There is no valid reason of governance or constitutional allowance for the federal government to put a plebiscite on the Queensland council redistricting during the federal election. It is outside the national governments jurisdiction and further "the mergers will be law when any ballots are held".

I fully agree with the argument that the councils should have home rule and the legislative ability to construct their own charters rather than have the state government do it, but this is nothing to do with the national government.

I read somewhere that this may be an attempt to get the same electoral effect as the ballot initiatives in the United States during the 2004 Presidential election where constitutional amendments to ban gay marriage at the states were included in the state elections.

The US tries to make state and federal elections occur on the same day including any referendum and plebiscite questions. They are a state based authority and it was not the federal government putting these on the ballot, it was the states, though I do not doubt that the Bush Presidential campaign was behind the suggestion.

I don't see how Howard can do this, or even if he will bother. It is probably enough politically that he has even mentioned it.

There has to be some wariness of cynicism that this is just a political stunt and there really isn't complete disdain by the Howard government for the separation of powers between the federal and state governments - it is just electoral pragmatism.

But as these new establishments of sovereignty over the states responsibilities grow it is corrosive on the whole federalist system and leads to new layers of overlap in responsibility, authority, services and funding. They end up having an effect far greater into the future than just a temporary electoral one.

For those that intimately care about political structures and their benefits as technologies this behaviour is quite repulsive.

Update - I read the plebiscite being used in a similar manner to the US ballot initiatives at Poll Bludger.

Apparently one narrative for why we went through six years of bad governance was because Howard thought Costello would be worse. I cannot accept that; for it to be true we would have to ignore the Schmittian governance since 2002 including the out of control governance in the last two years with emergency after emergency and executive whim. Howard was fine as Prime Minister until the Tampa Affair when he effectively stated that he was willing to trade good governance for maintenance of power. This is sufficient to explain why he would not pass on the reins to Costello.

I think Costello would have been fine as Prime Minister, no worse in corruption than any of the other Prime Ministers we have had. The malignancy in the Liberal Party's governance only came as they exhausted their policy outlook and then they sat on power. They abused government and executive power in the weak Westminster system to maintain that power. This is where they tripped up. It is also why they were voted out in a landslide.

Bad governance gets governments kicked out. Especially if there is a credible opposition.

Howard's tenure has to be judged under the damage he has done to liberal democracy, executive power and anti-federalism. In this he comes short. It is hard to see how Costello could have done worse. If anything a change would have brought the Liberals back to something less Schmittian, as we are seeing with the Rudd government as it seeks to disentangle itself in the electorate's eyes from what was seen as the excesses of Howardianian government.

Chris Evans' speech on the closing of detention centres outlines Labor's policy toward what the Howard Government called illegals. The closing of the detention centres and some of the worst abuses of arbitrary governance from the Howard Government are very welcome. There is no information whether the hole in the Migration Act that allows the executive to act arbitrarily will be closed or not.

While the Pacific Solution is being dismantled mandatory detention will persist and the use of military assets to police immigration will also be used - for a task which is civil. The Rudd Government will also keep the arbitrary definition of what Australia geographically is by having - what will be politically motivated - 'excision zone'.

However it is good news that a more liberal and humane approach will be taken toward this aspect of immigration and that executive and political excess will be halted by Evans and the Rudd Government. Which will be a good thing.