Better Democracy NZ is a non-partisan, non-profit organisation.

Our mission is to foster the improvement of New Zealand's democratic system and encourage the use of direct democracy through the

Veto, Citizens' Initiated and Recall referendum.

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Tuesday 25 August 2009

"What is to be done?"


This referendum was different from the previous ones because it was in fact a “Veto” referendum on a ‘law’ ‘approved’ by ‘parliament’.

To carry out the instruction from the people all that is needed is to reverse out the Bradford changes at once and with a minimum of fuss. All that ‘parliament’ needs to do is to rubber-stamp the decision taken by the people of New Zealand.

The government reversed out the changes in the NZ honours system without any difficulty, and that was at their own whim, not by any command from the people.

So why won’t our politicians obey us? Why do they kow-tow instead to the orders of a bunch of UN bureaucrats appointed by an assortment of very unsavoury regimes?

I think the reason is simple: they cannot stomach the idea that they should obey the orders of the people. Look around the world; is there any state that has a democratic constitution like that of Switzerland? No, there isn’t, despite that model democracy having shone its beacon for 150 years. And you can see why! The political classes of all states are united in one simple thing: their megalomaniac pride. It means that they will never permit the people they ‘represent’ anything more than the basic rudiments of influence by means of the occasional ‘general election’.

What are the implications? No, we don’t want to use force, even though most of their political systems were imposed by force of arms at some stage or other. We have but one resource upon which they depend like manna from heaven: our votes.

The way to bring down all these misbegotten, moth-eaten, corrupt ‘parliaments’ is for the people to completely abstain from voting in their ‘general elections’. Suppose at the next ‘general election’ farce a bare 20% of the electorate voted. The legitimacy of whatever ‘parliament’ resulted would be nil. This would indicate a complete collapse in confidence in the existing political arrangements and would signal the need for a special People’s Conference to put together our first democratic constitution, closely modelled on the Swiss Federal Constitution.

The technique for achieving this result is patently simple: Don’t vote!

“Don’t vote!” must be our slogan and our unswerving purpose. Therefore, in time for the next ‘GE’, we need to mobilise and motivate the same number of people who signed the referendum demand to throw out the Bradford folly. The task would be absurdly easy: just let us all talk regularly to all of our friends and families, colleagues and acquaintances and explain to them why they should *not* vote.

We can start now.

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2 comments:

Steve Baron said...

Well I certainly agree with you Dominic. In fact for the first time in my life I did not vote at the last elections because I could no longer support party politics. When a government is elected it is with a package deal of bundled policies. Yet we all know one party doesn't have all the best policies and the opposition parties all the worst policies. I even started a website called DONT VOTE. Unfortunately there wasn't a huge amount of interest but there was one enquiry from the press. Until we have binding referendums we will not have democracy. Only a weakened version.

Dominic Baron said...

Thanks Steve. I think we should revive your "Don't vote!" website as the nucleus for a movement for a truly republican constitution. It would be a society, not a political party. A movement with a single aim: to replace the present undemocratic 18th century political slum with a gleaming 21st century democracy. An educated and technologically equipped people deserves nothing less.