Economy
The state of democracy
In a recent article1, Sue Neales weighs the performance of the Tasmanian Government in the balance, using the metric of Abraham Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address, to find it sadly wanting. Government of the people requires that politicians should truly represent a cross-section of those who elected them; government by the people should that mean politicians are accountable to the people and operate transparently and truthfully; and government for the people should mean that services are delivered in the interests of every member of society. If these are the criteria for a truly democratic government then recent government decisions – she mentions the Brighton Bypass, poker machines, Health department food contracts and power subsidies – indicate that the present Government falls far short of these democratic criteria.
Her article is especially important at a time when both federal and state governments, including opposition parties, are operating entirely for their own self-preservation, with scarcely a nod towards consistent policy or the interests of the electorate. As we have seen in the last state and federal elections, politicians outdid each other in ad hoc appeals to self-interest – just whatever it takes to obtain power for the sake of power itself. Power has become the end for the major political parties, not the means by which they may serve the interests of all citizens, not just of those living in marginal seats, or the interests of favoured mates and of corporations. Sue Neales, in deploring the selfish ad hocery of current politics, is hauling us back to consider what democracy is about and how therefore all parties claiming to be democratic should be operating.
I would like to elaborate on these ideas, with reference to where current Tasmanian polity is at. Lincoln’s ideas make fine rhetoric, but less sense if you push hard. Attempts at direct democracy can have very undemocratic outcomes. Many US states have tried direct democracy, whereby individuals can move motions and have them voted on. Sounds good, but California’s Proposition 8 voted down taxes, leaving that State’s coffers empty. Similar propositions in other states led to legislation allowing vigilante squads and the hounding of sex offenders after they have served their sentence. As Donald Horne said ‘government by the people might have made some sort of sense in a Greek city-state where it all started’ but it is impossible today2. The trick is therefore to translate direct government by the people into a representative form of government.
Horne points to another danger hidden under the ‘legitimating myth’ of government by the people is that the process of voting is the sole or main key to democracy, which in turn gives rise to the notion that democracy is ‘majority rule’. Several letters to the editor of the Mercury after the 2010 election invoked majority rule to argue that because 80 per cent did not vote Green, therefore the Greens should butt out and leave it to the winning party. The fact that this marginalised 20 per cent of the electorate they would see as a necessary fact of life in a so-called democracy. To take another example, majority rule means that if, for instance, 51 per cent of the electorate are in favour of a particular course of action, say criminalising homosexuality, then tough beans for the 49 per cent who are violently opposed to such a course. Clearly other considerations, such as human rights, need to be factored in with voting outcomes. Representative democracy requires that the rights of all sections of the electorate are upheld.
In somewhat similar vein, Paul Lennon stated that he had a mandate to do whatever he thought best for Tasmania; if Tasmanians didn’t like it, they could chuck him out at the next election and give someone else open slather. This is to make elected government the rulers of the electorate, not their representatives. Lennon had confused democracy with serial autocracy.
A true democracy, as Horne pointed out, is an ecosystem, comprising many interacting factors, not just voting, but also including human rights, the rule of law, equality before the law, and other components that collectively comprise ‘due process’. Due process most effectively delivers the best and fairest outcomes for all people. This is not happening in present day Tasmania because due process is not being followed. The issue is to define what the components of due process are. This article is an attempt to get that ball rolling in our Tasmanian context.
Politicians as representative of the people
Given that direct voting by the people is impractical, politicians need to be drawn from the ranks of those they are meant to be representing if they are to understand their values, their problems and the choices available to them. We were closer to that ideal when the electorate roughly comprised employees, employers and the rural sector, their interests being looked after by the Labor, Liberal and Country/National Parties respectively. The last two combined thus fitting nicely into the Westminster adversarial two party system. This is not, however, a good facsimile of modern society. Today we are much more varied in our interests and the way we function, and like any functioning system, we should be seen as working interactively and cooperatively. And that is the way governance should work too. A two party system in a society comprising a range of interest and values cannot but leave large sections unrepresented and disenfranchised. Actually it is worse than this because in terms of philosophy the two major parties are captive to the dogma of economic rationalism, which serves corporate interests not those of the people.
