Oh come on JK

[mashman]

who does he think he's dealing with!

http://nz.news.yahoo.com/a/-/top-sto...oved-by-march/

[Dino]

Proves that democracy only ever works at election time!

.

[rainman]

Proves that democracy only ever works at election time!

For a given value of "works", I suppose. But yes, our only option is to vote the baastids out.

What this proves to me that the "March for Democracy" was a ferkin waste of time. If you want to change the law on referenda to make them binding, draft some legislation and get an MP to introduce a private members bill. Prepare a clearly articulated set of responses to how this would work in practice, how referendum questions have to be set up, etc. This protest was just a lazy indulgence.

[p.dath]

For a given value of "works", I suppose. But yes, our only option is to vote the baastids out.

What this proves to me that the "March for Democracy" was a ferkin waste of time. If you want to change the law on referenda to make them binding, draft some legislation and get an MP to introduce a private members bill. Prepare a clearly articulated set of responses to how this would work in practice, how referendum questions have to be set up, etc. This protest was just a lazy indulgence.

+1. I want it to be binding, but to put that into legislation would be difficult. Imagine if the public gave a simple yes/no vote - and then it is left to the politicians to turn that into a piece of legislation with all the special clauses, definitions, and finer points of law. It may not end up quite doing what the public wanted.

So you could put proposed legislation into the referendum - but then it would be too complicated for the average member of public to vote one.

[jaymzw]

Yeah, John Kirwan. What a bastard....

Oh...what?

[mashman]

+1. I want it to be binding, but to put that into legislation would be difficult. Imagine if the public gave a simple yes/no vote - and then it is left to the politicians to turn that into a piece of legislation with all the special clauses, definitions, and finer points of law. It may not end up quite doing what the public wanted.

So you could put proposed legislation into the referendum - but then it would be too complicated for the average member of public to vote one.

Creating the bill would be easy in comparison to getting it passed. We overwhelmingly said no to anti-smacking and they ignored us! There was no money involved in that... Good luck with getting a bill through that would allow the people to have their say and the result be binding.

[Genestho]

For a given value of "works", I suppose. But yes, our only option is to vote the baastids out.

What this proves to me that the "March for Democracy" was a ferkin waste of time.

Or was it??

The point of a march is not in itself to create change but bring the issues publicity, and create awareness. Discussion from '5000' attendee's - brings the issues to the public for debate. (Yes there was more than ONE!)

Quotes - post march ..more publicity, interweb chatter, more publicity.
Goal achieved.

There's already real work and communication behind the scenes addressing some issues raised at the march.

[scissorhands]

The more marches and protests against the nats the better for us.

The nats will be feeling VERY VULNERABLE right about now. And have called media to close ranks around them to prevent a VERY POSSIBLE slide into pre Xmas mass dislike for this administration.

Unless someone else (not bikers or march for democracy) steps up with a major protest action, maybe being the straw that broke the camels back, Xmas may come and go and The Government will wash off Nov/Dec 09 in the forgotten memory of the new year.

[The Pastor]

The mistake was made when they (labour greens + some nats) voted in the smacking law.

It would be a HUGE mistake to change the smacking bill right at this point in time.

The government is sitting under urgancy until the end of the year to clean up a lot of smaller / quicker to change / bring in new laws that they promised would be made before 2010. THIS IS THE REASON THEY WERE VOTED IN. THIS IS WHAT MOST PEOPLE WANT (but dont quite understand how politics work/belive the hype).

In order for the nats to change the law, it would not be a simple "lets change it, whos in favour" It would take MONTHS of debating and aruging in and out side of parliment. The cost wouild be astroflippingnomical.

The truth is this, No one wants the smacking bill. I dont want it, and thats part of the reason i voted national BUT it doesnt really effect anyone. Dose anyone have a case of a parent being charged over a light smack on the hand? I can't recall any.

So what would you do?

Spend a STACK load of time and money changing something that wont effect day to day living at the expense of breaking your campain promises (hint try to get out of the ressession, and set us up for a few years till labour come back and spend it :P)

OR

Ignore it now, fix up all the changes national promised then deal with the smacking bill at a later date?

This anti democracy bullshit is naivety of the mass public. - Blame the wankers who brought it in in the first place.

[Skyryder]

These dorks are wasting their time. I'm not going to go about the pros and cons of Bradford's bill 'cause it's getting so fucking boring. Most of us have moved on.

