People-led democracy is the answer to Australia’s political malaise

Dr. As governments become increasingly disconnected from public needs, people-led inquiries and democratic forums offer a way to regain influence over policy and spending decisions, writes Bronwyn Kelly.

WITH ANNOUNCEMENT regarding an intention contained in the last Federal Budget cut $37.8 billion National Disability Insurance Scheme for four years (NDIS), it’s clear that something terrible has happened to Labor and its commitment to Australians.

This is the government party that is proud to have enabled millions of disabled Australians to participate in the economy and society when it established the NDIS. This secured their hope for a good life. So what is it that, not 15 years later, has led Labor to so severely cut aspects of the NDIS that support disabled people’s social connection and economic participation?

As someone outside politics, it is impossible to predict the reason for this regrettable policy change. But no doubt the standard explanation would be about the alleged lack of money.

Those who understand how money actually works in an economy like Australia, where all currencies are printed by the government, will understand this directly. They will point out that the Government, as the creator of money, cannot escape money. Like John Maynard Keynes correctly observed, “We can really afford anything we can.”. Money is not our problem.

But the Government clearly tends to fall back on hollow and hopelessly unconvincing themes such as the need to ensure the NDIS is “fiscally sustainable”; because it plays into its donors and their neoliberal preferences for low public spending, low taxation (or none at all for some businesses), low public debt (rather than low private debt), and a balanced federal budget.

In the past, under Labor, all human lives were valued; but Labor’s now balanced federal budget apparently casts a shadow on human life.

So the current Labor Government has decided that it is preferable to sacrifice the lives and quality of life of millions of disabled Australians and their families rather than risk offending its big corporate donors and those in the media who long for neoliberal austerity.

This is all the more appalling given that although a fiat currency-issuing government would never need to balance its budget, this time it could do so by covering the expected future costs of the NDIS with a tax that would not fall on Australian consumers, namely a 25% tax on gas exports.

These and many other options were available to satisfy the government’s completely unnecessary obsession with balancing the budget. And yet the Government has chosen to doubly harm Australians by attacking disabled people and allowing unseemly private profits to be made from environmentally damaging mining and gas exports.

Despite recent changes and negative practices to capital gains tax, the Labor Government has a deeply ingrained fear of tax reform; Unless overcome, this fear will condemn Australians to ever-increasing austerity in the provision of services that are essential not only to our survival, but also to the private sector’s chances of making sustainable profits. The Australia Institute also called for national plebiscite A 25 percent tax is imposed on natural gas exports.

The plebiscite is an excellent idea. like its last launch people’s investigation into AUKUSPublicly-led investigations and policy reform programs are a long overdue democratic response to bad government. They can provide access to decision processes that will allow ordinary Australians opportunities to influence good policy design.

Throughout the 21st Century, a range of anti-democratic policies, particularly in the rules on lobbying and political donations, have significantly reduced the influence of ordinary Australians compared to large corporate donors and their lobbyists. Australia’s electoral system is now so distorted by allowable donations that we no longer have a one vote equals one system, as we would expect we deserve in a democracy. We have a system that is closer to one vote equals zero.

Of course, the reform that would restore the political equality of individual Australians more definitively than any other would be a complete ban on political donations and the proper funding of elections through the Electoral Commission, thus protecting political communications fairly for all. But since we cannot reasonably expect any Labor or Conservative government to give up on donations and instead campaign on the strength of good policies, there is little point in expecting fair reform of electoral distortions.

It is better to immediately join any forum that can be organized by ordinary people to devise policies that will minimize the irrational impulse of governments to deny a decent life to vulnerable sections of society, such as the disabled. The sooner we organize democratic forums driven by such people, the sooner we will prevent governments from taking even more unnecessary risks with our lives.

Today disabled people are singled out, but tomorrow it could be any other group; perhaps women, Indigenous Australians, students, immigrants, people of different genders, the elderly or children.

However, people’s research and other forms of organized grassroots-led policy analysis and development will have limits to their effectiveness unless they are organized to help the Government escape its moorings.

For example, Based on previous surveysAustralians could vote overwhelmingly in a referendum to impose a 25% tax on gas exports. However, if the Government consents to such a referendum and, in the even less likely event, agrees to impose the levy, we can expect no assurance that the levy will lead to the reinstatement of the NDIS or increased spending on any services essential to our health, safety and well-being.

Labor and Liberal/One Nation governments will be much more likely to insist on an adjustment of the Federal Budget rather than paying down government debts. Unnecessary fiscal prudence and austerity will continue to our detriment and endanger us.

The smarter way, then, to organize people-led reforms, especially tax reform, is to direct them toward a redesign and expansion of the Federal Government’s spending programs. An agreement needs to be reached with the Government not only on how tax should be reformed to make it fair, but also on how much the Government should spend and where it should spend to protect the health and well-being of the public. After all, why else do we choose them?

This does not mean that plebiscites on taxes and public inquiries into clearly bad policies such as AUKUS should be abandoned. On the contrary, it should be encouraged. But if we choose to respond by launching another popularly-led inquiry or referendum every time the Government veers into austerity, we will end up miserable, getting far less than we need.

The more productive option for time-starved Australians is to start designing these people-led forays into democratic decision-making so that we have a better chance of ensuring the health, safety and wellbeing of everyone.

A more effective model of this type of people-led reform process has recently been proposed by Australian Commonwealth Future Planning (ACFP). called Australian Public Interest CollaborationThe proposal allows ordinary Australians to collaborate as equals with the Government to design a new social deal; In this agreement, we can accept fair tax reforms of our choosing in exchange for certain guarantees about what public funds should be spent on.

This kind of forum gives people a gateway into the federal budgeting process that will prevent the kind of unnecessary austerity most recently demonstrated in the horrific cuts to the NDIS.

Dr Bronwyn Kelly is the Founder of Australian Community Future Planning (ACFP). He specializes in long-term integrated planning for Australia’s society, environment, economy and democracy, and governance systems for nation states.

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