The stunted country
Not so long ago, Australian tourism chiefs decided to put together a TV advertisement trying to lure visitors to this far-flung corner of the planet.
A simple enough task - or so you would have thought. But they were presented with a mind-boggling problem: of how to promote a country in which individual states and territories compete against each other for tourism cash.
Confronted by this dilemma, they came up with the most unhappy of compromises. The advertisement would run, but it would not include any shots or footage which viewers could easily identify as being from, say, Queensland or New South Wales.
Under this formula, the Sydney Opera House was banned. So, too, Uluru and the Great Barrier Reef.
Australia was trying to promote itself without being able to deploy its most instantly recognisable landmarks.
It launched into a global advertising campaign with its hands tied behind its back. And they were bound with bureaucratic red tape that's a remnant from the time, 107 years ago, when modern Australia came into being.
This story came to mind after reading your comments on Lucky, Lucky, Lucky? - specifically the remarks from respondents like Carltonblue, Rolinator, paulcrossleyiii, klldbbydth and Aussiened about the rivalry between the states, and their often dysfunctional relationship with the federal government.
I've been meaning to blog on this for a while, because you can construct a fairly strong argument that this relatively small country is made even smaller by its fractured and fragmented system of government.
Victoria vies with New South Wales. New South Wales vies with Queensland. And everyone vies with Canberra.
After federation in 1901, the process which produced the Commonwealth of Australia, the six former colonies eventually agreed on things like a standard gauge system for the railways - although up until 1917, a passenger travelling from Perth and Brisbane had to change trains six times.
But there are still points of strong divergence between the states on a range of subjects, from how federal infrastructure projects should be distributed to the management of the vital Murray-Darling basin, which irrigates the country's food bowl.
The Murray-Darling has now been nationalised, but that has not stopped the inter-state squabbles over how its water is distributed.
I've spent much of this week with farmers in the Lower Lakes of South Australia, at the terminus of the Murray River, who blame mismanagement, even more so than the seven-year drought, for their vanishing supplies of irrigation water.
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The environmentalist and former Australian of the Year, Tim Flannery, reckons that 130% of the Murray/Darling basin has been allocated to farmers, which demonstrates the extent to which individual states have plundered this great national resource with little regard for their neighbours.
Is Australia's nationhood sometimes a little stunted because its system of government encourages state-focussed provincialism? More comments on this please.
A final word, for the time being at least, on the economic front. The Anglo-Australian Rio Tinto has just announced that a slowdown in demand from China will last longer than expected, and had got noticeably worse over the past two weeks.
As Matthew Stevens writes in The Australian: Rio Tinto "effectively announced that the Great Wall of China that stands between Australia and the full force of global financial turmoil has been breached".
On the sledging front, PSHINOZ wins the award for the most gratuitous reference to Britain's medal haul at the Olympics ("yep Australia is economically sound so they should be able to pay for new Athletes for 2012").
This got me thinking that I should institute an award for the most tendentious and strained reference to the British medal haul at the Olympics, featuring a crate of Australia's finest beer as prize (Knapstein, since you ask). Or perhaps not.
On the cosmetic front, trinity47 complains about the "Clint Eastwood stare" in the byline photo that adorns this blog. Admittedly, I've been wanting to change that for a while. I was thinking of a picture of me on Bondi beach in a pair of budgie-smugglers, but have decided to save that for my Christmas cards.
Any other ideas are more than welcome. As Clint himself would say: the good, the bad or the ugly.
I'm 
© MMIX~RS~q~RS~~RS~z~RS~40~RS~)
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Nick, I have been saying for ages now that we have at least one too many levels of government in Australia and the level that is superfluous is State Government. That was brought home recently in NSW with the departure of the unlamented Morris Iemma and the appointment of Nathan Rees as Premier. As the Sydney Morning Herald put it, NSW is now run by the C-Team.
As for tourism, I regularly find brochures for Queensland in my copy of the S.M.H. so a lack of state governments shouldn't prevent the various tourist bureaux from hawking their wares. But I still like the "Where the bxxxxy hell are you?" campaign.
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I'm not sure the Australian federation is the dog's breakfast suggested here. Not quite
The UK is likely to lose Scotland, Canada has its separatist Quebec, Belgium seems to function in 2 halves, there are separatist movements and 'provincialism' all around the globe.
Meanwhile Australia is still an intact federation, 107 years down the track.
