Citizens Jury to review elections
Ms PATTEN (Northern Metropolitan) (18:36): Before I start, I would just like to wish everyone a merry Christmas. I hope you all have a lovely break and come back with renewed energy for this place—
Members interjecting.
Ms PATTEN: I know. It is day one, but somehow—
Members interjecting.
Ms PATTEN: Yes. My adjournment matter this evening is for the Special Minister of State, and it relates to electoral reform. As we are well aware in this house, the joint house Electoral Matters Committee is required to inquire into, consider and report to the Parliament on any proposal, matter or thing concerned with the conduct of parliamentary elections and referendums in Victoria. Having sat on this committee in the 58th Parliament, and I hope that I might get the opportunity to do so again, I know that it acts with integrity and has completed some excellent work. But it still remains the situation that those who get elected review the election, and while I know we do this, there still seems to be an inherent conflict of interest. Certainly it could be perceived as that.
I have every belief that the Electoral Matters Committee can and will thoroughly review the 2018 state election, but I also believe that the system needs to be reviewed outside, and outside to us. I know that many of us will have had comments made about the system over the election period. Post-election I have certainly had people asking, ‘How can we do democracy better?’.
We trust citizens juries on complex criminal trials every day. We trusted a citizens jury following the dismissal of Greater Geelong City Council in 2016, when the Victorian government consulted with the community on the structure of its future elected council. That was a groundbreaking engagement process. No other community had ever before had the chance to influence its council structure to this extent. That 100-person jury, which met over four days and considered a wide range of inputs and information, set a fine precedent for a community review of democratic processes.
With that successful process in mind, the action I seek is that in parallel to any work of the Electoral Matters Committee the Special Minister for State commission a citizens jury to review the 2018 Victorian state election and make recommendations to this Parliament on the conduct of future elections.
Fiona Patten MP
Leader of Reason
Member for Northern Metropolitan Region
Adjournment matter 19/12/18
Answer
Mr JENNINGS provided the following response in the House:
Ms Patten raised for my attention a matter dealing with a review for electoral reform. If this was a citizens jury in this chamber, I would think that probably at the moment something in the order of 30 or 40 of the members of this chamber would actually be pretty happy with the electoral outcome, but we do not take that for granted. Ms Patten is actually putting on record that there may be some people in the community who may have a different view from the views of those of us in the chamber in relation to whether we think the electoral outcome is a good one or a bad one. What happens is that the Electoral Matters Committee of the Parliament will review the effective operations of the Parliament, so a committee will be established in the Parliament to look at that. The Victorian Electoral Commission itself will have a look at these matters and actually look at the review of the effectiveness of the operations of the election.
I will take consideration of what Ms Patten has implored me to look at, which is in fact to use a particular method, a citizens jury, as the way in which we may review the effectiveness of the electoral outcomes and the way in which our electoral system works in terms of determining the outcome of this chamber. But I start from the premise of recognising the choice of the people and the outcome of the election on the basis of the method of electoral process that has led to us all being here. I do not start by questioning the legitimacy of any member that has actually arrived through the electoral process, but I look forward to the debates and consideration of the appropriateness of that method into the future.