Today, political candidates are no longer drawn from the ranks of those they are supposed to be representing. The way to power in the Labor Party is to go to university, catch the eye of someone in the party, and work in the electoral office until such time as you are pre-selected by an older clone of yourself to represent the interests of … who? You and your mates in the party, and the heavy donors to the party who are mostly super rich individuals and corporations buying favours.
We need to fine-tune our procedures for selecting and electing political candidates who genuinely represent the range of sectional interests in society, not the factional interests within their party and their wealthy sponsors.
Accountability to the people, transparency, truthfulness
If the people can’t rule directly, then those who represent them must be held accountable for their mistakes and their failures to honour their promises. That in turn requires transparency and truthfulness. But when government business is negotiated behind closed doors, and when dealing with taxpayers’ money is ruled ‘commercial-in-confidence’, how can governance be transparent?
As for truthfulness, when David Bartlett was appointed Deputy Premier, he made the extraordinary statement: ‘I promise to speak the truth at all times.’3 Obviously he, and no doubt many other people, felt such a promise to be necessary in the mendacious context of Tasmanian politics. And speaking of mendacity, Bartlett’s promise was shredded as finely as Steve Kons letter of appointment of Simon Cooper to the bench. Recall how Bartlett lurched from promising not to rule out a deal with the Liberals on 24th May 2009, to categorically ruling out such a deal with Liberals and with Greens on 25th May, and three months later saying he was prepared to talk to the leaders of other parties, then on 17th Aug promising he would ‘never’ work with the Greens – and now of course he is.4
I’m not just picking on Bartlett, although he did ask for it with his reckless promise. There are thousands of examples of the mendacity of politicians but space forbids.
Independent public service
One of the first things John Howard did was to slash the Commonwealth Public Service, ostensibly on the grounds of economy. However, as he replaced those sacked with many more, and more expensive, minders, the real reason was that he wanted to be advised by those who would tell him what he wanted to hear – even to the extent of forcing senior Naval officers to so advise, against their own knowledge of the truth, in Children Overboard. Howard’s example was eagerly copied throughout all states, and especially in Tasmania.
The Tasmanian Labor Government has 112 minders (Bartlett 20 all to himself) at a cost of over $9 million.5 Of course ministers need advice – that is exactly what an independent public service is for, to give advice that is not skewed – but when the advisor’s job is dependent on pleasing his or her master, they will say what their master or mistress wants to hear. This situation inevitably leads to poor decision-making. Here’s just a few examples of faulty advice: the Royal Hobart Hospital site, the waterfront, health, education, rural affairs (that ‘food bowl’), transport, infrastructure (think Brighton and Kingston bypasses when homework simply wasn’t done), dedicated funds left unspent – the list goes on and on. The fact that Independent Andrew Wilkie single-handedly and in a matter of weeks fixed the RHH mess is a blasting indictment of a succession of Labor governments – and even then, the Minister concerned squeaked the paperwork through only just in time!
An independent and autonomous public service can have its problems, as Sir Humphrey Appleby reminded us, but if the alternative is incompetent and corrupted government, bring on the Sir Humphreys.
Fiscal responsibility
A truly democratic government must be a good caretaker of the public purse. The $9 million spent on incompetent advice-giving is peanuts, however, compared to other examples of fiscal irresponsibility. One of my favourite examples (for its social irresponsibility, cronyism and sheer waste) is Jim Bacon in 2003 giving a 15 year monopoly on pokies to Federal Hotels and generously waiving the licensing fee – at an estimated loss to the State of $300 million. Or take Bartlett’s raising a $27 million taxpayer funded annual subsidy to the racing industry from 5 to 20 years for an extra $540 million in all.
