Fregerson for Speaker - Stability

[Fregerson]

I would have preferred to post this thread earlier in the election period, unfortunately the May general election coincides with a long holiday in my country. Not to mention that I was asked to cover some duties before the weekend as a bout of the virus hit my workplace...not the best time for an activity-oriented position. Nevertheless, here I am, and I have decided to revert to a question & answer format for my campaign for this time round.

Who are you?
The user behind PotatoFarmers. The person who lives in that Australiasian timezone, so they can't be in the voice calls on Discord when all the Americans are in. The guy who broke his way into the Ministry of World Assembly Affairs writing their own version of TNP's IFVs. The TNPer who doesn't RP in any of TNP's RP worlds, but RPs on NationStates. The Speaker for the past 5 months. Yeah, I think those answers suffice.

What are your key targets for the office?

1. To ensure that the day-to-day responsibilities are executed without any hiccups. After a sluggish start in January, I managed to find some really reliable deputies that helped shoulder some of the responsibilities associated with this office. In particular, a shoutout to 3 of them - @Caius, @Cretox and @Lord Dominator. Once they picked up the workload, they managed to get most of the citizenship checks and legislative votes on time. Although there were still a few human errors, such as missing out on the opening of a vote by 12 hours, or the curious case of the most recent Citizenship Appeal, I think this was a step up from what happened when I took over in November, and we can certainly tighten the screws on the timeliness and the accuracy of our work.
2. To allow more people to get onboard with the work of the Office. Previously, I have promised to start work on a series of guides that will be used to tutor incoming members of the Office. However, due to RL issues, I was unable to complete the entire guide as promised. Nevertheless, should I continue to be elected, I would make completing the guide my first priority. I would also continue to be more accepting of more members to join the Office, with a program to give newcomers an opportunity to taste what is the day-to-day work of the Speaker's Office.
3. To assist more gameside members to obtain citizenship more easily. With the passing of the Citizenship Reform Act, I believe it is time for us to use this point to welcome more members of our TNP community into the citizenship fold. This could be something the Office can look into in conjunction with the Gameside Advocate and the Ministry of Home Affairs, coming into the next term.

So, what is this newcomer program you are thinking about?
Let us bring back the Speaker's Staff. Not as a permanent feature, but as a probation program. Members with no prior experience will start as a Staffer, where they will go through the key processes of the Office, such as checking citizenship status, Speaker's Checks, as well as opening votes in the Regional Assembly. These are some of the simpler duties that every Speaker-to-be should go through. Especially some of the Speaker's Checks and Citizenship Status checks - these can be done during major or minor updates, where a Deputy or myself can personally make sure they done the right thing, and make immediate corrections on the actions of the Staffers should it be necessary. The principle behind appointing a Staffer, rather than going straight to starting from being a Deputy Speaker, is that a Staffer is not a government official, but a Deputy is. It would just be like the difference between the Minister of an Executive ministry, a Deputy, and their Executive Staffers. The work of the staffers will constantly be vetted by the Deputy or the Speaker, and after we deemed that they are capable of handling the simple tasks, they are then promoted to become a Deputy, should they find the job satisfying and something they want to commit to.

With the use of the Staff as an induction program, I would then expect more of my Deputies - they should maintain enough presence in the Regional Assembly, as well as with regards to checks. Going into this term, I would like to promise a monthly report and review of the work among the Deputies, as a means to allow the populace to keep the activity of the Office in check. Deputies would no longer have the excuse of "not knowing" what to do, since they would simply be relegated back to the Staffers program if that is indeed the case. This, in my opinion, is a way of ensuring the standards of the office going forward.

I am open for any question on what I have mentioned thus far.

 

[St George]

To quote what a very wise @Crushing Our Enemies once said to me when I proposed a similar function for the Speaker's Staff... why not just make them deputies?

Would you ever use the Speakers power to stop a matter from being debated? If so, in what situations could you see yourself using it?

 

[Zyvetskistaahn]

What is quorum at the moment? Do you have any comments on your opponents answer in relation to quorum?

Do you know why it was that the citizenship rolls had incorrect votes entered for some 35 citizens in relation to the Citizenship Reform Act?

EDIT:
Suppose three bills: the Court Reform Bill; the Crime and Punishment Bill; and the Regional Assembly Procedure Bill. The Court Reform Bill amends the Constitution and the Legal Code. The Crime and Punishment Bill amends the Legal Code only. The Regional Assembly Procedure Bill amends the Legal Code and the Regional Assembly's Rules. None of them include the clause required for omnibus bills.

