A Modest (and somewhat stupid) Proposal

Here in Australia we face the very real possibility that our Prime Minister will be dumped in favour of someone else.  When the other party, the Australian Labour Party was in power, we started off with Kevin Rudd as Prime Minister.  He was dumped by the party in favor of Julia Gillard, who was then eventually dumped herself in favor of Kevin Rudd once more.  Now with the Liberals in power, it appears this sequence will repeat itself once again though with different characters.  This all reminds me of one of the best episodes of Gilligan’s Island called The Little Dictator.  In this episode, an ousted Latin American dictator played wonderfully by Nehemiah Persoff, lands on the island.  He has the only gun on the island and takes control.  There is a sequence in which the dictator walks with Gilligan, whom he has at gunpoint to a meeting of the castaways.  They go behind a rock and an off screen struggle ensues.  When they emerge, Gilligan holes the gun on the dictator.  Then they walk behind a bush and another off-screen struggle takes place.  When they emerge, the dictator has the gun and the two continue walking.

This seems to be what Australian politics is all about lately.  But aside from constant speculation of who next week’s Prime Minister will be, the country seems to be mismanaged as well, though probably not as poorly as one would think based on what the media tells us.  But it does seem that Australia is run like Gilligan’s Island sometimes.

So why not consider something different.  Why not have six year alternating terms.  The Liberals run the country for six years with everyone in both house and senate being of that party.  Then, Labour gets the gig for the next six years with everyone in both houses being of that persuasion.  Of course we can’t really do this because then we would not be a democracy.  The people would not be allowed to vote on the issues nor would they be allowed to choose a candidate.  So let’s modify this proposal slightly.  Let’s say that each party must nominate three candidates per district per term and the people can choose which candidate they want.  That way, the illusion that the people actually have a say in their government can continue.  Thus, the Liberals put up three candidates per district, all Liberal, and the people elect which one they want, and so forth.

While this is probably a ridiculous idea it does have some benefits.  For one thing, elections would not really matter that much and the public would not be bombarded by them.  We would elect our local representative and that’s it.  Second, since we know the party in power only gets six years regardless, they can go about managing the country without worrying about poles, speculation, or policies.  What?  I hear you ask?  Of course they need to worry about policies.  To this I counter, why?  They don’t worry about it now.  Policy is really only meant to fool the public into electing them.  They don’t do what they say they are going to do anyway.

But this proposal, as it stands, does have one weakness. . .OK maybe a few, but I’ll only concentrate on one.  Since there is no accountability, why would the Prime Minister manage at all?  Why wouldn’t he have a six year party at taxpayer’s expense?  No reason.  So I have to modify this a little more.

The way to do this is to put some rules in place which will minimize the damage mismanagement could do.  For example, we could mandate that every 20 years, a comprehensive tax review takes place and changes to taxation can only occur within one year of the review’s conclusion.  The other 19, no changes.  No tax increases, no tax decreases, nothing.  The law stays as is.  We can do the same for superannuation.  Between reviews, no changes, no tinkering.  Imagine how much stability this would give everyone.  Business confidence might actually rise because everyone would know what to expect most of the time.  The Reserve Bank continues to be independent.

As an incentive for the Prime Minister to manage properly, if he gets ousted, he loses his pension.  If the budget is in deficit when his term is over, none of those in power for the last six years get one cent of pension.  I’m sure we could think of a few more rules to put in place to force those in power to manage properly.    And finally, since we still have elections every six years, the public gets to vote on the approval rating of the party who was just in power.  If the approval rating of the party which was last in power is 40% or less, none of them get any pension, any perks or any government subsidized benefits of any kind.  Of course this last idea would make the politicians slaves of public opinion just as they are now.  But there is one difference.  The only way to get out of any approval rating jam is to do a competent job.  If, instead, they argue and bicker as to who will lead them, then they will lose any benefits they could have had because there is no way that kind of behavior would increase their approval rating.

So there you have it, an absolutely ridiculous idea for fixing Australia.  I mean, it is ridiculous right?  Sure it is.  And yet. . .Yes, definitely ridiculous.  Absolutely ridiculous.