The RA Amendment

JhawnathinJ

JhawnathinJ

TNPer
The Regional Assembly Amendment:
Section 3 of "Article 2. The Regional Assembly" of the TNP constitution shall be amended and thus read as follows:
3. If sufficient evidence of a government official abusing his/her power is shown, the Regional Assembly may remove a government official them from office by a two-thirds three-quarters majority vote, without the delegate's consent.
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Section 2 of "Article 9. Ammendments" of the TNP constitution shall be amended and thus read as follows:
2. The Regional Assembly may amend the Bill of Rights by a three-quarters two-thirds majority vote.
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A new section in "Article 7. General Provisions" of the TNP constitution shall be created and shall thus read as follows:
1. Constitutionally-mandated elected officials are the Delegate, Vice Delegate, Speaker, Justices, and Attorney General.
2. Government officials are the constitutionally-mandated elected officials, any officials appointed by them as permitted by law, and members of the Security Council.
3. The executive category consists of the Delegate, Vice Delegate, Attorney General, and government officials appointed by government officials in the executive category.
4. The legislative category consists of the Speaker, and government officials appointed by government officials in the legislative category.
5. The judicial category consists of the Justices, and government officials appointed by government officials in the judicial category .
6. All government officials, with the exception of members of the Security Council, must maintain membership in the Regional Assembly while in office.
7. All government officials will swear an oath of office. The content of these oaths will be determined by law and be legally binding.
8. No person may simultaneously serve in more than one constitutionally-mandated elected official positions.
9. No person may simultaneously serve in government official positions in more than one of the executive, legislative, or judicial categories. Exceptions to this provision may be established by law.
10. All offices in the government of the North Pacific that may appoint deputies, may appoint a maximum of two.
11. Candidates in any election must maintain membership in the Regional Assembly for the fifteen days before the opening of candidacy declarations and throughout the election.
12. Government bodies may create rules for their own governance subordinate to this constitution and the laws.
13. Procedures to fill vacancies in constitutionally-mandated elected offices may be established by law.
14. No law or government policy may contradict this constitution.
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*Sections 10-13 renumbered to 11-14
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I am not in favor of limiting the number of deputies a speaker may appoint, unless we limit the number of deputies each department can appoint, it isnt fair to limit one department and not any others, and I currently am not in favor of limiting any departments allotment of potential deputies. Nor am I in favor of having to confirm deputies as it were. That could lead to a popularity contest of department heads not having their deputies approved because some RA members may not like a particular appointee. Likewise I feel the Speaker, Delegate, and AGs are elected and we entrust them to make good decisions, letting them appoint their deputies is entrusting them.

So as of now I am not in favor of this legislation. Though I am open to hearing the proposals sponsors rationale on the matter.
 
@JhonsJoe.. I should point this out to you:

Constitution:
Article 9. Amendments

1. The Regional Assembly may amend this Constitution by a two-thirds majority vote.
2. The Regional Assembly may amend the Bill of Rights by a three-quarters majority vote.
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While not an impossible task, amending the Constitution can be difficult.. given the high threshold to amend it. I would recommend starting with the Legal Code. It could definitely use some amending.

That said, I'm in favor of 2 deputies maximum. They should still be appointed though, since RA approval is tantamount to electing them. So it's either appointed or elected. :shrug:
 
This legislation was created to reduce corruption. The reason we should limit the number of deputies appointed is really self evident, why would the speaker need more than TWO deputies, that is spelling something fishy. For the record, I will expand this to all offices which may appoint deputies. Also, the RA shouldnt let any office appoint deputies which the ra may deem harmful in this area of government, and to make sure that the RA is okay with this invidual holding this office.
 
Deputy positions are a great way for new and inexperienced members to get involved in the government. Limiting that would actually increase the potential for corruption, in my opinion, because it would become harder to new players to take part in politics. In addition, deputy positions can provide needed training and experience to do a better job in the higher positions, so appointing deputies is an investment in the future efficiency and competence of our government officials. The more deputies, the better, I say.
 
As far as the RA is concerned a Deputy Speaker is given tangible tasks to have on the job training as it were to eventually run for speaker if they so wish. It is like an apprentice ship program. I am a former Deputy Speaker and chose another route, though I did enjoy my time moderating legislative debates. Lord Nwahs was also a Deputy Speaker and chose to run after the former speaker declined another term. So a speaker basicly appoints a deputy to assist as well as to train an ultimate replacement should the time come. Having more than 2 deputies would be beneficial in the hopes of hedging their bets and that at least one would break out and step up should the speaker become incompasitated and also to ultimately step up and run for speaker if they so chose to.
 