What has happened is that the original restriction on centralised power - similar to the US federation - to preserve state power has changed. I think Australians are less parochial than in 1901, think more in national (and international) terms and our system of governance should reflect that
The change in attitude might even have something to do with compulsory voting
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This parochialism is countered by the viewpoint that many of us consider that the three-tier governmental system is ridiculously flawed, and that a two-tier system (a federal government and regional governments) would be a better option then the current arrangement. Nevertheless, the state-based provincialism and the "tensions" between the states, while they exist, are generally only taken jokingly.
Oh, and Knappstein? There's better beers than that out there, I'll tell you...
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I agree that Australia could loose the State governments. Australia is really over governed. Do we really need 8 differnet Departments of Health? Think of all the money that could be saved by centralising administration.
I think Australia really is over governed. As a lawyer, the various Governments can't even agree on a centralised system of regulation. The same with employment law etc. This makes doing business in Australia so much more expensive.
Living overseas I see the more lax way that countries regulate themselves. I sometimes wonder if our love affair with legislation comes from our criminal past? Anyway, cutting complexity and reducing overall government spend can come from cutting the state governments.
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Now wouldn't the rust belt southern states just love to abolish the states just to get their hands on the riches of WA and Qld. We who live on the site of these assets cannot get the state government to spend money here as they woo the population centres to buy votes.
Imagine trying to deal exclusively with Canberra.......no way. Most inhabitants of the rust belt states have no idea where the money comes from which enables them to purchase their fancy imported sports automobiles or fancy TVs etc etc.
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Our way of organising the country may seem a little clunky but in the end it doesn?t really matter - all types of governance have their drawbacks. No matter what system you have, people will find out how to either make it work, or get around it. They always do.
That is why the world can have many varied types of democracy and governance and still end up with remarkably similar results. Now if we had better politicians?we might get somewhere.
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I tell the world I'm Australian. But, in my mind, that's a qualified to *Queensland* Australian.
I love Melbourne, I don't much care for Sydney and I'd love to visit Darwin. I love my country but I often feel more patriotism to my state than my country. Currently living in England, I'm more interested in what Premier Bligh is doing with my home, than with what Prime Minister Rudd is doing with my country.
Queenslanders, particularly those of us who live near the NSW border, often joke that we should cede from the rest of Australia. We're only half-kidding.
It's been said "God" is the magic word in an American presidential speech - it just reels in the voters. In my home state, that magic word is "Queensland". Beattie couldn't say it enough and we can't hear it enough.
I'm not sure, though, that what I feel is any different to what anyone feels, anywhere in the world. Isn't a Sydneysider fiercely patriotic over their city - they're a Sydneysider first, Australian second?
It's just an ongoing story of tribalism and small communities and the smallest common unit wins.
As an interesting aside, when I'm overseas, I'm much more nationalistic in my approach. I might bump into an Aussie from Perth - a stranger - but they're like family. Not from Brisbane, alas, but then nobody's perfect ;)
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Is it any surprise Australia has one of the highest tax rates in the world - we need to pay for all 3 levels of government and bureaucracy. What a huge administrative overhead the country has to pay for - and what good to the nation are: 8 Health Departments, 8 Treasury Departments, 8 Commerce Departments, 8 Planning Departments, 8 Tourism Departments.... I go on...
How can this ever change, will the State politicians ever vote themselves out of a job, I don?t think so.
Ok 100 years ago you can understand a country so vast required decentralised administration, we are now in the 3rd millennium, surely in another 200 years Australia won?t be in this situation, not that the monarchy is a huge topical issue in Australia, but if Australia ever decides to become its own sovereign state lets go the next step as well and do away with the State Government?s as well, they don?t seem to make any difference other than cost.
I agree with the comments of another reader, this is not good for business and industry having 8 different state laws, how does this attract foreign investment in the current economic climate?
Come on Canberra, Nationalise the State Government like the Darling-Murray - you know it makes sense - and so do the Australian people in this 3rd millennium, let?s have a referendum on it.
Canberra dare you do it?? Dare Canberra even suggest it?
