What happens to a government when it loses a referendum?
- 8 months ago
#governmentlose #referendumnigeria #Whatgovernment
KEY POINTS Polls show voters are ready to reject Indigenous Voices in Parliament on October 14. But history shows that failed referendums do not cause electoral harm to the governments that call them. Australian voters tend to prefer the status quo in referendums and federal elections. Polls show Indigenous Voices in Parliament are heading for failure, and if that happens you may start to hear dire predictions about Labour's election prospects. The theory is that a No vote could seriously damage Prime Minister Anthony Albanese's political standing and provide Opposition leader Peter Dutton with a launching pad to take over the Lodge. After all, first words in Albanese's 2022 election night victory speech were his "full" commitment to the Uluru Declaration from Heart. A defeat on October 14 will see ambition collapse at the first hurdle. Opposition Indigenous Australian spokesperson and leading No advocate Jacinta Nampijinpa Price warned the Prime Minister he should have looked over his shoulder after the vote. "I think what's at stake in the first place is Albanese's leadership," he told the National Press Club last month. So does losing the referendum really mean disaster for the government that announced it? Australian National University historian Frank Bongiorno says that's not necessarily the case. “Referendum defeat does not tend cause lasting damage to governments, particularly in the Australian case, and it certainly does not lead the resignation of prime ministers,” he says. “There is no history of governments being mortally wounded by referendum defeat.” Here's why. What referendums are we looking at? In the 122 years since Federation, Australians have rejected 36 of 44 proposed constitutional amendments. Thirteen times they said No to every question on the referendum ballot, whether to one or more questions. These thirteen events can be divided into two groups four were held on the same day as a federal election and nine were not federal elections. A no vote would cause this commitment to fail at the first hurdle. When unsuccessful referendums are held on their own There will be no federal election on October 14, so the history of independent referendums may be our best guide. Looking at the nine failed independent referendums and their aftermath, there appears to be good news for Albanese. The first was in 1911, and the Labor Party went on to lose the next federal election. But this has only happened once since then, all the way back to 1949. John Howard called for a referendum on an Australian republic, but campaigned against it. He won both the referendum and the next federal election. Source AAP Rob Griffith Six more times, governments that lost the independent referendum won the next election. Robert Menzies' attempt to ban the Communist Party failed in 1951, but this did not stop his momentum; He ruled the country for another 15 years. Australia's 1999 republic referen
KEY POINTS Polls show voters are ready to reject Indigenous Voices in Parliament on October 14. But history shows that failed referendums do not cause electoral harm to the governments that call them. Australian voters tend to prefer the status quo in referendums and federal elections. Polls show Indigenous Voices in Parliament are heading for failure, and if that happens you may start to hear dire predictions about Labour's election prospects. The theory is that a No vote could seriously damage Prime Minister Anthony Albanese's political standing and provide Opposition leader Peter Dutton with a launching pad to take over the Lodge. After all, first words in Albanese's 2022 election night victory speech were his "full" commitment to the Uluru Declaration from Heart. A defeat on October 14 will see ambition collapse at the first hurdle. Opposition Indigenous Australian spokesperson and leading No advocate Jacinta Nampijinpa Price warned the Prime Minister he should have looked over his shoulder after the vote. "I think what's at stake in the first place is Albanese's leadership," he told the National Press Club last month. So does losing the referendum really mean disaster for the government that announced it? Australian National University historian Frank Bongiorno says that's not necessarily the case. “Referendum defeat does not tend cause lasting damage to governments, particularly in the Australian case, and it certainly does not lead the resignation of prime ministers,” he says. “There is no history of governments being mortally wounded by referendum defeat.” Here's why. What referendums are we looking at? In the 122 years since Federation, Australians have rejected 36 of 44 proposed constitutional amendments. Thirteen times they said No to every question on the referendum ballot, whether to one or more questions. These thirteen events can be divided into two groups four were held on the same day as a federal election and nine were not federal elections. A no vote would cause this commitment to fail at the first hurdle. When unsuccessful referendums are held on their own There will be no federal election on October 14, so the history of independent referendums may be our best guide. Looking at the nine failed independent referendums and their aftermath, there appears to be good news for Albanese. The first was in 1911, and the Labor Party went on to lose the next federal election. But this has only happened once since then, all the way back to 1949. John Howard called for a referendum on an Australian republic, but campaigned against it. He won both the referendum and the next federal election. Source AAP Rob Griffith Six more times, governments that lost the independent referendum won the next election. Robert Menzies' attempt to ban the Communist Party failed in 1951, but this did not stop his momentum; He ruled the country for another 15 years. Australia's 1999 republic referen