How Democratic of John Howard. How about we get to vote on a few things at the Federal election.

I wonder if Howard would deny funding for these plebiscites if the States put those proposals forward ?

Mr Howard said the commonwealth offer to fund plebiscites would apply across Australia, not just in Queensland.

How Democratic of John Howard. How about we get to vote on a few things at the Federal election. For instance:

Should we withdraw all Australian troops from Iraq within 3 months of the election?

Should we sell uranium to India or any other Nation if they haven’t signed the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty (CTBT)and are not a member of the nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty (NPT)?

Should the Australian Government ratify the Kyoto Treaty?

Should citizens be able to enroll to vote up until 48 hours prior to an election?

Let Democracy bloom…:)…be a change for this Federal Govt.

But if Mr Howard’s move was an attempt to wedge federal Labor on its support for Mr Beattie’s Government, it looks to have failed.

Mr Rudd called a press conference shortly afterwards to announce that federal Labor would back the law changes in Parliament and would move to let the Government introduce the necessary legislation as early as today.

“When it comes to the imposition of fines, or the threat of fines, and the making it illegal for local authorities to test the sentiments of their local voters if they so wish, I disagree with those courses of action on the part of Mr Beattie,” he said.

“Therefore the course of action outlined by Mr Howard, I’m prepared to support.”

On a tangentially related topic, the City of Sydney is planning on holding a local referendum at the next council elections (September 2008) on whether wards should be introduced and people were not optimistic about the Governor-General agreeing to hold such a referendum in conjunction with the federal election. Clover Moore in fact was using this as a reason to not hold the referendum until the next council elections, with the effect that wards could be introduced at the 2012 council elections at the earliest.

If the commonwealth is going to allow council plebiscites at the federal election, it would make sense for the commonwealth to allow a local plebscite in the City of Sydney on the question of whether wards should be introduced.

The federal government will introduce laws to overturn a Queensland ban on councils taking part in referendums on amalgamations, Prime Minister John Howard said today.

The federal government is opposed to the Queensland government’s plan to forcibly reduce the number of local councils in the state from 156 to 72 and has offered to fund local referenda or plebiscites on the issue.

The Queensland parliament has passed a law which would allow local governments which participate in referendums on council amalgamations to be sacked.

Mr Howard today said federal coalition MPs had approved a draft law which would permit the federal electoral roll to be used to enable referendums on local government amalgamations to take place.

“The law will also provide that any state law such as the law in Queensland which penalises, discriminates against or interferes with local councils or other people being involved in plebiscites, is invalid,” he told reporters.

Mr Howard said the commonwealth had been given legal advice that it can act in this way.

He said the “arbitrary jackbooted fashion” in which Queensland sought to impose amalgamations was “beyond the pale”.

“We’re going to act to prevent that occurring,” he said.

“And we have legal advice that we can do so.”

Mr Howard said the commonwealth was not expressing a view as to whether any individual mergers should occur.

“We accept that in some parts of Queensland there will be strong support for particular mergers,” he said.

Mr Howard said the commonwealth offer to fund plebiscites would apply across Australia, not just in Queensland.