JhonsJoe, let me just say that we're really not as corrupt here as you seem to think we are. You've been here on the forum less than a month, and it seems like you've judged us as a community very quickly. Why not try to participate in the system we have as it is, and identify problems to fix through legislation as you experience them? I feel like right now you're assuming a lot about our government that isn't true, and trying to change it prematurely.

EDIT: To clarify, I am NOT suggesting that new members refrain from proposing legislation. I just think that legislation should be proposed when you observe an actual deficiency in the law, instead of supposing a broad systemic problem, and focusing on "fighting corruption" in a very vague sense. It seems like you glanced at the constitution and said "how can I make this less corrupt?" instead of experiencing corruption and setting out to fix it. The reason I say this is that the provisions of the constitution that you suppose are corrupt are actually quite the opposite.
 
I think having multiple deputies opens up delicious avenues for satire.

But kudos to jhonsjoe for trying to improve the TNP system.
 
I echo the sentiments of the other members. Deputy positions are usually utilised to help newer members gain experience. To be honest, an RA vote on deputy position appointees may just be delaying what is already a fairly difficult process on the end of those appointing.

Although I would add that I don't really mind having less than two deputies.
 
Youre putting limitations on the Speakers and AGs deputies, but what about the deputy cabinet ministers..should the ministers in the executive branch then also only be allowed to appoint a maximum of two deputies?

This brings a greater question. Every department except for Justices have deputies, if deputies are to give young players experience, should we also be consistent and have deputy court officials to get some experience on the court? Obviously they could not hear cases, but they could "file" legal paperwork, do administrative busy work for the court and get the Chief Justice a Starbucks occassionally.
 
PaulWallLibertarian42:
Youre putting limitations on the Speakers and AGs deputies, but what about the deputy cabinet ministers..should the ministers in the executive branch then also only be allowed to appoint a maximum of two deputies?

This brings a greater question. Every department except for Justices have deputies, if deputies are to give young players experience, should we also be consistent and have deputy court officials to get some experience on the court? Obviously they could not hear cases, but they could "file" legal paperwork, do administrative busy work for the court and get the Chief Justice a Starbucks occassionally.
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i like that Justice idea
 
This bill is in formal debate for five days, after which no amendment to the bill can be made, and it will be scheduled for a vote.
 
Why do you think that the two thirds threshold for removing government officials? Wouldn't that give the RA unwarranted power over other government authorities who are apt to disagree with it?
 
plembobria:
Why do you think that the two thirds threshold for removing government officials? Wouldn't that give the RA unwarranted power over other government authorities who are apt to disagree with it?
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Heh.
 
Considering that we don't even require majority support to *elect* some of our government officials in the first place, I think it would be a bad idea to allow a simple majority to remove them. In general, I think government officials should be given the benefit of the doubt to do their job as they see fit, and we can judge them at the end of their term. Recall is a measure designed to remove officials who are seriously abusing their power. In those cases, 2/3 majority support for a recall motion shouldn't be hard to come by.

Remember that officials are only in office for four months anyway. There are very few situations where it's necessary to remove someone rather than simply elect someone else when their term is up.

EDIT: Also, officials can appoint deputies without a provision in the constitution saying they can. Deputy AGs were around for almost a year before they were codified in the constitution, for instance. So I don't think a new section of the constitution allowing officials to appoint deputies is necessary. And again, the maximum of two is counter-productive.
 
JhonsJoe:
This legislation was created to reduce corruption.
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For all the talk about corruption, I've yet to see anyone present a shred of evidence that there is corruption (let alone widespread corruption) in any branch of government.

Moving on (and putting aside the fact that this unnecessarily creates a whole new article in the constitution for a single section).
The reason we should limit the number of deputies appointed is really self evident, why would the speaker need more than TWO deputies, that is spelling something fishy.
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There are several reasons why the Speaker or Ministers would appoint multiple Deputies. The Office of the Speaker requires a lot of tedious work that needs to take place on a near constant base, often requiring more than two people to share the workload. Likewise, the Ministries often undertake multiple projects, and having Deputy Ministers oversee them can improve effectiveness dramatically. In other cases, Ministers may feel the need to appoint someone with a lot of expertise in their portfolio as a Deputy, so that they can make the best use of their input. For instance, I as Minister of WA Affairs have four Deputy Ministers, who are all world-renown WA authors and whose input to the Ministry is invaluable.

Furthermore, as others have said, being a Deputy is one of the best ways for new members to get involved and gain experience in the government. As far as the Executive Government is concerned, the Executive Staff and the appointment of Deputies are the two key methods we have for integrating new members. Personally I instruct Minisers to appoint at least one and ideally multiple Deputies for this reason.
This not just an unnecessary, but a potentially very damaging bill. I recommend strongly against it.
 
