Rudd stated:

"What I'm signalling firmly, strongly today is it's time for the buck-passing to end and it's time for the real work, with sleeves rolled up, to begin," Mr Rudd said yesterday. "These are huge challenges for the nation," Mr Rudd said. "The time for buck passing has come and gone. I think the Australian people are tired, just sick and tired of all the excuses which their politicians have served up for so long as to why progress can't be realised in these critical areas of public policy need."

The only reason buck passing is possible is because the national government has delved so deeply into the states' revenue stream and responsibilities. We have a broken federal system which has been smashed through successive anti-federalist Governments and High Courts.

A government is only supposed to raise enough revenue from taxes to support itself and no more. This is not the case in Australia as the national government does 85% of all taxation in the country. Half of the state budgets are dependent on nationally raised taxation revenue such as the GST and Grants.

The quickest way to fix federalism in Australia is dump the GST and Grant system. States would become responsible for meeting their own budgetary needs. This would force them to revisit their agreement allowing the national government to tax income exclusively, curbing the national government's fiscal power by eroding their monopoly on income taxation. (more)
Ken Parish has an article on federalism, or the lack thereof in the case of the Northern Territory and how that has led the National Government to remove property rights on an arbitrary basis. Constitutionalism and vertical separation of powers through a federalist political structure is important in maintaining liberty and basic rights. (reply)

The federal government is going to poke their noses into the curriculum of High Schools. The public school system is run by the states. NSW, Victoria, Queensland and Western Australia should collectively tell the federal government to bugger off. It is none of their business, and the feds best stick to policy in areas that the federal government is responsible for. Anything else is bad governance. (more)

I am not a fan of the GST. I consider it an anti-federalist tax. I would accept it if it was funding the federal government, but since it is redistributed to the states, and not one for one, it breaks the principle of a government only raising the revenue it needs to support itself and nothing more. (more)

Julie Bishop made a speech on 'history' rather than education. (more)

The Australian History Summit was recently held by the Commonwealth Government in order to strengthen teaching of history in schools. Public schooling remains a State based responsibility so this can reasonably be viewed as an anti-federalist imposition by the federal government. However, there was some interesting comments by Paul Kelly on the Insiders which leads the question to be asked; in the current environment where governments are heavily entrenched at the federal and state levels, is the real opposition to the state governments the federal government and vice versa? (more)

An excise is imposed on producers and their production, as opposed to a sales tax which is imposed on sales by retailers and wholesalers. Section 90 of the Australian Constitution grants the federal government an exclusive right to impose duties of customs, excise and export of goods. Successive High Court decisions have expanded the definition of excise beyond production to the point of sale. (more)

George Williams has an op-ed in the Sydney Morning Herald warning against not only the vertical tax imbalance present in our system of government, but also the unrestrained anti-federalism. His recommendation is to have another series of constitutional conventions, as we did in 1890, toward solving the problem of federal/state authority and rejuvenating our system of government. While Williams did not state that his recommendation would be part of a Republican convention, this is what maximalist Republicans would desire. Australian Republicans are democrats too and demand good government above all. Republicans are more than aware of the weaknesses in our system of government. (more)

This time Jon Stanthorpe is the one copping it . The party room's discipline extends to the State and Territory governments - even if they are labor. Huzzah for anti-federalism . (more)

The Federal Government continues its hostility toward State autonomy in taxation. Costello is asking Western Australia to remove taxes it levies, and instead rely entirely on the federally collected GST for tax monies. As it is, the federal government collects nearly 90% of all tax collected in Australia. If any should be removing taxes it is the federal government. (more)
Cam Riley: South Sea Republic. Freedom, liberty, equity and an Australian Republic.