Suppose each bill receives 17 Aye votes to 13 Nay votes with 5 Abstentions. Do they pass?

Which of them, if any, need to be presented to the Delegate for signature or veto?

Suppose the Delegate vetos any that are presented, what is their fate?

 

[Fregerson]

To quote what a very wise @Crushing Our Enemies once said to me when I proposed a similar function for the Speaker's Staff... why not just make them deputies?

I note that what you suggested back in your campaign is not exactly what mine is. What I am proposing, is for the Speaker's Staff to be a probational role. Which means, a more short-term position where they learn the ropes, before they become a Deputy. The alternative is to nominate them straight to Deputies and put them in a probation there, but now I would be begging the Admins to change the Deputy rosters every few weeks when I decide certain Deputies on probation haven't done enough to become a full fledged Deputy... I don't know if that is a cool idea. But I will see how it works.

Would you ever use the Speakers power to stop a matter from being debated? If so, in what situations could you see yourself using it?

There are probably few situations where I believe it is in the region's interest for the debate to be stopped. For instance, a debate that is spiraling out of topic, a series of conspiracy theories against our government that have been proven false, as well as some debates which might contravene our OOC guidelines (I mean, the last one would probably be shut by moderators)

What is quorum at the moment? Do you have any comments on your opponents answer in relation to quorum?

22. The number of votes required to achieve quorum for any legislative vote is equal to one third of the number of citizens who have voted in at least one of the three most recent legislative votes. A legislative vote is a vote of the Regional Assembly to enact, amend or repeal laws.

Quorum currently is 14, unlike what my opponent have mentioned. This is because 41 people have recently voted in at least one of the three most recent legislative votes, and 41/3 = 13.667.

Do you know why it was that the citizenship rolls had incorrect votes entered for some 35 citizens in relation to the Citizenship Reform Act?

After an internal check, we determined that when removing members who no longer have citizenship, there was an error in how we removed the names. As such, the entries were off by a certain number of cells. This has since been corrected.

Suppose three bills: the Court Reform Bill; the Crime and Punishment Bill; and the Regional Assembly Procedure Bill. The Court Reform Bill amends the Constitution and the Legal Code. The Crime and Punishment Bill amends the Legal Code only. The Regional Assembly Procedure Bill amends the Legal Code and the Regional Assembly's Rules. None of them include the clause required for omnibus bills.

Suppose each bill receives 17 Aye votes to 13 Nay votes with 5 Abstentions. Do they pass?

Which of them, if any, need to be presented to the Delegate for signature or veto?

Suppose the Delegate vetos any that are presented, what is their fate?

I would like to note that the Court Reform Bill, and the Regional Assembly Procedure Bill should not have been sent to vote, per Clause 5 of the Regional Assembly Standing Procedures, as given below. As such, I would consider both bills as having violated procedures, and not going to vote.

5. No proposal will be scheduled for a vote that includes changes to more than one document, unless it includes the following clause or a functional equivalent:

No portion of this bill will take effect unless/until all portions take effect.

The Crime and Punishment Bill receives the simple majority (17 out of 30 votes, ignoring Abstentions for the purposes of calculating majority), and as such, it passes. It will need to be presented to the Delegate for their signature or veto.

If the Delegate vetos the bill, the Regional Assembly can move for an overriding of the Delegate's Bill. The new motion for override requires a 2/3rd majority for it to be passed.

 

[Zyvetskistaahn]

Might I tempt you to offer further thoughts on the other two bills, supposing they were not pulled?

EDIT:
Do you have any reflections on the last four months, in terms of how you have met some of the concerns that were expressed at the last election (particularly with reference to your post: here)?

 

[Fregerson]

Might I tempt you to offer further thoughts on the other two bills, supposing they were not pulled?

Since the clause is missing, technically for Court Reform Bill, the parts that edit the Legal Code passes. The Regional Assembly Procedure Bill always passes. Only the parts that edit the Legal Code need to be submitted to the Delegate for his signature or veto. Same procedures apply should it be vetoed.

I get back to you on the reflections part.

 

[Pallaith]

After all this time, you have to have a strategy for starting and ending votes on time right? What is it? You have a lot of deputies so how does this keep happening? Do you plan to get more? And if so, will you actually schedule them or plan with them somehow?

