One of our favorite activities in Sydney was a visit to the Parliament of New South Wales. Colman’s new-ish job is as the Chief of Staff for the NSW Minister for Mental Health, and so he was able to have us invited to listen to question time from the public gallery. We had heard that we needed to be quiet in the gallery or else the speaker could ask us to leave, but we were definitely the quiet ones and the elected officials had to be reprimanded by the Speaker, in some cases being asked to leave. For US readers, here is a really good explanation courtesy of the New South Wales parliament web site:
Question Time is one of the most significant parts of the Parliamentary day. This is because almost all the Members are present in the Chamber and topical and challenging questions often arise which may highlight and reveal major issues or problems. Question Time has a theatrical quality which attracts the press and visitors because it can be controversial for the Government. More importantly, it is the clearest demonstration in Parliament of the concept of responsible government under the Westminster system.
The session started with a welcome to visitors, including us! Very exciting! Then the questions started, with the first one being more of a statement: the opposition nicely offered to forgo question time so that the Government could talk to the firemen who were STRIKING OUTSIDE PARLIAMENT AT THAT VERY MINUTE! Well, you can imagine the Government wouldn’t take a jibe like this sitting down, so a government minister (the prime minister? it all was moving very quickly at this point) jumped up to say that the fire firefighters had a chance to talk to him and they refused all rational negotiation, and that they were irresponsible for leaving their posts, and volunteer fire fighting groups were in place to protect Sydney. He was very upset about all this. But the clock ran down (5 mins per response), and it was time for a new question (or 3) about the Northwest Rail Link in Sydney. An official from the opposition read off the morning train timetable and wanted to know if the Minister for Transportation could GUARANTEE that each and every train would remain in service for the rest of her life. Well, that question clearly being a trap, she took the opportunity to talk for 5 minutes in response to each question about how the opposition had failed during their time in government to make any positive changes for the commuters of northwest Sydney. And so on.
Miles in particular was very taken by the spectacle, and when Colman mentioned this later to the office of the Minister for Transportation, she gave Miles the full consultant’s pack of information about the NW rail link. After reviewing the materials, Miles agreed that the government is indeed working hard on it. One vote, albeit absentee, young and not a citizen of Australia, won!
(Note the southern hemisphere-centric map in the background, thanks to Colette for expanding our image of how the world can be viewed.)
As part of the strike, the firemen hosed down the building, which was quite exciting to find out about later. Here’s the story (thanks, Colette, for the link!)
http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/duty-calls-before-protest-20120621-20qyq.html
I’m putting Question Time on my list of things that we could adopt from Australia. (OK, it’s British, but we’re talking about Australia.) Another is rock pools. Stay tuned for a post on rock pools.
Excellent description of Question Time… it was a fun day in the “bear pitt” (the nick-name for the NSW parliament!). Hope Miles will be back to view progress on the North West Rail Link!
First, I wish the firemen from Australia could come hose down the American Midwest. It has been a very hot summer, and we could use it.
Second, I really enjoyed seeing the map that shows a world image from the southern hemisphere.
Third, it’s interesting to view someone else’s political process;