Actually none of these analogies are very good. The US Presidential election
is an electoral college, but everybody knows which of two identified
candidates their electors are going to vote for, and nearly all of the
States appoint their delegates to the electoral college on a simple majority
basis with only a few smaller States using a proportional system.
With judicial appointments the appointees now hold office for a fixed term
that is non-renewable and significantly longer than the elected term of
those appointing them, so there is some balance in the result.
The GFA electoral system was valid when the GFA was actually a federation
where its members were the 5 state Associations, but this changed quarter of
a century ago so the members are now all of us, but still the old voting
system is in use and most Clubs (in most States) take very little part in
their State Association activities - not even competitions! Most GFA members
don't know who the candidates are within their State Associations or who the
State Association has in mind to be its Councillor/Board Member, because
nominations do not occur openly around the general membership.
Unfortunately, the system is self-perpetuating and it will take a major
upset or a major change of thinking among the present Board members to alter
the system.
I am currently in the UK and watching a major change unfolding in the way
the British parliament administers its internal affairs... I trust the GFA
will not need such a jolt to prompt a more open succession plan.
Wombat
----- Original Message -----
From: "Roger Browne" <[email protected]>
To: "Discussion of issues relating to Soaring in Australia."
<[email protected]>
Sent: Tuesday, May 19, 2009 10:45 AM
Subject: Re: [Aus-soaring] democracy and the GFA
Exactly like the system used to elect the President of the United States.
(Electoral College).
Roger
Mike Borgelt wrote:
Yes Harry, a rather poor analogy.
The GFA system analogy would be as if your vote as a citizen stopped when
you elected your local council(club) who then sent representatives to
become your State Parliament(State Association) who then sent
representatives to Canberra to form Federal Parliament (GFA Board) which
had an Executive, which had been there from before anyone could remember,
which appointed representatives from say the Public Service, the ACTU and
the Business Council of Australia, who together with the Executive had a
majority in the Parliament which could out vote the appointed
representatives.
I'm sure we'd all be happy with that.
Mike
04:03 PM 19/05/2009, you wrote:
Hi All,
The big difference is that the judiciary interpret the laws made by
parliament, which is democratically elected and can change the rules we
live by if it doesn't agree with the judiciarys interpretation, ( and
has done so not infrequently, particularly in regard to taxation,)
subject to the constitution, which also can only be changed by an
overall majority vote of electors and a majority of states. If we had an
arrangement like that in the GFA we would all be happy.
Sorry, but really no comparision, you will have to find a better
example,
Regards,
Harry Medlicott
----- Original Message -----
From: <mailto:[email protected]>Mark Newton
To: <mailto:[email protected]>Discussion of issues
relating to Soaring in Australia.
Sent: Tuesday, May 19, 2009 1:35 PM
Subject: Re: [Aus-soaring] democracy and the GFA
On 28/04/2009, at 3:16 PM, harry medlicott wrote:
The sticking point is that the Executive and Board of Directors are not
elected by the popular vote of fee paying members, but by a convoluted
system involving club committees, state associations and the Board then
electing an Executive who may never have faced a vote of any kind.
This separation of the Executive from the general membership is pretty
unique. I know of no other organisation whose compulsorily fee paying
members do not have a direct vote in electing the powers-that-be.
I know of one: The judiciary.
In Australia, citizens vote for members of parliament, and those
members form an executive which directly appoints judges.
The processes of electing MPs and of appointing judges are
separated. The main benefit of the separation is that the judges
won't be seen to have conflicts of interest when they make
decisions which affect citizens, because citizens have played no
part in the hiring/firing decision. Judges are free to draw
whatever conclusions they see fit, secure in the knowledge that
they'll never be held accountable by those affected by their
decisions.
I think there are a great many exact parallels between that process
and GFA's governance.
I'm not being judgmental about this. It's entirely possible that
the GFA (and/or GFA members) believes there is some kind
of overwhelming benefit stemming from a management
structure that's independent from the members. If so, the fact
that this issue has been a controversy for as long as I've been
gliding would seem to suggest that they've spectacularly failed
to communicate the attractiveness of the status quo.
- mark
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