Debating Against The Adoption Of The Pacific Parliament To The New Zealand Parliament

Government system

“Pacific parliaments should follow the New Zealand example and open up all Bills for comments that can be submitted online”.

You have been assigned to be arguing against the above statement.

Your essay/debate must contain the following:

• States that you are arguing against the statement
• discuss in detail your key points/arguments;
• indicate what the opposing team’s arguments are likely to be and how you would counter these arguments; and
• contains references to any sources that you use.

Marking criteria for debates

The following criteria are taken from the Guidelines for the Royal Malaysian Intervarsity Debating Championship
The whole exercise of debating revolves around the persuasiveness of the speakers in convincing the adjudicators.

Your team will be marked on the following:

1) Matter: Matter consists of three main elements; arguments, examples and rebuttals.

2) Arguments and examples will be judged based on their relevance, explanatory and interest value, their development in advancement of the team's case, and the clash they provide against the case of the opposing team.

3) Arguments and examples that are developed in a logical analysis are marked favourably than those based heavily on assertion (i.e. arguments without proper substantiation) or emotion.

4) Marks will also be awarded for effective rebuttals. Debaters are not, strictly speaking, obliged to make a detailed refutation of every argument of their opponents. There are however, expected to forward effective and convincing rebuttals of the main contentions of the other side by confronting those contentions head-on. Rebuttals should not get bogged down in unnecessary details.
Manner: Manner is the style in which a debater presents arguments. This is just as important to the debate as the arguments themselves. Manner includes persuasion, the ability to demonstrate a polished and confident speaking technique and to hold the attention of the audience and adjudicators.

The style employed through the use of emotion, tone, gestures and rhetorical techniques should also be appropriate to the material presented and assist the argument being made. For example, the use of humour and wit in terms of appropriate sarcasm and amusing examples or anecdotes is appreciated but will score few marks if it does not advance the argument. Examples of humour not appreciated in the debate are inappropriate jokes, personal insults and mere stand-up comedy.

One important thing that debaters should remember is that there is no one best way to debate; there is no difference between an aggressive and forceful debater and one who is calm and understated if both are able to demonstrate the ability to persuade and hold the attention of the adjudicators. Notwithstanding this, there is however a limit to the degree of acceptable "manner" - neither an overly aggressive nor a too understated debater will score many points.

Method: The structure of individual arguments and a team's case as a whole constitutes method. Clear distinction between points and the existence of a logical flow between them will be marked favourably. There should not be any contradiction of analysis within a particular argument or between arguments presented by speakers on the same team (The opposing team that points out such contradictions stands to be marked favourably).

As with written articles or books that begin with a clear introduction, then proceed with a thorough and systematic analysis of the substance central to the article and end with a concise conclusion, debaters should also be able to structure their speeches into separate categories with appropriate headings. Debaters should not lump different arguments together without clear separation and expect the adjudicators to figure out for themselves when a particular individual arguments ends and the next one begins.
Debaters must give attention to the logical and systematic flow of their elaborations on the arguments. They should guide the adjudicators through their analysis and make them feel as though they are reading an authoritative book on the issue presented. Needless to say, a debater who achieves this shall be marked favourably by the adjudicators.

This task aims at debating against the adoption of the Pacific parliament to the New Zealand parliament.  A brief preview of the New Zealand parliament is that it's one of the oldest parliaments which constitutes of the Queen of New Zealand and the New Zealand House of Representatives. It was established in the year eighteen fifty, and it remains functional up to date. Pacific parliament is supported by the Pacific parliament network which enables the Pacific legislature to have access to authoritative information as well as research services.  This pacific parliament works in collaboration with the New Zealand, Australian Parliaments, and the United Nations programmers of development. (Goldman and Brashares 2014, p.75). This network compiles information on political events and training practices from all the Pacific regions. Sharing of issues among the Pacific areas it's also facilitated by the system. In compliance with the Parliamentary research Request service, it instructs the Pacific clerks to submit the paper to the parliament and share their current information relating to their parliaments

Opposing Side: The Pacific Parliament should not follow the New Zealand parliament because of the following reasons;

Government system

It takes a shorter time to change its Government system. In relevance to the New Zealand law though, a new government is formed after three years. ( Christensen and Lægreid 2013,p.73).The effect of this is that the previous government after the exhaustion of the stated period of three years may not have exploited its full potential and the performance of the last government might be undermined and termed as incompetent due to a failure of completing its strategic projects. Besides, the Pacific parliament in the side of governance is characterized by the problem of incompetence, which originates from incompletion of projects will also be exhibited.

