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nexus © NEews— nexus © NEews— Changing the Constitution | When the Australian Constitution was | should be deferred until voter-initiated formulated at the turn of the century, it | constitutional referendums have been was expected to be updated to keep | examined by the Commission, which is abreast of the times. Some important | due to report to the Federal Government changes now seem overdue. by June 30th. According to Section 128 of the Taking a Punt Constitution, any change must come from a referendum of the people. But at Referendums can be expensive and diffi- present, referendums to change the | cult to organise - but technology is pro- Constitution can be triggered only by | viding some interesting alternatives. Federal Parliament. According to lan | While computer vote registration sys- Cunliffe, secretary to the Constitutional | temscancount very quickly and inexpen- Commission, “a surprisingly wide range | sively, their integrity is only as good their of people” submitted proposals arguing | programmers’. The last US Federal elec- that “Citizens Initiated Referenda’ or | tion results were probably falsified by a “Direct Democracy’ should beenshrined | new computer voting system which was in the Constitution. weighted to give a biased result across The system, whichalready works suc- | one-third of US States! But similar prob- cessfully in Switzerland and parts of the | lems can occur with ballot boxes - even US, enables a specific number of voters | when they’re not made of cardboard. A (eg 500,000 or 5% of the electorate) to | Democracy is only as good as its proc- initiate a referendum by petition. esses allow. Checks and balances must be This encourages active participation | evolved for all such problems, and World’ Ss Oldest in the political process byenabling people | computerisation can make direct repre- to vote for issues, not just parties and | sentation work. Comp uter faces. And the public decides the issues. In Australia a computerised system is This may concentrate even more real | already in place in almost every suburb, A model ofa machine built around 80BC power in the hands of burgeoning media | town and village, networked across the | has been built at Sydney University. monopolies at first, with their ability to | nation, whichis aboutas secure as we can The Antikythera Device - found near sway public opinion. But it can beargued | make it. This system is already designed | the Greek island of that name by sponge- that people become hardertoinfluenceas | to count things and to be accountable for | divers in 1900 - is now a badly corroded they become more aware of issues. Refer- | errors. It isrelatively safe fromtampering | lump of metal, which makes it difficult to enda also take economically or politically | as BILLIONS of dollars go through it. The | determine just what it did. But Professor contentious legislation out ofthe handsof | Totalisator Agency Board - The T.A.B., | Allan Bromley of the Basser department government and private power-brokers. | already organised along State bounda- | ofcomputer scienceand Frank Percival, a The Constitutional Commission’s | ries! Perhaps the tool for making partici- | part-time clock-maker and retired engi- Advisory Committee on Individual | patorycemocracy possiblein Australiais | neer, have made a working model using Rights is recommending that debate on | here, a true outgrowth of our culture, 2,000 year old technology to solve the voter-initiated legislation, legislative It’s a bit like a horse race, really. mystery of its purpose. veto and removal of office-holders Thirty years ago an American profes- sor unravelled the inner workings of the device using X-rays. Using this research, their delicate model of cogs and gears appears to be capable of predicting eclipses over an 18-year cycle. A handle on the side smoothly turns a pointer, which moves to a new square each new moon. After 223 months (18 years) the cycle is completed; another set of gears shows the cycles of the moon, while still others on the original device are sus- pected to show planetary positions - per- fect for astronomical observation and navigation. PAR Ps <; = aT ARON Changing the Constitution Computer SS Taking a Punt World’s Oldest