[LINK] E-Democracy

[stephen at melbpc.org.au]

At 09:45 AM 24/11/2006, Tom Worthington wrote:

> At 11:34 PM 11/21/2006, Stephen Loosley wrote
>
>> In terms of e-democracy we are still playing around the edges. ...
>
> (I) publicly contribute ideas as to what should be done in the hope
> some of it will be incorporated into the policy process ..

Yes, and good on you for this socially responsible, pro-active work, Tom. 

>> most proposed legislation eventually appears somewhere on the web,
>> but, why not in one central web location with easy-to-use invitations
>> for comment, before debate? ...
>
> It is a bit late to wait for draft legislation. But it would help to
> have drafts ..

Agreed the draft stage is mid-way through the law-making process. But why
not enable Australian citizens to participate in our law-making process at
a stage which still enables sensible amendments, based on public comment.

For example, these two sites could very easily include drafts of the bills
together with a simple form-page allowing for citizen comment. How easy :)

 http://www.dpmc.gov.au/parliamentary/reps/html/reps.html

 http://www.dpmc.gov.au/parliamentary/senate/html/senate.html

or, simply placed here: http://www.pmc.gov.au/parliamentary/index.cfm

For example, there is a House of Reps Main Committee Report on the draft
Telecommunications Amendment (Integrated Public Number Database) bill to
be tabled tomorrow which I am absolutely sure would be better legislation
with considered input from a number of respective Linkers.  Naturally,
voting gives one a good feeling .. how much better the feeling of having
one's input made law, and how much better would be the final legislation?

Cheers all ..
Stephen Loosley
Victoria, Australia