Monarchy Parliament

The New Zealand parliament is monarchy constitutionally. This implies that the head of state which in this case is Queen Elizabeth II exercises the full sovereignty of the country. She is represented by the Governor-general called Dame Patsy Reddy. This Governor General system uses the mixed member proportional system of voting which discourages the multi-party political system, and thus most of the seats are won by the single political party which comprises of the Queen Elizabeth side. (O'Neill 2012, p.751). The adoption of this system of parliament by the Pacific parliament may be of a massive disadvantage since this kind of system advocates the dominance of a single party which holds all the available seats in the government. This ineffective of this type of government can be identified as some of the individuals elected may lack leadership qualities and thus may lead to deterioration of the pacific parliament if adopted.

Voting system

The Voting System, The mixed member voting system advocates a responsible government. This states that ministers will only be chosen from those who were initially elected as members of the House representatives. The government is believed to stay in power only if it has sufficient members in the House of Representatives (Pahl-Wostl, Kabat, and Möltgen 2010, p.56). In compliance with this statement, it's clear that the adoption of this system of government obliges the participation of new members who are not part of the House of Representatives and have better leadership qualities than those already in the House of Representatives. The adoption of this voting system by the pacific parliament may lead to a downfall of the whole economy just because it limits the chance of people who understand more about the problem of the economy and are ready to formulate the relevant strategies to correct those problems.

Monarchy Parliament

System of Governance

The system of Governance, The New Zealand system of governance is sub-divided into three branches which have the same separation of powers. The distinction of management with the three branches should have different separation of powers. (Iosifidis 2010, p.67).This is because if all equal exercise power, only a single office should be adopted to represent the three branches. If this must be approved, therefore unequal power should be implemented so that, there is a hierarchal distribution of forces such that, one chapter responds to the above it. The offices in which the government of New Zealand is sub-divided is as discussed below

Its legislature

Legislature, this constitutes the parliament which in other terms is referred to as the House of Representatives and also entails the selected committees which perform a variety of roles. Some of which include making new laws and also updating the existing laws and the amendment of bills which finally become laws. They act as representatives of the other New Zealanders, determination of the tax system and also the implementation of government expenditure. The adoption of this type of legislature in the pacific parliament will entail the amendment of various laws and the government system to deploy its services successfully to the citizens. This is because the New Zealand governments beliefs on the sovereignty of the queen and any Member of parliament action taken on behalf of the citizens has to be approved by  Queen, and therefore she has the right to accept or reject the offering from the member of parliaments. This is a significant disadvantage if this is adopted and it fails to be amended.

Its Executive

Executive, About the New Zealand constitution, the executive has been given the power to make the decision on daily activities and the expenditure of the government money. It proposes laws to the parliament and policies which guide the daily practice of the government departments. It also constitutes of ministers who are supported by the government agencies.( Larner and Walters 2011, p.361).The role of Executive in New Zealand is made of mere illusion since any expenditure by the government is prepared to satisfy the group of member states first since the government is the monarchy. The implementation of this kind of government by the pacific parliament will be a great menace to the regular residents since there wants will only be catered for after the top level political there need have been provided for.

Its Judiciary

Judiciary, this entails cases of Court and Judgment. It involves the interpretation of laws by judges in the court of law and making the correct decision from the knowledge obtained through the code. This also entails reviewing the actions made by the government and giving a breakthrough to most of the problem brought to them by the ordinary citizens. The branch of Judiciary in New Zealand has been fully exercised since most of the courts do not follow the constitution and exercise biases in the decisions made at the court. The implementation of this branch by the pacific parliament will attract some further changes in the system to achieve equality and fairness in making decisions in court.

Voting System

The above points were formulated for the opposing side which critically rejected the aspect of the Pacific parliament to adopt the New Zealand parliament due to the points deduced as shown above.

