An offer to Australians
February 3rd, 2010 at 9:00 am by David FarrarSouth Australia goes to the polls on 20 March, and for 25 to 55 days before the election it will (arguably – see comments in previous thread) be illegal to comment on their elections without disclosing your name and postcode.
Even worse, blogs and media sites have to collect names and postcodes from all their commenters or risk being be fined.
Hopefully the law will be repealed or clarified before the election. If it is not though, I am happy to offer Kiwiblog as a temporary forum for discussion of the South Australian election if any Australian sites are worried about the new law. I can set up a general debate every day, or even give some Australian bloggers posting rights.
I have no intention of forcing commenters to give me their name and address/postcode.
As a non resident of Australia, they can not enforce their law on me.
As I said hopefully the law will be repealed. If it is not repealed, I suspect many Australians will ignore it anyway. But if it does result in people feeling they are unable to blog and comment on the state elections, I am happy to help host such discussions here. In fact I am sure many NZ blogs would be happy to adopt an Australian blog for a month. It could be a great trans-tasman initiative!
UPDATE: Heh I wrote this post last night and timed it for 9 am. In the interval, the South Australian Government has backed down and promised to repeal the law, as reported by No Right Turn. Excellent. The Government must have worked out how deeply unpopular it was going to be.
Interestingly the law can not be amended before the election, so the Government has said it will not be enforced and will be retrospectively repealed after the election.
Related posts:
- South Australia Electoral Finance Act
- Two state elections
- Family First and the Sex Party
- Why Australia should invade New Zealand
February 3rd, 2010 at 9:14 am
Scooped DPF!: http://norightturn.blogspot.com/2010/02/freedom-of-speech-wins-in-south.html
ATTORNEY-GENERAL Michael Atkinson has made a “humiliating” backdown and announced he will retrospectively repeal his law censoring internet comment on the state election.
Vote:February 3rd, 2010 at 9:19 am
So if there is a policy/law that you don’t afree with it’s o.k. to help others to circumvent it. Hmmmm!
I’m sure the BoTs will be happy with the precendent National are setting.
Vote:February 3rd, 2010 at 9:26 am
“As a non resident of Australia, they can not enforce their law on me.” While you’re probably right in this case DPF, it isn’t always so clear cut…
Vote:February 3rd, 2010 at 9:30 am
Ah Fitzgerald v Muldoon…
Vote:February 3rd, 2010 at 9:54 am
@mpledger 09 19. I am not very sharp this am, translate second sentence please
Vote:February 3rd, 2010 at 9:54 am
So South Australian pollies are Communists. Too late for them to back down They have already revealed their true colours.
And in doing so have explained one of the colours their cricket team wears
Vote:February 3rd, 2010 at 10:21 am
Everyone is missing the point- once again the ability of DPF to manipulate world events is revealed!
Vote:February 3rd, 2010 at 10:46 am
Thanks, DPF!
Graeme, I thought about Fitzgerald v Muldoon too, but the problem there was that Muldoon tried to shut down the super scheme without legislation, whereas Atkinson is saying he will repeal the legislation as quickly as possible, and in the meantime won’t enforce it.
Vote:February 3rd, 2010 at 10:55 am
Crusader Rabbit is ahead of the curve:
Vote:http://crusader-rabbit.blogspot.com/2010/02/south-australian-government-gags.html
Feb 2 4:32pm
February 3rd, 2010 at 11:22 am
Deborah – I understood that Muldoon said legislation would be forthcoming, but people should stop paying into it in the interim, but it’s been a while since I’ve read it.
Vote:February 3rd, 2010 at 1:01 pm
They Want To Steal Our Freedom:
Shades of Helun Klark during Labour’s last term in the lead up to the election.
It continues to intrigue (deliberate irony) me that the socialists/progressives always desire to stem ‘freedom of speech’ and limit the flow of information.
One might even conclude that they fear the truth being made available to the general populace, and especially their voting base. Why do they so fear TRUTH?
Oh, I understand now; they want to steal my FREEDOM.
Vote:February 3rd, 2010 at 5:48 pm
South Australia is still a better place to do business than New Zealand.
Vote:February 3rd, 2010 at 6:56 pm
Kris K…oh the irony
Vote: