Abstract

Upon reading Issue Paper 1, “Reform of the Federation” (Commonwealth, 2014) and based upon the terms of references of the White Paper itself, it does not seem evident that there is any real intention or attention being given to actually distributing power to the States and Territories, and local governments, a transfer of authority that theoretically would motivate subnational government(s) “…to plan and manage investment and service-delivery ‘at street level’ (OECD report on inclusive growth cited in Issue Paper 1, 6). In fact, a real intention to re-invigorate a federal system that is about the States and Territories having ‘sovereignty in their spheres’ and to a lesser but some extent local governments is first, about decentralization, and second, about how to coordinate multi-level governance. First however, subnational units need to be governed as ‘functional economies, rather than administrative units’ (OECD, 2014).

A shorter version of this article appeared on October 30th 2014 in the Canberra Times.

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