But the granddaddy of them all is of course subsidising the forestry industry, which has received an estimate $638 million over ten years and yet scarcely runs a profit.7 Now the pressure is on. Do we continue to pour millions into an unsustainable pulp industry as it is presently run, create artificial and environmentally damaging markets such as woodfired power stations, in order to keep plantations going that need a 100 per cent tax credit to make them viable and that still make losses?
Equality before the law
In a democratic society, all citizens are equal in the eyes of the law, by definition. This is not the case in contemporary Tasmania. Inequality became law in July 2007 when the infamous Clause 11 in the Pulp Mill Assessment Act was enacted giving one party in the community, Gunns and any person or body representing Gunns, protection from legal redress. This is a privilege unavailable to ordinary citizens. When three residents from the Tamar Valley tried to obtain more information on how the mill had been approved, the Government refused, citing the PMAA, which prevented any legal challenge to the mill’s approval, construction or operation. Thinking that a bit much, in the interests of transparency and accountability, these residents, together with Environment Tasmania, sought leave from the Supreme Court to obtain the requested information. After all, this had a direct effect on their livelihoods. Justice Peter Evans refused, citing Clause 11, and ordered them to pay costs.8 Additionally, as one of the plaintiffs writes, ‘not only did we not get an answer to why the pollies had approved the PMAA, we were told that due to section 11 they did not have to tell us, but we were threatened with contempt and possible jail for daring to ask the question.’9
Two more examples of inequality are lobbying and political donations. The process of lobbying allows the rich to hire lobbyists to push their case with legislators in a way that ordinary people cannot. The fact that many of these lobbyists are ex-politicians with connections and inside knowledge makes it far worse.
Second, donations to political parties allow the rich to donate huge amounts in a not at all subtle attempt to buy the legislative discretion of the ruling party. Thus, in Tasmania, both Labor and Liberal parties permitted forestry practices – clear-felling, ‘regeneration’ burns, unrestricted chemical spraying, the pulp mill itself – that the majority of the electorate are opposed to. Hardly government for the people, but certainly government for those with the clout.
Lobbying should be banned, and political donations heavily capped.
An independent judiciary
This raises the question of the independence of the judiciary. ‘Shreddergate’ was not only a matter of Deputy Premier Steve Kons lying to parliament, it was evidence that the Premier’s Office was interfering with senior public service appointments, including those to the judiciary, according to the appointees’ adherence to the party line. The independence between the executive and the judiciary was at stake. The Law Society, both Liberal and Green parties, and the Director of Public Prosecutions were just some of the powerful voices calling for the appointment of an independent corruption commission.
It is fundamental to democratic process that the judiciary and the executive are independent. Otherwise government critics can be punished just for being critics, as is happening Russia at this moment, and in China all the time.
Rights of appeal
One of the hallmarks of a democracy is the admission that governments and courts can’t always get it right. But that is not what the Resource Planning and Development Commission Legislation (Miscellaneous Amendments) Bill 2009 and associated legislation allows. This Bill, the brain child of then Planning Minister David Llewellyn, allows the Minister to declare a project to be of state significance that is then referred to a small committee whose decisions cannot be appealed. Llewellyn stated that no appeal was necessary because there was ‘no logic’, as he put it, to the notion that a second committee would provide a better planning outcome than the first.10 On that argument we would save a lot of money and time if we did away with all courts of appeal, on the grounds that, like Chinese justice, the government will always get it right first time. It seems that Llewellyn, in his totalitarian wisdom, believed just that.
The ancestor of this infamous legislation is the process of fast-tracking the PMAA itself. These planning procedures give the government power to cut deals with whoever it likes, and without a mandated need to carry out a cost-analysis of potentially deleterious impacts – and without any appeal against decisions reached. In short, a recipe for corruption.