The proposing side comes up with the following arguments;

Government Formation

About the first opposing point, the proposing team argued that the formation of the government after three years was a great deal since after every three years the offices will be occupied by new leaders who can exercise their competence to come up with go-ahead plan and aid in achieving sustainable development. (Larner and Craig 2010, p.402).They suggested that this type of strategy will eliminate incompetent leaders in the offices and new ones take over their chances. In countering with this argument, I stated that the probability of the incoming leader competence is unknown and the existing leader needs only time to confirm his or her incompetence. This argument attracted the expansion of the government formation time to give the current leaders time to exploit their full potential in the field to bring a desirable result thus the parliament was not to wholly adopted in relevance to that.

System of Governance

In accordance to the second opposing point on the system of governance which was the monarchy in nature, the proposing side suggested that this system of governance was the best and had to be adopted since it constitutes members of a family who hold higher level seats in the government. (Reddy, Locke, Scrimgeour and Gunasekarage 2013, p.51)They deduced an example to support their point by arguing that, a family that has good governance traits is well off in guiding the country towards achieving sustainable development of the country through the implementation of quality decisions to improve the economy. In opposition of this argument, is stated that the trait of leadership is spread from and a variety of citizen and therefore, there are better than them, and if given a chance to hold those seats, they can provide better performance than them thus there proposing statement is invalid.

Voting system

The point on voting system of New Zealand was also a significant interest by the proposing side. They stated that electing members of parliament from those who already exist in the House of Representatives was a great idea which not only the Pacific parliament should adopt but also the other nations as well. This was because they understood better about the operation and duties of the members of parliament than the recruits from the full range of citizens. In opposition to this statement, I stated that there is no need of voting for a person who knows about his role and he or she cannot undertake it. (Durie 2012, p.100).Despite he can use the power of the office for his or her benefit. The goal of voting was to involve the citizens in a selection of members of state who in their view were to achieve sustainable development in their ministries or own origins or localities in which they represent. Therefore, the idea of voting should ignore whether you know about the job or not and focus on the welfare of the citizens.

System of Governance

The system of governance also was also a crucial area to discuss by the proposing side. They argued that this system of subdividing the government into three that is the Executive, Legislature and the Judiciary was a great idea. This was because each branch represented a critical part of the government and helped it to perform its functions and operations efficiently. They suggested on equality of powers among the three branches in an offering of the government services. In counteracting with these statements, I criticized the three branches and advocated for amendment only if they were to be adopted.

Legislature

The legislature was evidenced that they advocated for the role of the parliament which was to regulate the daily expenditure of the country, determining the tax expenditure as well as the amendment of a bill which finally becomes laws. These roles were excellent as every state has its legislature in which it relies on for its operations. In compliance with this legislative role, I pointed out that the legislative function was genuine and deserve to be followed though not like the way New Zealand does. (Marsden and Prevost 2011, p.255). Proper compliance with the services has to be achieved if pacific c parliament has to adopt this and has to define its legislative roles which abide by the need s of its citizen. The side of expenditure has highly been neglected and the quality of selfishness overflows in the country thus the ordinary citizen does not benefit from this leisure as supposed to help. Therefore good amendment has to be followed and rules and regulations set to those whore break the roles under this branch.

Executive

Executive, Great importance was attached by the proposing side on this branch and stated that it implements roles which help the management of other departments of the government and therefore performs a critical function which also the pacific parliament should also apply. (Hossain, Prevost and Rao 2009, p.119). In line with the statement, I argued by the monarchy system of government which gives the Queen total sovereignty above all the departments. Therefore for every action that has to be executed in any of the department has to pass through the Queen who has the right to accept or reject the work suggested. I also indicated for the reduction of the powers of the Queen or the top level seats not to manipulate the rights of the citizens thus considered the proposing point void.

Judiciary

Judiciary, the proposing side also recommended that the Pacific parliament should adopt the New Zealand parliament and implement these judiciary roles which include the judgment and Court of law.(Thompson 2010, p.480)About this statement, I stated that the judges in the court should represent the true citizen and not to be biased with those in power. They should adhere to the statement that says that no one is above the law regardless of his or her strengths.

Conclusion

In compliance with the above debate, is clear that the Pacific parliament should not adopt the New Zealand parliament due to issues regarding the formation of a government, the voting system and the governance systems. Despite the proposing side, the opposing team remains firm and stable on its arguments towards the motion on a debate. 

Reference

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