Essay On Australian Federation

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The federation of the six self-governing colonies of Australia into a federal Commonwealth of Australia was a radical change to system of Government in Australia, but one that reflected the pre-existing realities of Australian society. At the time it was clear that the federal government should be given complete control over defence, customs and currency - the motives for federation - but by that point the colonies were proud of their achievements in the economic and social spheres and would not be willing to unite at the cost of their autonomy, even ignoring the infeasibility of trying to centrally control such a widespread and geographically dispersed communities, so there was much debate over how much additional power the federal government should have. (Sharman and Moon, 2003, p.4) (Singleton et al., 2012, p.58) The Upper House, or Senate, was created …show more content…

... While the composition of the Senate is structured to reflect the federation, with equal representation of each of the states, for the most part the modern parliament is dominated by political party machines that keep a firm grip on votes in both houses." (Department of the Senate, 2016, p.139) However, while party discipline generally prevails in the Senate much like it does in the House of Reps, there have been cases where senators have places interests of the State over the party line; for example, under the Howard Government the Queensland Nationals senator Barnaby Joyce crossed the floor and voted against Coalition bills. (Singleton et al., 2012,

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