Bill of Rights
A final underlying safety net for democratic processes is a Bill of Rights. Had we had one, it is unlikely the PMAA could have got up because it deliberately excluded from consideration the rights of those living in the Tamar Valley to lead their lives free of threat to health, livelihood and general wellbeing – and incredibly worse even than that, expressly forbade them from seeking legal redress had they indeed suffered such damage.
Attorney General Lara Giddings is to be congratulated for raising the issue of a Bill of Rights but most Australian politicians, unlike those in most in other Western countries, do not want a Bill of Rights. It puts a brake on their ruling for the benefit of powerful minorities instead of for the wellbeing of all citizens – I have already canvassed many examples of that. Human rights legislation makes corrupt government that much more difficult. The claim by politicians that such legislation takes power away from parliament and places it into the hands of unelected judges is disingenuous. It shows that they don’t understand, or don’t want to understand, that proper democratic government requires the separation of powers. And few politicians want to be separated from as much power as they can grab. Checks and balances keep feral politicians under control.
Conclusion
The whole idea of representative democratic government is to bring about the fairest and best outcomes possible for all citizens. In his Gettysburg Address, Abraham Lincoln threw up an inspiring but disarmingly simple framework for achieving that. We need to elaborate the principles and mechanisms that can give practical force to that framework that collectively defines ‘due process.’ I have mentioned a few components of due process – and of course there are others, and better ways of explaining how they operate – but at least it is clear that when due process is not followed, political outcomes for the people are not fair and equitable. The lesson is that when the nature of democracy, and the function of due process, is not understood by politicians and public, and when due process is not followed, fair outcomes for all just will not happen.
Refs
1 ‘Bigger picture ignored’ (Mercury, 18th December, 2010), HERE
2 Horne, D. and Horne, M. Dying, Camberwell, Vic: Penguin/Viking, 2007, p. 211 ff.
3 Mercury, 11th April 2008.
4 As reported in Mercury of these dates.
5 Mercury, 3rd January, 2011.
6 As estimated by Jenni Owen of Citigroup (Mercury, 16th July 2003).
7 Wells, G. ‘Wells Economic Analysis’, Report prepared for The Wilderness Society (Tasmania) Inc. and Environment Tasmania Inc., May 2009, p. 2. Reported in Sunday Tasmanian, 7th June 2009. TT HERE
8 Mercury, 18th July 2009.
8 ‘Stephani of Rowella’, Tasmanian Times, 26th November, 2010.
10 Mercury, 17th July 2009.
Associated …
IN 1990 just over 40 per cent of employees were members of a trade union.
That number now is less than 20 per cent. For a Prime Minister who was elected president of the Australian Union of Students and was a partner at labour law firm Slater and Gordon, Julia Gillard must feel as though her base is slipping.
Labor and the trade unions are generations removed from the ethos and numbers of the maritime and shearers’ strikes of 1890. They are generations removed from the first meeting of the Australian Labor Party, held under the Tree of Knowledge in Barcaldine, and the NSW Trades and Labor Council sponsored Labor Electoral League in Balmain in 1891. These are proud traditions, but about as relevant to today’s politics as the Queen’s speech.
And there is more bad news to come on the union front. The bastion of trade unionism for some decades has been the public sector. The sale of public assets and the outsourcing of various service and IT functions means the prospects for organising in the public sector are declining.
In 1990, an astonishingly high 67 per cent of public sector workers were members of a trade union. That figure today is less than 45 per cent. In the same period, little more than 30 per cent of private sector workers were members of a trade union.
Now, the proportion is less than 14 per cent.
Indeed, the proportion of public sector workers among trade union members has declined somewhat. In 1990, the proportion of public sector trade unionists to all trade unionists was 45 per cent. Now, the proportion of public sector trade unionists to all trade unionists is 43 per cent. This change in the proportion of trade unionists is driven by the relative decline in the size of the public sector workforce.