The Australian government system has been originally created in 1901 through the Constitution. With the fundamentals carved in the Constitution, the Australian System is often referred to as a ‘Washminster System’ as it is a hybrid of the Washington (US) and Westminster (UK) system of government. With the fusion of North America and the United Kingdom’s government systems, the phenomenon of the bicameral system was implemented in the Australian system. Bicameralism’s origins are from England and it was later established in the United States. Hence, the onset of the Australian system’s structures was anglocentric by reflecting the foundations and concepts of England. However, the concept of bicameralism is known to have existed since medieval times and has since been in the chronical of the Western political progress for centuries. Bicameralism is an important system in the Australian government. It refers to a government which consists of two chambers, or houses. Alike North America, the houses are known as the House of Representatives (the lower house) and the Senate (the upper house). On the other hand, in the United Kingdom, the chambers are known as the ‘House of Commons’ (the lower house) and the ‘House of Lords’ (the upper house). In 1789, North America altered their constitution in order to ratify how the American citizens were represented. Through bicameralism, the House of Representative would represent the people equally by population, whereas the Senate would
In his article Marsh (2010) suggests that the Australian political system could benefit from new infrastructure by replacing senate with committees of
The legislature of the Commonwealth, is bicameral, much like our Congress, it is composed of a Senate and a House of Representatives. The Senate, made up of 40
The Texas Legislature is bicameral composing of 31 member state senate and 150 member House of Representatives. The legislature has power of the purse as well as direct the activities of the state government; it is regarded as the most powerful arm of the government in Texas. Some of the duties of the legislature include consideration of the proposed laws and resolutions, constitutional amendments for submission to the voters as well as appropriation of funds for operation of the state government.
two houses is called bicameralism and it was set up by the Constitution in Article
Canada has a Parliamentary Democracy system of government. Its governmental system holds the law as the highest authority. The Constitution Act of 1867, is the beginning of Canada’s Constitution, which stated Canada shall operate under one Parliament that will include three distinct elements such as, The Crown, The Senate, and The House of Commons. In addition, Canada as a federal state shared lawmaking between one federal, ten provincial and three territorial governments. The Legislature has the power to enact laws, which consist of persons chosen to represent the Canadian people. The system is called Representative System of Government. The Federal Legislature is bicameral that has two legislative chambers, which includes an Upper House,
Look at pages 11 and 12 of your ‘Inside the Parliament of Victoria’ booklet and answer these questions.
The separation of powers is that the controlling mode of a political entity is separated between three powers (the legislature, the executive and the judiciary). Then,It is necessary to introduce and understand the meaning of these concepts and the relationship between them in conjunction with the Australian Constitution. The Australian Constitution and the Chinese Constitution are similar to the written constitution. The first three Chapters of the Constitution grant each of these three powers to three different bodies established by constitution. These three different bodies are the Parliament (in Chapter I), the Executive Government (in Chapter II), and the Judicature (in Chapter III) respectively. They call them the three arms of government
It is very evident that Queensland does not have to reinstate an upper house to be an effect government. This is due to that the original upper house was unable to do its job effectively of reviewing and negotiating laws and bills. Especially amending money bills that the lower house passed, due to that its members came from elitist group of wealth and education (Queensland Parliament, 2010). This elitist upper house resulted in a lacked of diversity, therefore laws that where made for working class Queenslanders, were rarely passed.
Firstly, a government’s claim to a majoritarian mandate can reduce Australian politics to an ‘electoral democracy.’ The opposition might be able to criticise government policy but according to this theory they have no right to amend, block or delay government legislation. This reduces the role of members of parliament, pressure groups and the media to simply channel public opinion. Broader participation in the political process is limited by the government’s claim to an all-powerful mandate. Furthermore, in recent parliaments, the will of the government has been frustrated by the parliament. However, it is because of this fact it can be argued parliament produces better legislation due to poor legislation being blocked. Australia’s two-party dominance, reflecting the majority of people’s will in the lower house has been proven effective and the Senate that is designed to act as the ‘house of review’ is an effective check on the people’s will. Despite this, the ‘review’ function of the senate is becoming increasingly a reflection of the ‘will of the parliament’ and this is contributing to parliament becoming dysfunctional. The Turnbull government hopes to resolve this through a double dissolution later this
It is irrefutable to say that, voting is a freedom of choice. While Australians are bound to vote at every election, whereas Americans keep their freedom alive. I am inclined to believe that casting vote is totally individuals choice but at the same time, it is equally important for our country welfare. This essay will discuss the advantages of a keeping voting system mandatory, thus will lead to a logical conclusion.
The two reasons why the framers created a bicameral system was for theoretical and practical purposes. The theoretical part of the bicameral system is because the framers wanted a sense of “checks and balances” which led them to believe that a unicameral legislative system may have a lot of power centralized in one institution. But by splitting the legislative into two separate parts formally called “the House” and “the Senate” respectively, the two legislatures would serve as checks against each other's powers, in theory it would prevent either one from amassing too much power. The practical part of the bicameral system is because the framers wanted a sense of practical politics. At the Constitutional Convention it included delegates from
Political thinkers Rousseau, Locke and Montesqieu claimed that the powers of government should be limited, divided and checked. The principle is that there should be a division of government executive, legislative and judiciary powers into three separate arms or institutions that act separately and are independent of one another (members of one branch cannot be members of either of the other two). Australia’s constitution separated powers by delegating the legislative power to Federal parliament (s.1), executive power to the Governor General (s.61) and the Judiciary to the High Court (s.71). However due to Westminster conventions (adopted from the British system of parliament) commonly practiced by the Australia government, the members of the executive (cabinet) are selected from the legislative by the Prime Minister (going against the concept of having no cross-branched members). The PM (also Westminster convention) is not mentioned in the constitution and yet exercised executive power; for example in 2003 PM John Howard exercises (s.68) by sending troops to Iraq. The constitution also provides the executive with the power to appoint the High Court Judge (s.72) and thus is could be argued that the executive has power over the Judiciary in that sense; However the constitution actively safeguards the position of the Judiciary by stating the High Court Judge “Shall not be removed except by the Governor-General in Council, on an address from both Houses of the
The Australian political system consists of many different levels of power. While the government is set up with a system of checks and balances, the power of different people, agencies, and organizations depends on rules, laws and ultimately the Australian Constitution. There are many different components to the Australian political system. They range from the Queen, exercised by the Governor-General, all the way down to the people. The people could be the most important part of the political system, without the people there is no Australia. But there are two components to the political system that stand out the most. They are the Australian Prime Minister and the Australian Parliament. These two parts have different responsibilities to the
The Division and Separation of power are essential to keep our societies rulers to have a restriction on their powers. The importance of each on the Australian domestic law especially in relation to the rule of law, and protecting individual rights, and the legal system.
Parliamentary and Presidential democracies are forms of government that similar in some respects and differ in others. The Parliamentary system like the Presidential is divided into three separate arms of Government, the Legislature, Executive and the Judiciary. Both democracies have a bicameral legislature, often referred to as the House of Representative and the Senate. The House of Representative is elected and the Senate is appointed by the Head of State on the advice of the Prime Minister in a Parliamentary type while both houses are elected by the people in the Presidential system.