As for the staff thing. I established the first Speaker’s staff. You know that I believed in it. And I do believe it can have a place in the office. But how will you verify their work and use it as a staging ground if they can’t actually do anything that the deputies can do? Even when I used the staff I knew that I couldn’t actually put them to practical use - they were not legally allowed to do any of the actual work we need them to do. So how would that actually work?

 

[Cretox]

Let us bring back the Speaker's Staff. Not as a permanent feature, but as a probation program. Members with no prior experience will start as a Staffer, where they will go through the key processes of the Office, such as checking citizenship status, Speaker's Checks, as well as opening votes in the Regional Assembly. These are some of the simpler duties that every Speaker-to-be should go through. Especially some of the Speaker's Checks and Citizenship Status checks - these can be done during major or minor updates, where a Deputy or myself can personally make sure they done the right thing, and make immediate corrections on the actions of the Staffers should it be necessary. The principle behind appointing a Staffer, rather than going straight to starting from being a Deputy Speaker, is that a Staffer is not a government official, but a Deputy is. It would just be like the difference between the Minister of an Executive ministry, a Deputy, and their Executive Staffers. The work of the staffers will constantly be vetted by the Deputy or the Speaker, and after we deemed that they are capable of handling the simple tasks, they are then promoted to become a Deputy, should they find the job satisfying and something they want to commit to.

Who would appoint the Staff if not you? Would you make a new elevated deputy position to this end?

Were there any situations in the past where you would've made someone a member of the Staff but not a deputy if the Staff had existed? You mention major and minor updates- what's their significance here?

 

[Fregerson]

Do you have any reflections on the last four months, in terms of how you have met some of the concerns that were expressed at the last election (particularly with reference to your post: here)?

I think generally I have adapted to the points about activity levels by learning how to work on the go. I have resorted to doing citizenship checks on the commute to/from home, which I find extremely useful especially during the period where we had a huge burst of citizenship application (around February?) and a lack of Deputies. Then of course, came LD, Caius, and then Cretox, and like I said, they did a lot of the work towards the later parts of the term, so I think that is the Deputy problem resolved.

As for the issue of removing less active Deputies Speakers, I think I didn't actively purge Deputies this time. From the next, however, I would definitely be doing a more frequent review, and the probation/Speaker Staff scheme will definitely allow me to do just that.

After all this time, you have to have a strategy for starting and ending votes on time right? What is it? You have a lot of deputies so how does this keep happening? Do you plan to get more? And if so, will you actually schedule them or plan with them somehow?

The starting and ending votes on time is something I never really ironed out at first, but I think it is obvious now - unless prearranged, the person who scheduled the vote should open it, and should close it. The timings of the vote is based off one's work-rest cycle, so I don't think it is necessarily unreasonable to expect the individual to know their schedule best?

I think the question about the number of Deputies is a non-issue. Ultimately, it is the quality of Deputies, work attitude, and how much time they can devote to the work, that determines whether this Office does work on time. Going forward, I am likely to reimplement the duty system. Not as a way of saying "only X can do the checks on 1 day", but rather, as a way of having 1 person as the overall in charge daily.

I answer both Cretox and your point about the Speaker's Staff. I think ultimately all I want to do is to have some form of probation program. Whether to call it the Speaker's Staff or Deputies on probation, I haven't really finalised on the idea, though expect it to be a Deputy-lite position which would be temporary. The idea doesn't change. The program aims to let them go through the basic day-to-day workings of the Office, like citizenship checks and application approvals. It will be followed up by 1 to 2 opening and closing of votes. That was the original idea. The only problem I always had was...if they were elected as a Deputy and did some steps wrongly (even after following the guide/a mentor's demostration), do we have rights to "undo" the action? The laws doesn't explicitly mention it, however. It is supposed to be the next step in the process to allow the new Deputies to be able to start working on their own without requiring someone else to "watch them" do the work, that is my original plan.

Who appoints the Deputy-lite/Speaker's Staff? The position will be on an application basis, like Executive Staff, and clearly they are accepted by Deputies & the Speaker.

Were there any situations in the past where they would started out as a Staff? Well, basically, any of the Deputies without previous experience would all be a Staff first, though some would probably be promoted faster than others.

Also, why major and minor updates were mentioned? That is because of citizenship checks - when CTEs are calculated, and also, major is the start of a new day in America.