The only people who want this middle layer of Government are the State Politicians themselves on their fat salaries and what good do they do, they just got NSW $1Bn into deficit, what is the possible answer from state government .... raise taxes ;-)
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Nick, Australians did not put the lines on the map of Australia, the English colonial government did. How could they cope with such a big country as England fits into 2/3 of Victoria the smallest mainland state? To abolish the State Governments would require a referendum and history will inform you that they are often rejected. The biggest problem is that Australia has a two-tier political system e.g. Labor and Conservatives (Tory). Consequently, we often have these parties ruling some states and federally. Only recently we found Labor in all states, both territories and federally. We hope the Kevin07 can put a slice through the parochialism that emanates in all states. While visiting Western Australia as a TAFE Queensland officer I had morning tea with the TAFE teachers in a Perth Institute. All they did was bag Victoria, as they were unaware that I was born in that state. On Leaving I remarked that I saw mostly Holdens, Ford or Toyota cars in their car park, and I asked where did they think they were manufactured? Both Victoria and Queensland were created as the people desired to escape New South Wales as they could not work with them. Now you suggest to have the second tier of government as regional councils that are often ruled by the National Party (never). Leave us alone as we need to generate finer Olympic athletes to ensure we finish in front of the UK in London.
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If Australia acts a little provincial at times due to the action of the state versus state mentality on some issues, thats fine. As a country we do well in pretty much all areas. Compare The European union with its collection of states to Australia. Europe is discordant on almost all issues and the world wonders if the states will ever evolve into the country of Europe with many member states. In some ways Europe is over a century behind Australia. At least we speak with one voice internationally and when we work together we are frequently unbeatable. Europe has much it can learn from its friend down under.
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These states are worse than useless, they put the country backward. I'm sick of this sick state of Queensland. 'Where else but Queensland?' as the ad says, do we have to go without daylight saving. Where else but Queensland do they pump water 2000km from Cairns instead of 20km over the border from NSW? Where else but Queensland would they hire Dr Patel to kill off half the state?
Sure you can say that it is all in jest between the states, but there is always truth in jokes. I wish Kevin would get rid of the states once and for all, or at least get rid of there power.
Who knows how many counties there are in the UK? No one knows and no one gives a rats.
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gawd possum do always say inaccurate nonsense. Try and be a little objective and only quote facts and not fiction and others may take a little notice in what you have to say.
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Ay up, the natives are getting restless.
It would seem that our eminent leader, Kevin, agrees that we are overgoverned and inefficient to boot. He has just anounced that if the states don't clean up their act, he's going to take on the hospitals and put them into the federal bed pan. Let's hope the schools are next...
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Don't hold your breath possum as it will never happen.......no votes in it means no go show. What makes you think fat cats in Canberra will do any better...unless you are one of them!!!
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They couldn't do any worse, that's for sure. My local hospital in Queensland is inefficient beyond belief. The specialist doctors here have been hired en masse since Jayant Patel hit the media. In certain specialisations the public guys do one tenth of the work that the private guys do. I am not exaggerating. It is an outragous waste of tax payers money.
Give it all to Canberra I say Through this credit crunch we will all be forced to tighten our stethoscopes, and it has been a long time coming for the State governments. I don't know about the other states, but what goes on in Queensland Health is a disgrace. From one knee jerk reaction to another.
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Hedley Thomas, who writes for the Australian did a pretty good expose on Queensland Health in "Sick to Death. A manipulative surgeon and a health system in crisis - a disaster waiting to happen."
All the wrong people seem to get promoted in Queensland Health. People who love administration and research. Why not leave research to the Universities?
And that's another thing. Research centres. Do you know how many centres of research we have in this country for, say, cancer? There's research centres in each state as well as the federal one all competing to find the answers first. What an outragous waste of taxpayers money is that? And what better results could be achieved if they were all working together co-operatively.
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Wow, it's nice to see that the US is not the only country to deal with the issue of local v. state v. federal governance! Actually, until I read this article I didn't even know that there were 8 states in Australia!
Sometimes, having a variety of departments in government allows for an interesting system of checks and balances - maybe one state is doing something different that another state may find interesting, or maybe your federal government can pick and choose portions of each states' rules that fit most people, like ours tries to do.
You are a young country - younger than the USA - and a true world force to be reckoned with. You have a lot to be proud of; you've overcome greater adversity than almost every other new country out there. Who cares if your ancestry is a mixed mutt bag - so is ours in the USA. It is really a strength you can play upon.
You are right, the advertising campaign is a bust - much of the world does recognize such things as the Great Barrier Reef and associates it with Australia, but just as easily associated are kangaroos and koalas and other wildlife indiginous to your great country. I saw an ad for Australia recently and it wasn't until the very end of the ad that I realized it was for your country, not a portion of mine.
