Thanks for update, and I am impressed with most of the proposals. I like
the idea of Size of Council being simultaneously determined by each voter.
What about length appointments and dissolutions? There's a lot of benefits
if Council is dissolved only in extraordinary circumstances (like the
Senate), so normally it doesn't dissolve. With half (or 1/3) replaced each
year, and 2 (or 3) year appointments, there would still be annual elections
(and the number then could still be determined by each voter).
Would a small working executive necessarily all be or could Council appoint
from wider ranks or even externally - with nominations by Councillors? If
drawn from Council, would menbers of working executive retain full Council
voting privileges? Would each position on the working executive be
appointed or just the leader? If electing to each position, or just the
leadership, Hare-Clarke PR won't work, but what about most preferred
candidate and 2nd most preferred candidate getting position and deputy
position? As well as inhibiting polarisation, this could be model for 2
member electorates in federal & state parliaments.
Finally what about proxies? If each elected position brings as many proxy
votes as preferences, we'd certainly have "One vote - One Value, and the
'numbers' game would change dramatically, but not necessarily for the
better.
I could add a few more comments but put these in 1st for reactions.
Regards
Jim Stewart
phone/fax: +617 3397 4420 (with Messagebank)
mobile: 04 1427 4420 (with voice-mail)
Subject: Neither Constitution
>[JS]
>
>If it will
>be several months before you have a democratic structure to replace
>current
>elected but dormant committee, could I make a suggestion/question? Will
>the
>new NEITHER democratic structure reflect/incorporate ballots as proposed
>for
>parliaments? It would be a great way to prove the merits. I hope to
>see an
>announcement about that soon.
>
>[AL]
>I was just discussing that with Tom today. I would strongly support use
>of Hare-Clarke PR to elect a "Neither Council" directly by vote open to
>all members.
>
>Size of Council could be simultaneously determined by each voter
>specifying what size they would like (after seeing the list of
>candidates) and taking the median (not average but the number which half
>the voters want smaller than and half want bigger than).
>
>Then Council appoints (and can dismiss) a small working executive
>subject to direction by Council - like Cabinet responsible to
>representative legislature.
>
>Council could meet annually in person and continuously by e-mail.
>
>This or any other arrangement is not the basis for expected delay of
>several months. PR is already used in many associations and I understand
>there is a kit for conducting elections using it available from
>Electoral Reform Societies.
>
>Delay is due to need for:
>
>1) Agreeing on goals, membership criteria and structure.
>2) Forming regional and project groups within which urgent work is done
>and item 1 can be discussed and supporters not on Internet can get
>involved.
>3) Opportunity for people to decide to join, get to know each other etc
>before voting.
>4) Establishing functioning "machinery" with membership database,
>newsletter etc necessary for conducting elections.
>5) Possible incorporated association delays.
>
>Implicit in above structure is:
>
>1) Not based on indirect elections from regions or project groups
>(though people may tend to vote for regional candidates or people they
>work with in a project group).
>
>2) Does not provide any role for "affiliated organizations". (Assumption
>is that we would be joining umbrellas with various other groups in
>campaigns such as "Vote No" in "Republic" referendum or for electoral
>reform, civil liberties etc but there would be no real basis for Neither
>itself being an umbrella coalition of groups as opposed to individual
>members.
>
>My other thoughts on structure are:
>
>3) Membership open to anyone who agrees to the goals and membership
>criteria policies and pays the fees without nomination or approval by
>regional groups etc or requirement to participate actively by attending
>meetings etc.
>
>4) Expulsion of individuals or exclusion of members of hostile
>organizations only in accordance with regulations approved by Council.
>
>5) Regional groups not entitled to exclude members from their activities
>without permission of Executive.
>
>6) Project groups are entitled to select their membership to be
>"like-minded" and able to work together - as opposed to regional groups
>based strictly on geography.
>
>7) Individual members including office bearers not required to support
>or refrain from opposing Neither policies (apart from goals that are
>membership criteria).
>
>8) Official activities of Regional groups and project groups required to
>support Neither policies on matters directly related to Neither goals
>(ie tactics) and required not to oppose Neither policies on matters not
>directly related to Neither goals.
>
>9) Neither to regularly have debates and decide whether or not to adopt
>policies on issues not directly related to its goals - aim of above is
>for it to be clear that support or opposition to such policies is not a
>criteria for membership. Likewise for support or opposition to tactical
>policies. (Purpose being for Neither to also provide a forum for
>political debate generally).
>
>10) Policies decided by Council, not Executive.
>
>11) Both regional and local groups subject to direction by Executive,
>not autonomous.
>
>A major variation on PR which might be of interest is to enable
>continuous replacement of Council members by allowing people to change
>their votes and trigger a recount any time they like so that depending
>on performance Council members could lose their seats. (Say monthly
>recounts).
>
>This would require signed ballots instead of traditional secret ballot
>used in almost all associations for elections.
>
>Secret ballot is primarily to protect against bribery and intimidation
>and may not be all that important for an association like Neither.
>
>One way to get around the conflict between allowing continuous changes
>and having secret ballot is to make it optional.
>
>If you submit an unsigned ballot your name is checked off and you cannot
>change it until next annual election. If you submit a signed ballot then
>it is not secret but you can change it. So the secret ballots are just
>like signed ones that never happen to be changed.
>
>Most interesting thing to "prove the merits" of as example for
>Parliaments would be possible use of ticket based ballot papers with
>anyone able to submit a ticket (at any time if using signed ballots).
>But that is only needed with large number of candidates/seats as in
>Parliament and presumably initial Neither Council would be small enough
>for simple ballot papers listing all candidates to be all that is
>needed. (Could still do it anyway, just to test the idea).
>
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