Chapter 253 The Upcoming House of Representatives Election

On January 17, 1908, after several days of negotiation and preparation, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs officially issued an announcement to the public, announcing the establishment of the Australasian Propaganda Department, which is under the management of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and is responsible for domestic and foreign propaganda.

All news agencies, media, and writers' associations should be supervised by the Propaganda Department to ensure that no information that affects national stability will be circulated at home and abroad.

The news of the establishment of the new department quickly attracted the attention of many people in the political arena. After all, the current official positions in Australasia can be said to be more wolves than meat, not to mention that it is an important department under the Ministry of Foreign Affairs such as the Propaganda Department.

Under Arthur's suggestion, Grant Wilson made sufficient preparations early, and took advantage of the advantage of the United Party as the largest party to successfully obtain the position of the first Minister of the Propaganda Department.

Grant Wilson, who became the Minister of Propaganda, naturally knew Arthur's purpose. Therefore, on the first day of his appointment, he reported his plan for the Propaganda Department to the Foreign Affairs Department and requested the approval of the Cabinet Department.

On January 19, Foreign Minister Andrew successfully brought Grant's plan to the Cabinet for review, and successfully obtained the approval of the Cabinet, and officially began to implement it on the same day.

Starting from January 19, all immigrants going to Australasia will be assigned to different regions as a family unit, and the focus of immigration will be more inclined to areas with less population.

In order to encourage these immigrants to go to Western Australia and South Australia, the two state governments, at the suggestion of the cabinet department, introduced relevant policies to compensate immigrants with at least five acres of land.

Anyway, these two regions are considered to be vast and sparsely populated. Together, they account for nearly half of Australasia's land area, but only have one-fifth of the population. It is time to support them well.

For immigrants, Australasia's compensation is really powerful. If they go to Western Australia and South Australia, they will get at least fifteen acres of land, hire a few indigenous workers, and be a landlord.

And if they give up these fifteen acres of land, they can have priority to enter the Leonora Industrial Zone under construction, become workers in the industrial zone after training, and get higher wages.

At present, the income of workers in Australasia is not low, at least about 47 Australian dollars.

After the National Day, the Australian government also resumed its busy work, and construction across the country continued in full swing.

In particular, the Leonora Industrial Zone, which the government currently attaches great importance to, has invested more than 20,000 indigenous people. Basically, there will be a small change in the construction site every few days, and a big change every week.

Since February, Arthur has participated in the groundbreaking ceremony of the battleship Australasia, the launching ceremony of the second Russian battleship, the ceremony of the Fourth Regular Division, and so on, and finally got a little rest time in March.

Although it is quite busy, it is very gratifying for Arthur.

The hope of the Australasian Navy has entered the construction stage, which means that Australasia will gain a strong naval force in the near future, and the security of the country will finally be guaranteed.

On March 17, Prime Minister Walter asked Arthur to attend the regular cabinet meeting, one to report on the current situation of the government, and the other to determine the specific process and arrangements for this year's national election.

Australasia is different from other European countries. The people of Australasia can elect members of parliament at all levels, and members of parliament can elect government officials at the same level.

The term of office of members of parliament is generally two years, but they can maintain their status as members of parliament by re-election.

The term of office of governments at all levels in Australasia is the same, and has now been unified to four years.

Among them, the prime minister of the cabinet can be re-elected for a maximum of two terms, and a maximum of three terms. Cabinet ministers can be re-elected for a maximum of three terms, and a maximum of five terms.

The restrictions on governors are slightly looser, with a maximum of two terms, but there is no limit on the number of terms.

This means that if a governor is popular with the people, it is possible to serve in office for three terms and two terms.

The rules for the appointment of mayors of various cities are more relaxed. Although the term of office is still four years, there is no limit on the number of terms.

As long as the mayors of cities are popular, Arthur does not mind letting them continue to be re-elected as long as they can do something practical.

As for the village and town levels below, the positions of village and town heads are generally appointed by the state legislature for a term of six years, with no limit on the number of times.

All these officials are supervised by the two major houses and all the people. The parliament has the right to dismiss elected officials, of course, this does not include the cabinet government.

But the House of Representatives can petition the Royal House and Arthur to dismiss the current cabinet and re-elect.

As it is related to the election of the House of Representatives, Arthur also decided to attend this meeting, and by the way, he could also listen to the reports of government officials on their work in the past few months.

On March 19, the regular meeting of the Australian Cabinet Government was held in the State Council.

Amid cheers and applause, Arthur also attended the meeting and naturally sat in the main seat of the conference room.

The meeting first reported on the current work of each department, such as which industrial base the Ministry of Industry has expanded, and the current situation of the construction of the new industrial base, etc.

Among them, Arthur is more concerned about the immigration situation reported by the Ministry of Civil Affairs over the past two months.

At present, the immigration of Australian and American countries can be said to be higher and higher, and stronger and stronger year by year.

After setting a new immigration record last year, the number of immigrants in the first two months of 1908 has exceeded 130,000, and this year is expected to set a new record.

If the data from March is added, the number of immigrants in 1908 has exceeded 170,000. On average, Australasia receives more than 2,000 immigrants every day, which is enough to show how terrifying the immigration speed of Australasia is now.

It is precisely because of such an exaggerated number of immigrants that Australasia conducts a census almost every year to determine the true population of Australasia and facilitate the government's next plan.

At present, with these new immigrants, the population of Australasia has exceeded 7.3 million, and the population of Sydney has officially exceeded one million.

