Could a hung parliament that’s unable to pass any legislation be one of the best things that could happen to us right now? I’m being serious…
Passing legislation is only a ‘good thing’ if the legislation itself is good. And lets be honest here, there hasn’t been much good legislation getting through the lower and upper houses this decade so far… so what if we just stopped passing any legislation. Would that be so bad?
It’s not unprecedented, as Peter Hartcher writes in this excellent article. I urge you to have a read!
My thoughts didn’t go to Belgium as Peters did, mine went to the US government’s ‘shutdown’ from 2013. If you’re not sure what that was, take a look at this Vlog I did at the time:
An incredible thing happened as tens of thousands of ‘non essential government workers’ (I didn’t know there were ‘essential’ ones…) stayed home… life went on! In fact as you’ll see in the video, the US Feds had to go out of their way to make sure that the American people felt ‘put out’ by the shutdown. If it weren’t for the government deliberately screwing with people, most Americans wouldn’t have known or cared!
Combine the US experience with that of Belgium, and you’ll start to see that I’m entirely serious… what if they just didn’t pass any legislation for three years till the next election…? Would that be so bad? Sure we’re going to rack up a bunch more debt, but as Peter rightly points out, we’re going to do that ANYWAY, even if they can pass legislation… and I would argue that we would accumulate debt faster if we have a ‘functioning government’ (another oxymoron) vs a hung parliament…
Sadly I don’t think it’s likely. Bill Shorten and Malcolm Turnbull are both too power hungry to miss an opportunity to rule, and they’ll do deals with the devil himself (or the lower-house crossbench, which may be even worse) to get the top job. The crossbench will be only too happy to lend their support to either of them in return for the right price… which in this case means billions of our dollars being wasted on their particular pet issue…
Yes indeed, the more you think about what would have to happen in order for a minority government to form, the more attractive a hung parliament starts to look…
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