2 said:

The last thing we need, is to entrench local government in the constitution - one day we may hope to see a restructure of Australian governance, maybe regions based on meaningful geographic lines, and a central govt.
No states, as such.
No councils, as such.

And secondly, how dare these stuffed shirts inflict this irrelevancy upon us, when there are rather more meaningful questions that ought to be put to the Australian people, like
"Do you support same-sex marriage?" for example?
This is not the thread to debate the merits of that proposal, the point is that's the sort of question that should be put to the populace, not left to the "conscience" vote of parliamentarians.

I advocate a write-in addendum to merely ticking the NO box: "<moderate expletive beginning with P> OFF!"

Exeunt right, muttering ...

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A mate in the AEC tells me that a feck off has not the same effect as a NO.

So just vote NO mate.

Tell your troubles to an ALP member outside the polling booth on Sept 14, if you can find one.

gg

I can see where this one will go.

sails said:

With this being a Gillard initiative, one can only wonder what the real agenda might be. Not likely to be good for the country going by her history so far.

If she had been a trust worthy PM, I might take a closer look, but under these circumstances, I am concerned there would likely be stuff in the fine print and in legal gobbledegook that gives too much power to someone/somewhere.

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good point, on the face of it the proposal seems a fair and logical one, but it surprises me that we havent had a scrap of debate or even media discussion about this issue, past referendums, to my knowledge, were always pretty hotly debated because referendums are hard to get through, and always about something quite important, so im skeptical about this, we need more information and debate, it seems like its being rushed through for some reason, im likely to vote no simply because we're not being told enough

Running this referendum at this stage is a waste of taxpayers money.

Better off shouting everyone a Happy Meal.

Just another Labor distraction tactic and no doubt a grab for more power in Canberra.

No chance of getting up.

I will be voting NO in the referendum on recognising Local Government in the Federal Constitution.

The federal government has provided around $10 million to the 'yes' campaign and only $500k to the 'no' campaign. They Feds should be taken to task on that abnormality, alone.

The funding allocation process was in essence slanted in favour of one particular outcome..

The allocations were dubiously based on parliamentary support:
Anthony Albanese (Minister for Local Government) has used a proportional funding model for the upcoming referendum based on what he described as 'strong bipartisan support for change'.
Last month, 134 government, opposition and crossbench MPs voted for change in parliament against two dissidents, NSW Liberal Alex Hawke and his West Australian colleague Dennis Jensen.

The fact that funding for the 2 sides was based on federal politicians asking themselves if they wanted more power is highly questionable at best.

Technically the 'yes' advocates are getting over $30 million in total, as they have been given another $11.6 million for a 'national civics education campaign' as well as donations from local governments.
To give any one side of any campaign the control over 'educating' the public of the process and future implications is potentially opening the process to severe manipulation.

That in itself is enough to set the alarm bells ringing and cast doubt over the motives for this referendum.

At the 1999 Republic Referendum John Howard gave $7.5 million to both the ‘yes’ and ‘no’ case. At this referendum the Federal Government is attempting to buy an outcome which increases their power by essentially giving money to just one side of the debate.

The referendum proposal is to amend section 96 of the Constitution. This provision allows the Commonwealth to “grant financial assistance to any State on such terms and conditions as the Parliament thinks fit”.

Yet in press releases and in an opinion piece by Albanese it reads "During a period of ten years after the establishment of the Commonwealth and thereafter until the Parliament otherwise provides, the Parliament may grant financial assistance to any State, or to any local government body formed by a law of a State."

They had deliberately omitted the "on such terms and conditions as the Parliament thinks fit".

This is nothing more than a power grab designed to bypass the State Governments.

Do we really want Canberra deciding where and when money goes to local projects and on what conditions?
What does Canberra know about which roads need fixing or the urgency of any local project in Armadale, Belmont, Stirling or any other city suburb, or regional town? Do you think they care about the small issues (to them) that Local Government deal with?

When you control the cash flow, you control the (local) Government. What we will begin to see is money flowing to different Local Governments, not based on need, but based upon the political bent of their residential population and how they vote.
Projects will live and die based upon which federal political party is in power at any one time and for which candidate the residents voted for.

I, for one, do not want this. Nor do I want the political power of my Western Australian state government eroded no matter which party is governing.
It may be a case of the lesser of 2 evils, but I want locally based representatives making local Western Australian decisions for me, not power brokers, fat cats and faceless men based in other states who will look after their own first.

I am concerned that the manipulations of Federal Government will overpower the good-intentioned needs and wants of Local Governments.
I can understand the position of Local Government to want to be recognised, they play a crucial role in so many facets of our lives, and who in their right mind would not want more funding to get local projects completed.
I support their recognition in the Constitution, but I do not support the Federal Parliament controlling the flow of money.
We already have a state based system that handles these matters and until a better system arises I believe it should stay as is. My point being, I do not consider a Federal system being an improvement on the current one.

The Federal Parliament already has more control over our lives than they are able to handle as shown by the circus federal Parliament has descended into over the last 6 years.
They should work on fixing the current state of matters already under their control, rather than seeking out more responsibility which will just dilute and divide their time and efforts even further.

This is the last thing we need at the moment.


On a side not there is a form at this link http://www.nopowergrab.com.au/
Forget the title of the website it is not relevant to the request form. The form is sent to your local member and senator asking for equal funding to both the 'yes' and 'no' cases.
It does not in any way, shape or form ask for an opinion on either side of the case, it only asks that funding be allocated evenly.

In a democracy I think that is the least we can ask for.

I heard one academic state that it may be harder to dismiss corrupt local governments if the referendum goes through.
I didn't hear his reasons.

I heard Rudd's dropped it. Not going to happen.

chiff said:

I heard one academic state that it may be harder to dismiss corrupt local governments if the referendum goes through.
I didn't hear his reasons.

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At the moment a local government operates, essentially, at the pleasure of the state government (or it does in NSW at least). Entrenching it in the Constitution would remove the right of state governments to dismiss local government. I can't say I've read up much on this but on the face of it, I don't know why it's even being discussed. Is there a fault with the current system that the change would rectify?

The allocation of funding is a clue in itself imo.
I heard a discussion about it a few weeks ago, and the academic who explained what it was all about said if it happened it would be possible for the Feds to cut the State governments right out, dealing directly with local governments. He also said the suggestion that the legislation would allow the Feds to give more funding to local government was quite incorrect, that they can do that now.

What he didn't actually say but what was implicit was that it's a way for the Feds to gather even more under their control.

I'll definitely be voting no.

Julia said:

The allocation of funding is a clue in itself imo.
I heard a discussion about it a few weeks ago, and the academic who explained what it was all about said if it happened it would be possible for the Feds to cut the State governments right out, dealing directly with local governments. He also said the suggestion that the legislation would allow the Feds to give more funding to local government was quite incorrect, that they can do that now.

What he didn't actually say but what was implicit was that it's a way for the Feds to gather even more under their control.

I'll definitely be voting no.

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Ahh I figured it might be some attempt by the Federal govt to squeeze the states. They've been doing that since the states stopped collecting income tax.