Of course, it is limited to one million. After the population of Sydney reached one million, with the efforts of the Propaganda Department, the Ministry of Civil Affairs, the Ministry of Agriculture, the Ministry of Industry, the Ministry of Health, the Ministry of Education and other departments, most of the remaining immigrants have been moved to Western Australia and South Australia, and the remaining half have also gone to New Zealand.

The most popular place in Western Australia and South Australia is, of course, the Leonora Industrial Base, which is currently under construction.

This industrial base is highly valued by Australasia, and tens of thousands of industrial jobs will be created in the future. Therefore, it is necessary to migrate to this area as soon as possible.

In addition to the good news that immigration is expected to reach a new high, Australasia's current fiscal revenue is also very good.

The total fiscal revenue in the first two months has exceeded 7 million Australian dollars. Although the investment is also very huge, it is also good news.

Minister Grant also reported on the current actions and achievements of the Propaganda Department. Arthur also encouraged him and asked Minister Grant to make more arrangements abroad, promote other cities in Australasia, and strive to attract more immigrants.

Arthur also proposed an idea, which is to create a ranking list of cities suitable for immigration, and publish and promote it in large quantities abroad.

Anyway, it is a list created by Australasia itself, and it doesn't matter if it is biased towards itself.

As long as the European people can choose to believe in this list, the Propaganda Department's plan will be successful.

No matter whether it is true or not, just deceive the immigrants first. Anyway, immigrants of this era were not too wealthy, and it was not easy for them to afford the round-trip tickets.

Of course, Arthur only proposed an idea, and how to do it specifically depended on the ability of Minister Grant.

For Arthur, all he had to do was to make a macro layout for national development, and these officials were the real candidates for micro-implementation.

If a country needs the king to do everything personally, then the country is doomed to not last long.

After more than two hours of reporting, the meeting finally started the last agenda, which was about the upcoming House of Representatives election.

The House of Representatives election is a nationwide political activity for Australasia, and it is also welcomed and participated by most Australasia people.

According to the last House of Representatives election, that is, in 1906, there were more than two million Australasians who participated in the House of Representatives election, just for the 298 seats in the House of Representatives, which is enough to show the status of the House of Representatives election in the hearts of Australasia people.

This election is two years apart from the last one, and the number of immigrants alone has increased by more than one million.

This means that the number of people who will vote this year is definitely more than two million, and the voting process and plan also need to be prepared in more detail to avoid any accidents during the election.

Fairness, openness, and accuracy are the topics that Arthur cares about. Officials also know Arthur's thoughts. After all, this is not the first time that the House of Representatives election has taken place.

But the situation of each election is different. With the development of Australasia, the election of the House of Representatives will be more and more valued by people, and the number of people participating in the election will definitely increase.

In order to fully count the votes of these people, not only a large number of officials are needed to conduct statistical calculations, but also to go deep into cities, villages and towns to collect the intentions of all the people. This is also a big project, at least for the current Australasia government.

In fact, government officials also attach great importance to the election of the House of Representatives. After all, most of these officials already have parties, and their parties are also very concerned about the proportion of seats they occupy in the House of Representatives election.

After all, according to the regulations of Australasia, the proportion of seats they occupy in the House of Representatives determines how much money they can get each year, and also determines whether their main officials can enter the cabinet department.

For example, the two largest parties in Australasia, the United Party and the Country Party, each won a cabinet minister seat and obtained the qualification to enter the cabinet government precisely because they occupied more seats in the House of Representatives.

After all, this is the cabinet government, an opportunity to enter the highest government of the country in one step. No party or individual can miss such a good opportunity.

After more than four hours of discussion, the government finally finalized an election process and plan that everyone was satisfied with.

The first is the ballot collection box, which all villages and cities in Australia need to be equipped with. Among them, small villages are equipped with one ballot collection box, large villages and small towns are equipped with two ballot collection boxes, and large towns and small cities are equipped with three ballot collection boxes.

For cities with a population of more than 50,000, 100,000, and 200,000, four, six, and ten voting collection boxes are equipped respectively.

For all voting collection boxes, not only are there soldiers to protect them, but the state governments of each state also need to send a certain number of officials to supervise the voting collection boxes in their non-residential areas after they are dispersed.

In addition to the dual supervision of soldiers and officials, the state governments also need to organize personnel to randomly patrol the voting collection boxes in their jurisdiction to avoid accidents.

And Arthur and the cabinet government will also conduct random inspections, which is equivalent to five layers of insurance, basically eliminating accidents.

The time for the House of Representatives election will start from June 1st, the voting period will be from June 1st to June 20th, and the transportation stage will be from June 21st to July 1st.

All votes will be concentrated in the state governments for counting, and the Royal House, the House of Representatives, the cabinet government, the royal family, the people and the army will jointly supervise and conduct random inspections on the counted votes.

It takes about 20 days for each state to count the votes. It is expected that on July 21, each state government will report the final results to the cabinet government. After random checks are correct, the results of the House of Representatives election will be announced around July 25.

In order to prevent accidents that may occur during the election stage, even after the results are announced, all ballots will still be concentrated in the capital, and Arthur will personally organize people to review them.

If the statistics of each state are wrong or even too different, not only will the election results of the House of Representatives be rejected, but the state governments will also bear the corresponding responsibilities, and even pursue every ballot box.

Arthur does not believe that under such a strict election system, there will be people who secretly violate the rules or even cheat.

Anyway, the final results must be reviewed. If the state governments have the courage to tamper with the results, let them try.

Most people agree with this election plan, so it was successfully determined as the plan for the 1908 House of Representatives election and announced to the public.

This also means that people still have more than two months to think about who they should support to become a new member of parliament.

Four thousand words, please take a leave, brothers.