My husband and I dream of visiting some day - mostly havent' because of the expense of flying literally halfway around the world from Wisconsin - and we know there won't be enough time to visit every portion of Australia, but intend to do some very thorough research before we come (I am envisioning 5-7 years, because of kids and budgets) and pick our destinations based on our own interests - not just the splashy oft-touted images seen throughout the world.
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wow! with the exception of some State Patriotism (Statriotism?) it seems most Aussies don't reckon much to their state governments, and the system that they're part of.
If incognitrix and others feel worried that by doing away with state governments they'll loose their identity, I don't think that has to happen. We Yorkshire folk still feel pretty strongly attached to our county, even though we voted against greater regional government (probably because we're also tight and recognised it would be a waste of money!).
to ianeholmes - politicians tend to concentrate more on people than hectares, so the size of the country is, to some degree, immaterial.
NomadsUsR - if the state system worked so well, wouldn't it be Queenslanders and WAers who were driving the posh cars, while Sydney and Melbourne became quiet backwaters?
If doing away with the States meant the end of the cheesy, cringe-worthy approach that Queensland has to marketing itself I'd vote yes in a flash.
"I love you Queensland, cos you mean the world to me...."
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All together now ...
"Life is great in the sunshine state".
Love it.
If NSW is being run by the C team, I wonder what letter Queensland would get? An F comes to mind.
And what about those embarassing number plates "The Smart State". They were right up there with the Victorian plates "The Place to Be". Wot a laff.
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The only reason I believe Queensland to be the best state is because it is...and Iv'e seen em all. At least we don't have that stoopid "shaped daylight" thingo.
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"QLD, Beautiful one day, perfect the next" .... then fair to middling for approximately 3 months.
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Oh come on Nomads, what is it about daylight saving that you don't like? Please don't tell me it's to do with the curtains.
You wonder where they get all these songs and slogans from. Like that Queensland logo with the scratch marks across the state. It look like someone is desperately trying to get out.
And the latest logo they've got for Queensland is Q2. Queue to get in hospital, Q2 get a bipass, Q2 get a hysterectomy, Q2 get any medical procedure you care to mention.
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Possum figures never lie. Qld is the fastest growing state because EVERYBODY wants to live here. At least the premier of the day had the good grace to allow us a referendum on daylight saving and that was after a trial period, something the other states never had.
If you can't think of an intelligent anti-daylight saying the old schoolyard curtain quote will do. We've heard them all and all it does is to transmit the lack of intelligence of the perpertrator, two-bit journalists included.
Jo used to say the southern states needed an extra hour trying to catchup to Qld....... wasting their time trying.
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Nomads: "Qld is the fastest growing state because EVERYBODY wants to live here"
And soon the entire south east of the state will be paved over with new Lakeside, Marina or Golfcourse living housing developments.
Qld ......you mean the world to me......
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Paul, thanks for that, I enjoyed your post.
Mads, it seems ironic you bringing up old Joh. His argument is similar to the fading curtains in that it infers that daylight saving creates an extra hour in the day.
Since you asked, I would like daylight saving because I believe my quality of life is improved by having that extra hour of daylight in the evening rather than sleeping through it in the morning. It means I can got to the park with the kids, or go out with friends for a walk. It's so lovely. I spent half my life with daylight saving and half without and I prefer being with it.
In Europe daylight saving was tried for 3 years before people decided whether they wanted it. I think that if Qld had really wanted to give it a fair trial they would have tried it for more than one year before putting it to the vote.
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I'm kind of new to this whole daylight savings debate thing - it comes as a shock that it'll never be light until ten at night.
But just think Nomads, if we were given it here in Qld we'd be able to make much better use of all those outdoor BBQs that are so generoulsy provisioned in this state, maybe a couple of shops and takeaways might also be persuaded to stay open too...
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Paul - it could be just the boost the economy needs right now.
All together now...
Life is great in the sunshine state
Every Queensland heart sings a song
From the northern rains
To the western plains
It's a full and promised land.
Every mile every while
There's a sunlit smile
And a welcome handshake too
For life is great in the sunshine state
May it's sunshine keep smiling for you.
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Possum, that one pre-dates my time in the "promised land", but I'll be sure to look up the tune.
Is there a Qld government department devoted to the cheesy song production? I do hope so, perhaps my crossing the street tax has been well spent after all.
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Paul "life is great in the Sunshine State" predates my time here too. It was written in 1958 for the centenary of Queensland in 1959.
