Some thoughts on Citizen’s Assemblies
Browsing the NZ Herald, late yesterday Adam came across this opinion article, in the NZ Herald, on Citizen’s Assemblies, an idea promoted by The Greens and funding for which was included in the budget.
As explained by the article’s author, Jonathan Rose,himself a past member of one in Canada, the idea would seem to have merit.
Why therefore does Adam have concerns.
In the Ontario example noted the assembly spent time over some 12 weekends in their deliberations and some 103 people where involved for the Ontario province. In addition the selection process was through a mechanism that resulted in a random selection, as per the extract:-
The Ontario Citizens’ Assembly, in which I was involved, was a body of randomly chosen citizens of all walks of life, ages and backgrounds. Random selection ensured their diversity and helped to guarantee that the assembly was blind to race, colour, age, professional standing, learning ability, and class. Through an intensive learning phase, citizens were taught that policy is a product of values and complex issues have no easy answer. Over a period of 12 weekends from September 2006 to April 2007, its 103 members learned from experts, fellow citizens and most importantly, each other. They examined the strengths and weaknesses of all options including the status quo and its recommendation was put to all voters in a referendum.
First problem, Adam doubts that we would have a truly random selection in New Zealand, we would have to have a quota for Maori, Women etc. So the assembly would from the start be dogged by the fact that it was not a random selection and the results would be likely to be skewed.
Second problem, he doubts that in NZ sufficient time would be allowed or resource devoted to learning phase and briefing phases, as well as the deliberation and recommendation phases. You only have to look at the time spent by politicians on reviewing legislation now.
Thirdly, this concept is the product of a deal between the Greens and Labour as noted in this extract from another article also in the NZ Herald:-
The Green Party wants a “citizens’ jury” into taxpayer funding of political parties to get well under way before the election to try to stop it being scuttled if National wins.
During negotiations last year over the electoral finance legislation, the Government promised the Greens it would hold a “citizens’ assembly” comprised of ordinary voters to look at the funding of parties.
The jury was allocated $4.3 million in the Budget, but the terms of reference and logistics of running it have not been finalised.
The jury is unlikely to survive a change of government. Yesterday National deputy leader Bill English said his party did not support it and described it as “part of a grubby deal done between Labour and the Greens over the Electoral Finance Act.”
Green co-leader Russel Norman said the party wanted the assembly running before the election so it was harder to derail if there was a change of government.
Dr Norman said the jury was the best way to consider the issue of party funding, because it was non-partisan.
Because of the EFA and the lack of all party consultation the concept at present appears to be tainted, further given that it is to consider only taxpayer party funding and that “Red” Russel wants the assembly up and running pre-election, it is hard to escape a conclusion that the desired result is a pre-determined one, especially as Adam suspects the expert panel to run in concert with the assembly would be likely to be stacked with a one way view given the past track record of this administration.
The Greens were a willing party to driving through the EFA. Thus in some respects their democratic credentials are tarnished.
There appears to be no intent to allow any review of the EFA, despite the fact that clearly it is a badly drafted law which would appear more than suitable as an area of consideration by a citizen assembly.
Whilst not against the concept in principle, Adam would need to be certain that the expert panel selection is from a ‘broad church’ of views, that assembly membership is truly random, that the assembly was given generous time to meet, be briefed and to hold sessions. Further, the terms of reference should not be constrained to drive conclusions to a foregone conclusion.
For this reason Adam supports the conclusions reached by David Farrar at Kiwiblog in his earlier post on 5 June on this matter in which Mr Farrar suggested in his conclusions:-
Now this is not to say the concept of Citizen’s Juries do not have a place in electoral law making. I think they do. They can provide some very useful input if done the right way. But the way I would use such Juries are as follows:
- The independent experts must be chosen by a super majority of parliamentary parties, not just by the Government of the day. The formula which I like is that any appointments must be agreed to by party leaders representing over 75% of the MPs and over 50% of the parties in Parliament. This means that not only must both major parties agree, but so must at least half of the minor parties.
- The issues, terms of references and high level process must also be signed off by that super-majority. The most unforgivable crime that Labour and the Greens have done with the EFA is to treat electoral law as a bauble for the winner, rather than a bipartisan constitutional law.
- Issues referred to a Citizen’s Jury should be in totality, not just a narrow aspect such as taxpayer funding of political parties. It is ridicolous to exclude from consideration all the issues dealt with by the Electoral Finance Act. In fact the EFA should be abolished immediately upon a change of Government, and a citizen’s jury could be used as part of the process of consulting on and determining its replacement.
It is a shame that what is a perfectly fine concept is being damaged by its use by the Greens and Labour in such a partisan fashion. I mean Russel Norman is already calling for its timelines to be determined so that National can be attacked over it, rather than any sense of what a proper time-frame would be.
This post is possibly the first of several by Adam on this topic. He references this resource page from British Columbia for others who might be interested in the topic.
At present Adam is in a learning phase on this subject.
He is concerned that this sort of body, whilst potentially useful, may be subject to politicisation in some manner, under the guise of ensuring balance and equity.
Adam is concerned that the promoters of the concept have apparently not sought to obtain all party agreement on the concept.
Adam would prefer to see progress made on true constitutional reform and the introduction of appropriate checks and balances on the powers of an at present over mighty executive. He thinks that these result in far too much poorly drafted and ill considered legislation being drafted and passed into law with a consequently deleterious effect upon the compliance with and attitude to law.
The worst outcome of all would be to have such a ‘jury’ foisted upon us with an ‘Ingrammed’ terms of reference.
