South Australian state MP Nick Xenophon has proposed legislation that would require MPs who resign before a general election to pay for the resulting by-election unless the District Court declared the early retirement was justified on compassionate or other reasonable grounds. The proposal has some superficial appeal.
Mr Xenophon was elected on an anti-poker-machine platform as a “”No Pokies” MP, so his proposal is in the form of a Private Members’ Bill. The major parties have not stated their attitude to the proposal, but they are both likely to be against the proposal – – self-interest being strong enough to overcome the enmity between them that usually prevents an identical stand on any given issue.
Nonetheless, Mr Xenophon’s proposal gives rise to some interesting issues. It would cause some consternation among MPs if instituted in the Federal sphere. Soon after this year’s election, for example, Federal Labor frontbencher, Duncan Kerr, announced that he would leave federal politics and enter state politics. Mr Kerr, who was Minister for Justice in the Keating Government, said he had gone into public life to make decisions, implement policy and shape events. He therefore thought it better to be in the Tasmania Parliament where Labor governs than languishing on the Opposition benches federally. He has a point.
Mr Kerr’s view puts governance ahead of representation. In the Westminster system – where the executive is chosen from the Parliament – it is reasonable to say that governance is a more important function for an MP than representation, particularly where the party system is so strong. MPs are virtually forced by party rules or the history of ostracism to vote with the party no matter what. So the idea that an MP represents his or her constituents when voting the Parliament is a sham.
Independents are rare creatures indeed.
Mr Xenophon says that taxpayers should not have to bear the costs of MPs who walk away from their seat on a whim, or to advance their career elsewhere. He thought the $125,000 cost should come out of the retiring MPs superannuation.
This proposal would be unnecessarily humiliating to defeated Prime Ministers. Often a defeated Prime Minister or senior minister can make a more useful public contribution outside the Parliament. Malcolm Fraser and Gareth Evans are good examples. It would be unfair to ping them the cost of a by-election. The cost – which is a fairly trivial one or two dollars per voter is very significant if borne by one person.
Another problem with the proposal is that any MP facing a $125,000 penalty would sit pat for the remainder of the term, but would not have his or her heart in it. This would be unfair to the people he or she is representing.
A far more important question is whether we should have by-elections at all.
There are no by-elections in the ACT. If an MLA resigns or dies, he or she is replaced on a count back of the votes at the original election. But this can only work in a multi-member electorate. The Federal Senate, which is also multi-member, replaces retiring members with a nomination from the same party. That system was codified by constitutional amendment in 1977.
The Senate system could easily be adopted in the House of Representatives with some appropriate arrangement for independents. After all, government rarely depends on a single seat, and even if it did why should the electors of just one seat get a chance to expel or confirm a government.
Either way, circumstances change in people’s careers and locking people in on pain of a $125,000 penalty seems extreme, especially when one of the biggest changes in an MP’s career is whether his or her party is in government. Better to let them go and allow some new blood in.