I think we can all agree that the Senate is no longer a States' House. To that end, I wonder what forum members feel about the following change to the composition of the Senate:

Instead of the Senate being directly chosen by the people, half the senators are appointed by the GG (or President) BUT each political party must have such number of senators equal to the total percentage of votes received in the House of Reps (i.e. if the Greens get 10% in the House of Reps nationwide (whether or not they win a seat)), they'll get 10% of the seats in the Senate. One advantage of this is that micro-parties that appeal to specific voters in a particular State will have less chance of being chosen in the Senate, given that their votes would be swallowed up by the nationwide vote. I support a multi-party democracy, but not one that contains one-seat parties that are extremely parochial.

The idea behind this different Senate is to also strip away its powers. To this end, I would follow the House of Lords model: if the Senate rejects a Government Bill (not a private member's Bill) once in two successive sessions of Parliament (i.e. one sitting-year), then upon the second rejection the Bill automatically passes the Senate and becomes law. Money Bills (such as supply) are restricted to a one-month deadline by the Senate.

Given that the majority-party is not likely to control the Senate, there's no risk of the Senate just sailing Bills through, but neither can the Senate block the Government's agenda, making the House of Reps fully accountable for its actions. I think this manner is better than the current system of two rejections in 3-months, followed by a DD and a joint-sitting.

An argument against this is that the House of Reps would simply 'load the Senate' with Bills, wait for the second rejection and then have all their Bills passed. If only our Government worked that hard! And in any case, at least the Government would be doing something and would be fully accountable for those Bills. Given that elections are every 3 years, the Government is subject to frequent scrutiny anyway.

august,

none of this dreamtime stuff will ever happen until the Socialist United Nations sets up its One World Govt which they are trying to do by stealth.

Basically they propose an extreme Socialist centrist govt and local extreme Greenie councils that will control your every move.

You probably know if a Senate will exist at all.

Already the IMF is trying to goad Australia into dramatically increasing its foreign govt borrowing so that Australia will default on its loan payments and then the IMF can SEIZE control of all Australia.