For the people, by the people?

We often forget about the role of the Executive council in post-colonial Westminster systems. This body, presided over in Australian states by a Governor, officially advises the Sovereign's representative. In today's Courier Mail , David Solomon writes on the importance of the independence of the Governor from the Premier - and why that means the Governor should be elected.
"During the republican debate in 1999, Peter Beattie said he might radically change the way in which the Queensland governor was appointed: he raised the prospect of the governor being elected by the people, rather than selected by the premier."

What is striking is Solomon's argument for the independence of the Governor from the Premier, based on the precedents of former Governors in raising specific issues. But in none of the cases have the Governors actually held the Premier to account for their actions. Indeed, this is what Solomon is missing in his article, and perhaps his lecture: he seems to imply that an elected Governor would be better able to question the actions of the Executive Council advising him or her, but he never states this. I'll post an update once the lecture's full text is online.
cam: There was an instance during the waning days of the Bjelke-Peterson government in Queensland where Joh asked the Governor, Campbell, to sack his cabinet through the Executive Council, so that he could replace them with joh-boys. Campbell refused and asked Ahern if he had the numbers to govern.

Most of the times these sort of incidents have no prior convention to follow, and any Governor who seeks advice on them is treated as a leper. When Game asked on the NSW Chief Justice and the British Colonial Office over constitutional issues in 1932, they didn't want to know him or give any opinion.

It is a massive weak point.

The current Westminster thinking is that electing a popular ceremonial executive will mean that the elected person will believe they have a popular mandate to enforce, and since this part is unwritten and without much in the convention or practice, then it is a path to the subversion of parliament and the executive.

The Westminster is weak anyway because of its poor separation of powers, and I don't think a ceremonial executive should be elected, in fact, I think a ceremonial executive is tits on a bull. I know there are others here who have arguments for an elected ceremonial executive.

I reckon if the executive is to be directly elected then we have to break out the executive into a separate constitutional branch that does not mingle with the legislative.

New Zealand's President

Lewis Holden is exploring the issue of what a President would be in a republican New Zealand. He covers the advantages and disadvantages of a ceremonial appointed executive, separate executive and executive elected by parliament.

Any republican system has to be able to explain its choice of executive, especially one that will move from a constitutional monarchy based on a parliamentary system - as Australia and New Zealand are.

Lewis writes that he prefers the parliamentary model :

However, in discussions about deeper constitutional change, such as the separation of the executive from parliament - to prevent the melding of the legislature and the executive and thus protect against potential constitutional abuses by the executive - parliamentary republics still, in my view, stand stronger than presidential systems.

I disagree. I prefer the separate executive of the Washington system. The US system is messy and has massive arguments about separation of powers and checks and balances - arguments that parliaments don't have as those powers which the President and Congress are fighting over are predominantly the domain of the executive in a parliament.

A parliamentary system's calm belies the lack of independent legislative power in it. The Washington system is becoming more dependent upon party machines to provide the checks and balances like the Australian system. This is a recent phenomenon in the US; because of Labor's pledge and block voting in Australia it has always been a part of the Australian political landscape.

The messiness of the US system and its airing of its power struggles between executive and congress in public are a good sign of the deliberative component in liberal democracy.
Lewis: I think it depends on your aim for the political system. I suspect most republicans in Australia and New Zealand want to emphasise that parliamentary republics do have a greater degree of accountability, as a reaction to the accusation from supporters of the monarchy that republics in general do not. In this sense, my argument for a parliamentary republic is admittedly a reactionary one. That said, your point - that the "mess" of the US system airs its power struggles much unlike the Westminster system - is a valid one.
cam: Lewis, I don't think Parliamentary republics do have better accountability than Presidential systems. The checks and balances are just flat out lacking in parliamentary systems because the executive is in the lower house. In unicameral parliaments it is even worse.
Lewis: Ah, well I'm about to argue that due to proportional representation in NZ's unicameral parliament, we should avoid that problem (as is the case in Germany, upon whom NZ bases its electoral system).

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