Be warned, you may become familar with it during Queensland?s 150th celebrations in 2009.
But hey, let's sing our song. All together now...
Where 'as tha bin since ah saw thee, ah saw thee
On Ilkley Moor b?ah t?at
Where ?as tha bin sin ah saw thee
On Ilkley Moor b?ah t?at
Thou's bin a courtin Mary Jane, Mary Jane
On Ilkley Moor b?ah t?at
Thou's bin a courtin Mary Jane
On Ilkley Moor b?ah t?at
Tha?s gonna catch tha death of cold, death of cold
On Ilkley Moor b?ah t?at
Tha?s gonna catch tha death of cold
On Ilkley Moor b?ah t?at
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Where the ducks play football
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It's interesting to consider New Zealand's political structure as a contrast. Like all the Australian states, NZ was a British colony with a bi-cameral parliament. It was invited to join the Australian federation in 1901 but declined.
Some years later NZ's upper house was abolished leaving the country with a simple, unicameral system and (as of today) only 120 MPs. Decision making there is observably quicker and less complicated than across the Tasman.
Of course, NZ's opt-out may possibly have cost it in economic terms (at least until the introduction of CER), but that's another issue.
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Anna Bligh is encouraging all of us to work hard for Queensland and make it a better State: well, daylight saving would help - we would then be in the same time zone as the rest of the east for 6 months of the year and my husband would not have to spend 6 months of the year catching planes the evening before to get to an early start meeting in Melbourne, Sydney or Canberra.
And has anyone else in Brisbane noticed how QANTAS can't seem to keep to timetables? I think in the past 8 months or so, only a couple of planes caught by us have been on time.
Incidentally, when we last bought a new car (6 years ago), the garage assumed (rightly!) that we would *not* want a Smart State numberplate.
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Punctdevedere, well done on the NZ streamlining, but 120 MPs for a population comparable to Queensland, please don't give Commander Bligh ideas.
Susan, we had a hire car when we first arrived here and it had Smart State Plates. We proudly drove into New South Wales (arriving an hour late of course - true) assuming it was based on some kind of fact about the intelligence of Qld, are you saying it isn't based on fact?
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I live in Australia and don't get me wrong, it's always been a great place to live (great weather, etc, etc, etc) I still feel though that this country is NOT immune from the global economic crisis and call upon Kevin Rudd and Wayne Swann to save the banks while they are still in-tact, check the health of the financial system and keep a very strong eye on the budget deficit/surplus. I'm no economic minister but that is what I believe voters would want them to do.
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As an Australian living in Canada I now have a whole new perspective of the Fed/State/local government "power sharing" - Up until I left Australia late 99 I too thought that the states were verging on superfluous, however the last 9 years in Canada have me realise what a comparative legislative paradise we have in Australia compared to the mountain of disfunctional waste, duplication and pettiness found here north of the 49th parallel. we may complain of duplication in Australia but here in canada with no national education policies, no national labour policies, state based income taxation (with federal inocme tax on top), among many other things, that Canada functions as a successful nation-state is almost a miracle.
I love Canada, almost as much as Australia, but in terms of co-operative and functional Government it is Australia 1/Canada 0.
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Australia has to be one of the most over-governed countries in the world. It's a wonder that anything gets done, given the way the system works. Parliamentary terms are too short, the Senate has too much power, and the proportional system means that, even though voting's compulsory, you have to be psephological genius to exercise your democratic rights fully.
From a political science perspective, Australia's federal system is interesting. The theory says that you need federal systems where countries are divided by cultural, religious or language barriers - as in Belgium or Switzerland. But there aren't any significant cultural differences between the states, just historically competing interests.
To get rid of the state system, you'd need to shake up the whole lot pretty radically. Local government areas are much smaller than in most of the UK, so they'd have to be bigger, but then you'd effectively be diluting democracy at the lowest level. It's interesting that sub-regional government is gradually increasing in the UK. London, with a population similar to some of the Australian states, has its assembly and mayor. Manchester is developing a city-region structure too.
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Quote: Is Australia's nationhood sometimes a little stunted because its system of government encourages state-focussed provincialism?
Doen't that sound rather reminiscent of the current European Union problems?
Oh, are we talking about a Federal Republic here?? When will it happen?
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Mr Bryant, gratuitous? Tut tut. Mr Morris sends his regards from Wales!
PSHINOZ
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