Actually the political logic on national security legislation here is a little more complicated and not really related to the electoral system or compulsory voting.
National security policy has been used as a wedge issue here in the last 20 years, like in lots of other places. So the raft of security legislation that's been passed since the conservatives took office in 2013 has actually been as a result of both major parties voting together. If the Labor Party (centre-left) opposes security legislation, they're painted as soft on terror, weak on border security, etc.
Security agencies have given a shopping list to the Liberal (i.e. conservative) government - data retention, citizenship, and encryption amongst others. The Libs have put bill after bill forward in an attempt to generate opposition from Labor and thereby get an effective national-security wedge. Some of them have been 'genuine' reforms but some have been less so. Labor knows this of course. But it's ahead in the polls and wants to be a small target come the election, so it has refused to bite. The result has been a bunch of shitty new security laws.
It can be wonderfully disheartening to watch, especially given that lots of people on both sides of politics know perfectly well that they're bad laws but can't say it out loud due to the the politics of it. They're not all idiots who don't understand tech.
So while the electoral system here has delivered slim majorities for successive governments (or indeed minorities at times), it's not really relevant here. When the major parties vote together the laws are going to pass.
Sorry if that's off topic but I find it very interesting, albeit depressing sometimes.
National security policy has been used as a wedge issue here in the last 20 years, like in lots of other places. So the raft of security legislation that's been passed since the conservatives took office in 2013 has actually been as a result of both major parties voting together. If the Labor Party (centre-left) opposes security legislation, they're painted as soft on terror, weak on border security, etc.
Security agencies have given a shopping list to the Liberal (i.e. conservative) government - data retention, citizenship, and encryption amongst others. The Libs have put bill after bill forward in an attempt to generate opposition from Labor and thereby get an effective national-security wedge. Some of them have been 'genuine' reforms but some have been less so. Labor knows this of course. But it's ahead in the polls and wants to be a small target come the election, so it has refused to bite. The result has been a bunch of shitty new security laws.
It can be wonderfully disheartening to watch, especially given that lots of people on both sides of politics know perfectly well that they're bad laws but can't say it out loud due to the the politics of it. They're not all idiots who don't understand tech.
So while the electoral system here has delivered slim majorities for successive governments (or indeed minorities at times), it's not really relevant here. When the major parties vote together the laws are going to pass.
Sorry if that's off topic but I find it very interesting, albeit depressing sometimes.
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