JhonsJoe:
This legislation was created to reduce corruption. The reason we should limit the number of deputies appointed is really self evident, why would the speaker need more than TWO deputies, that is spelling something fishy. For the record, I will expand this to all offices which may appoint deputies. Also, the RA shouldnt let any office appoint deputies which the ra may deem harmful in this area of government, and to make sure that the RA is okay with this invidual holding this office.
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I don't see how the proposed change "reduces" corruption, of furthermore, what corruption are you talking about. Biased as any human led institution may be, TNP community has been in my time here shown to be quite mature regarding the handling of their government and while there are power struggles and discussions, I wouldn't dare to just outright go ahead and call the community at large "corrupted".

I don't see a reason for this change, the deputies limit is not "self evident", nor really required, handling stuff in a region can get HEAVY enough for you want a hundred deputies at times, and overall I feel this is an immature and not very well thought proposal.

I will not support this.
 
Understanding and listening to the concerns of the Regional Assembly, the legislator will take a moment to debate the bill progressively.

2 deputies are substantial for the holder to properly do his job. This will also stop deputy holders from having like 300 deputies. Deputies are a good way to have new users get involved. However, just because a user is not a deputy, doesn't mean he can't apply for another job, a little lower in the office's ranks, or if not, join a ministry.

Deputies are not supposed to be a group of people. They are supposed to be one or two people, who help out with the chief of whatever office they are in. Having like 5 deputies is like having 5 vice delegates.
 
It might be wise not to go overboard with how many deputies one appoints, but I don't think it should be the subject of legal restrictions. We elect people to office because it would be inefficient for the RA to collectively make every decision for them. I think the number of deputies is one that we can trust elected officials not to screw up. And while I agree that two deputies usually covers it, it's not going to hurt anything if someone has three. When I was Speaker, there was a brief period of time where I had three. One of them was sort of my main deputy, who I had been training for several months, and she sort of took over training the newest one. It worked out well.

EDIT: Actually, looking back at my records, I only had two. But there would have been nothing wrong with three!
 
The author has spoken with the true gift that only those ignorant to the system they have judged inadequate can.

Would the author perhaps like to submit a draft for a whole new constitution to prevent this so called corruption that they and some others have insisted exists?
 
By adding "without the delegate's consent." that fixes a major loophole, what if the delegate was the official being removed from power?
 
Actually, Justices does have a form of deputies; they're called Temporary Hearing Officers. THOs could be used to help guide pre-trial preparations which hasn't always been the case unless there was a need to replace a Justice who had a conflict of interest or due to a vacancy on the Court.

As a general rule though, I see no advantage to having ratification votes on Deputies. The official who appoints a deputy should be held accountable for their deputies' activities; we don't need to discourage recently joined RA members from being deputies in any part of TNP government by having ratification motions and debates; it would reduce the amount of time a deputy could learn and serve before the next election for that branch of government.
 
What ratification...I originally had that, but removed it. This only puts a limit on the amount of deputies a government official may have.
 
As the debate seems to be over. All that's left is people saying that they do not support a deputy limit, using the same argument.

I wish to close this formal debate, but first, any objections?
 
You made a major change to your bill less than 2 hours ago. I don't think debate is over by any means. It would be helpful if you posted when the bill was changed giving us an update on the changes.

Adding "without the delegate's consent" to the process of recall is redundant. Recall votes do not require delegate consent to begin with.

"If sufficient evidence of a government official abusing his/her power is shown," is a meaningless addition, because the judge of whether sufficient evidence of abuse exists is the RA itself, and they make that judgment through a recall vote.

Three quarters is too high a bar to meet for recall. It needs to be a challenge - it doesn't need to be impossible.

Lowering the threshold to amend the Bill of Rights makes no sense.

It seems like you're just pinning up our fundamental laws to a dartboard and adding or subtracting random words wherever your darts hit. Take a breath, withdraw this, and observe the system at work. Then identify deficiencies in the system and try to improve on it.
 
You made a major change to your bill less than 2 hours ago. I don't think debate is over by any means. It would be helpful if you posted when the bill was changed giving us an update on the changes.
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I agree about the debate, but would point out that we have a certain recent precedent of major edits to the bill just before a vote. I forget what that bill was.....
 
flemingovia:
You made a major change to your bill less than 2 hours ago. I don't think debate is over by any means. It would be helpful if you posted when the bill was changed giving us an update on the changes.
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I agree about the debate, but would point out that we have a certain recent precedent of major edits to the bill just before a vote. I forget what that bill was.....
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Please don't become Roman by letting issues that don't go your way bleed into other threads.
 
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