Why does Australia nee 8 parliaments,with hundred to sustain?

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â€¢ Koala â€¢ uÊop É¹Çpun

I'm not behind you on nothing mate - you are not talking any sense!

iamaustralian

You have no bloody idea what you are talking about do you?

mmdjaajl

i have had a few beers BUT NOT THAT MANY what the bloody hell you on about?

The_Mouse

Hi - there. Been on the town doing the pub crawl, have you?

LOL
by the way, you mentioned "JUNCKETS" [sic]..... isn't that what people used to have as a dessert/snack type of thing?

Suzieq

because our country is separated into states and each state/territory has its own government. keeps things interesting

But Why??

Yeah mate, say What???

jhally123

every country is separated into states and each state/territory has its own government. keeps things interesting

Zucchinisinratatouille

I'm in sympathy with previous answers! but I'll try to give a serious answer...

Australia's political structure came about because of its history. We started 40,000 years ago with many different Aboriginal clans and no central government.

The British introduced a military/monarchist government in 1788 with no democratic features. At the time, they knew nothing about the country, not even how huge it was. Gradually they explored and colonised more and more of it. As colonies separated by thousands of kilometres grew larger and more bolshy, pressure grew for more local independence and more democratic forms of government.

At the same time, the British government in London was shown to be completely out of touch and ignorant of local conditions on the other side of the world. Pressure grew for them also to give the colonies more independence.

Eventually we ended up with six SOVEREIGN states, that is, independent, self-governing states which were in continual disagreement among themselves. Only at this point did Australians decide they needed a single national government to deal with national issues, such as defence and foreign relations.

The first national parliament met as late as 1901 in Melbourne; we celebrate this as Federation. We then had to create an artificial national capital, Canberra, as the rivalry between the two most populous states, New South Wales and Victoria, was causing too much trouble.

We actually ended up with NINE parliaments: six states, two territories, and one Federal parliament. We often complain of being over-governed, but no one wants to give up their independence. Also there is continual tension between the State and Federal governments over where the limits of their power should be drawn.

Personally, I feel that this tension is part of the functioning of our democracy, which is a process, not a perfect state to be achieved.

Hamish

Because we like it that way.

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