Bottomline on this is that Key knows they will keep voting National or ACT or the Family party who can not even muster enough support to get past the threshold. As most are so anti Labour they will do anything to keep Goff from winning the next election and so will still support the right no matter what Key does. The most popuar right wing party are the Nats so why will Key change his policy on this?? He won't and it's about the only thing he has not changed his mind on..............so that should say something.

In short these 'dorks' have nothing to bargain with. Some one needs to tell them that and move on with the rest of us.

Skyryder

[rainman]

Even the Herald gets it:

About 5000 motorcyclists roared into Wellington this week and the Government backed away from an accident levy increase recommended by the board of the ACC. Many times that number voted to restore a parental right to violence this year and the Government was unmoved. Is this fair?

A "march for democracy" in Queen St tomorrow will say no. Instigators of the smacking referendum have made common cause with similarly disappointed campaigns to demand that citizens-initiated referendums become binding. But if they think it unfair that a rough and ready "bikoi" succeeded where properly conducted postal ballots have failed, they should think again.

The bikers' apparent success - ACC Minister Nick Smith told them the Government is unlikely to agree to the full increase - shows our system of government is not impervious to public pressure. A good argument, forcefully presented, can be persuasive. A poor one, promoted on emotion and confusion, can be ignored. This is how democracy works.

Tomorrow's march organisers are advocating a different sort of democracy: "direct democracy" in which binding decisions are made by a majority of citizens who bother to vote in referendums. This country's law has provided for citizens to petition for non-binding referendums on any issue since 1994.

If Parliament had made those referendums binding, we would have been saddled by now with some strange decisions.

The number of paid firefighters would have been frozen at the number employed on January 1, 1995. That is what 87.8 per cent of voters wanted at the first referendum, initiated by opponents of a change to the way firefighters were deployed.

The number of MPs would have been frozen at 99 rather than the 120 a royal commission recommended for MMP. A smaller House would reduce proportional representation, which was chosen by referendum. Consistency would be a certain casualty of direct democracy.

At a referendum in 1999 nearly 92 per cent endorsed a call for the criminal justice system to put more emphasis on victims' restitution and compensation, plus minimum sentences and hard labour for all violent offences. Parliament introduced victims' impact statements at sentencings and decreed five years' non-parole for all serious violence. But the Sensible Sentencing Trust was evidently unsatisfied. It is a co-sponsor of tomorrow's march.

All of these referendums produced majorities in the region of the 87.4 per cent that wanted a smack to be permissible "as part of good parental correction" a few months ago. The Government is able to over-ride that decision because the question was biased, the voters were under a misapprehension that a smack for any purpose is now illegal. Few realised that the law expressly permits reasonable force for a range of stated purposes.

The issue, in short, was not as straight-forward as the citizens' initiative pretended. It was a subject better left to elected representatives with the time and interest to study the legal subtleties and social implications. If their legislation resulted in unreasonable prosecutions or caused too many difficulties for parents the representatives stand to suffer at the next election.

That is how representative democracy works. Decisions are made with advice, consultation and deliberation by people who must seek endorsement at elections. Rule by referendum would be far more rigid, which is why it is suitable for constitutional arrangements but not for the ordinary grind of good government.

If non-binding referendums have been a recipe for disappointment, binding polls in California have been a fiscal disaster. Many of those marching for direct democracy tomorrow would be the first to regret it.

Or as Bomber puts it over at Tumeke!:

It’s simple, don’t hit your kids, let's move on, there is an economy in freefall and a massive unemployment about to hit us from the double dip recession. We have much bigger fish to fry than bullshit like this.

[The Pastor]

The bikers' apparent success - ACC Minister Nick Smith told them the Government is unlikely to agree to the full increase - shows our system of government is not impervious to public pressure. A good argument, forcefully presented, can be persuasive. A poor one, promoted on emotion and confusion, can be ignored. This is how democracy works.

I hate reporters.

[mashman]

I hate reporters.


The bikers' apparent success - ACC Minister Nick Smith told them the Government is unlikely to agree to the full increase - shows our system of government is not impervious to public pressure. A good argument, forcefully presented, can be persuasive. A poor one, promoted on emotion and confusion, can be ignored. This is how democracy works.

for getting it right?

[ManDownUnder]

Proves that democracy only ever works at election time!

.

LOL... ummm - yeah. That is how it works. We get ultimate say... every election day

[Ixion]

We dun invented a new word! Outside KB !

That may be my only claim to fame !