 

[Pallaith]

I would really hope you know the answers to some of these questions if you’re mulling over changing office policy…but since you don’t I’ll give you a brief rundown from my time in the office.

Speaker staff members volunteered to join the office and were admitted the same way executive staffers are selected. They could not open or close votes, edit the spreadsheet, grant or remove citizenship, do citizenship checks, manage legislative debates or motions. Basically, they couldn’t do anything deputies could do, because legally that’s how it works. Any work they do or practice is purely theoretical - we would have group chats where they would explain the procedure they would have followed and could be corrected if their steps were incorrect. What they could do was edit and write content for Q&As or guides. We had plans to make new ones for citizens to make it easier for them to understand the legislative process, but nothing new was generated the term that I utilized the staff. We also gave the staff the opportunity to do the Speaker’s digest, since this was back when we still did that. I can’t speak for any other Speaker and how they used the staff.

Back then the Speaker’s office simply didn’t have many deputies - it just wasn’t done. You usually had one or two. When I was Speaker it was a bit unusual that I had three, so it was just a different time. With that expectation, that we had to be careful with how many people we allowed to manage the Speaker’s job, we wanted to take steps to train the future people who would be in that office, so they wouldn’t have to be tested as soon as they took office as deputy and possibly mess up. Time has shown we didn’t have to be as cautious I think. Simply because of how limited the staff is in what they can do, and the main advantage is really only that you get a slightly more experienced and prepared deputy (the future deputies were by and large former members of the staff), the staff just doesn’t have much utility in most people’s opinion. I’m not saying it couldn’t find a purpose if you could come up with one, but really it boils down to if you want a higher threshold for who you consider worthy of being a deputy.

I also thank Zyvet for linking to the previous campaign, served as a good reminder of my concerns from that last election which…continue to be concerns to this day. One could say that letting deputies manage votes on their own schedule clearly doesn’t work, since they keep missing votes! Regardless of why your plan was what it was, it isn’t working is it?

 

[Fregerson]

I would really hope you know the answers to some of these questions if you’re mulling over changing office policy…but since you don’t I’ll give you a brief rundown from my time in the office.

Speaker staff members volunteered to join the office and were admitted the same way executive staffers are selected. They could not open or close votes, edit the spreadsheet, grant or remove citizenship, do citizenship checks, manage legislative debates or motions. Basically, they couldn’t do anything deputies could do, because legally that’s how it works. Any work they do or practice is purely theoretical - we would have group chats where they would explain the procedure they would have followed and could be corrected if their steps were incorrect. What they could do was edit and write content for Q&As or guides. We had plans to make new ones for citizens to make it easier for them to understand the legislative process, but nothing new was generated the term that I utilized the staff. We also gave the staff the opportunity to do the Speaker’s digest, since this was back when we still did that. I can’t speak for any other Speaker and how they used the staff.

Back then the Speaker’s office simply didn’t have many deputies - it just wasn’t done. You usually had one or two. When I was Speaker it was a bit unusual that I had three, so it was just a different time. With that expectation, that we had to be careful with how many people we allowed to manage the Speaker’s job, we wanted to take steps to train the future people who would be in that office, so they wouldn’t have to be tested as soon as they took office as deputy and possibly mess up. Time has shown we didn’t have to be as cautious I think. Simply because of how limited the staff is in what they can do, and the main advantage is really only that you get a slightly more experienced and prepared deputy (the future deputies were by and large former members of the staff), the staff just doesn’t have much utility in most people’s opinion. I’m not saying it couldn’t find a purpose if you could come up with one, but really it boils down to if you want a higher threshold for who you consider worthy of being a deputy.

I thank you for that bit of history, it is a higher threshold thing that I am working towards here, though I might very well just appoint Deputies with probation now that I think of it.

I also thank Zyvet for linking to the previous campaign, served as a good reminder of my concerns from that last election which…continue to be concerns to this day. One could say that letting deputies manage votes on their own schedule clearly doesn’t work, since they keep missing votes! Regardless of why your plan was what it was, it isn’t working is it?

The best way really is to make the Speaker himself do these time sensitive jobs. And now that I have adapted well to the issue of not being able to use my computer every day, and also started to finish up the guides that I promised to, I think I go into the next term in a better position to reign in the standards. And as the person facing the voters' vote, It can only be my responsibility to ensure the timings are met.