I don't think that is true Glen. Scylla was elected MoRA after just two months in the region, Feirmont was elected MoRA with around 3 or 4 months of experience and was elected Delegate after just 8 months and Imki was just recently elected Delegate with just a few months of experience so I think elections are welcoming to newcomers.

But who supported them?

The Old Guard did support them.

Deputy Regional Minister of the Planning and Development Agency(March 8-May 19, 2014)

Local Council Member(April 24-August 11)

Court Justice of TSP(August 15-December 7)

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"The 1% is like a 1% battery charge. It will die out if it is not charged(the charge is the 99%). But if you don't charge it, it will die for sure, sooner or later"
- Me (2001- Present)

"Change is the world's blood"
- Me (2001-Present)

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But who supported them?

The Old Guard did support them.

The voters supported them and you can't say that all voters are "the old guard." Feirmont and Scylla were just two ordinary members who worked very hard in RA, they were nominated, they accepted and won.

Europeian Ambassador to The South Pacific
Former Local Council Member
Former Minister of Regional Affairs
Former High Court Justice

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Punch, all those people had the backing of influential players, and some because they rose through the ranks as deputy. I'm talking about players who aren't friends or acolytes of an already influential player, who probably doesn't feel comfortable running in an election, but could do a good job nonetheless of appointed by the Delegate.

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Here is a full bill for consideration.  This should cover the Election Act and some clarifying provisions about the current terms and such.  I should also point out that this does not include anything about the Line of Succession so that would still be in place as is.  With the Vice Delegate becoming Delegate if their is a vacancy in that office.  I think we need to discuss that and how we want to handle it.

Appointed Cabinet Omnibus Bill

Section 1 - Amendments to the Charter

Article 5:  Executive

Section 1 - The Delegate and Vice Delegate
1.  The Delegate will serve as Head of State and Government of the South Pacific.
2.  The Delegate may implement policies regarding regional message board adverts and spam and expel recruiters for violating those policies.
3.  The Delegate is responsible for making sure all nations abide by the Endorsement Cap as established and enforced by the Committee for State Security.
4.  The Delegate may eject nations when permitted by the Charter and Code of Laws.
5.  With the majority approval of the Committee for State Security taken by a vote, the Delegate may declare a State of Emergency with reasonable justification that a threat to regional security is imminent, subjected to provisions granted by Article 6, Section 3 of the Charter.
6.  The Vice Delegate will hold the second highest amount of endorsements in the region at any given time.
7.  The Vice Delegate will be responsible for reviewing Citizenship Applications.
8.  In the event that the Delegate resigns, is recalled, or otherwise unable to carry out their duties the Vice Delegate will immediately assume the Office of the Delegate.
9.  The procedures for the election of the Delegate and Vice Delegate must be defined in Law.

Section 2 - Cabinet of the South Pacific
1.  The Delegate will appoint citizens to serve as members of the Cabinet of the South Pacific.
2.  The Delegate must appoint citizens to head foreign, military, and internal affairs.  The Delegate will have the ability to staff and create other Ministries.
3.  Each appointed Minister will be considered a Senior Cabinet Official and serve at the pleasure of the Delegate.  Each Senior Official may appoint Deputies who serve at the pleasure of the respective Minister.
4.  The Delegate must present the appointments of all Senior Cabinet Officials to the Assembly to be approved via a majority vote.

Article 3:  Legislature

Section 2 - Chair of the Assembly and Duties of the Chair.
3. The Chair of the Assembly will serve as the Legislative Liaison between the Cabinet and Assembly and have Junior Cabinet status.
4. The Chair will serve a term lasting three months.


Section 2 - Amendments to the Election Act

Article 1 - General Elections

1. Elections for the Delegate, Vice Delegate, and Chair of the Assembly shall commence on the fifteenth of every January, April, July, and November.
3. Terms for the Delegate, Vice Delegate, and Chair of the Assembly shall commence on the first of every February, May,  August, and December, while terms for Local Councillors on the fifteenth of every June, September, and January. 
5. No one can run for or hold more than one Executive, Legislative, Judicial, or Local Council position at any given time.

Article 2 - Position Specificities

1. The Delegate and Vice Delegate will run on a joint ticket. 
2. Cabinet offices will be voted on separately. 
3. Voters during Delegate, Vice Delegate, and Chair of the Assembly Elections shall list all candidates from their most to least preferred on their ballot.
4. The winning candidates during a Delegate, Vice Delegate, and Chair of the Assembly race shall be the candidate, when paired up against any other candidate, who would surpass any other candidate in terms of support; if no such candidate exists, the winning candidate shall be determined by an instant-runoff vote. In the event of a tie the election for that office will be restarted immediately.
5. In all elections an option to re-open nominations will be included. For non-judicial elections, If this option receives the most votes the nomination period for that office will be restarted.

Article 3 - Vacancies

1. In the event that no candidate runs for an available office the newly elected Cabinet will appoint a Citizen to fill the vacancy.
1. Vacancies in office occur when the office holder resigns, is recalled, or no longer holds citizenship. In the event of a vacancy in office a special election will begin within 72 hours of the office becoming vacant, unless the vacancy occurs in the month prior to the start of the term for the position in question; in this case the Cabinet will appoint a Citizen to fill the vacated position for the remainder of the term.

Section 3 - General and Special Provisions
1.  The Chair of the Assembly will ensure that all amendments are updated and the numbering is consistent for any amendment that causes changes to the numbering.
2.  The existing terms for the Cabinet and Chair of the Assembly will be extended by one month to match the new 3 month terms.
3.  Upon passage the Chair will lose senior Cabinet permissions and gain junior Cabinet level permissions.
4.  During the remainder of the current term if the office of an elected Minister becomes vacant the Delegate will appoint a successor with Assembly approval as defined law.

I'd like to make a small change if it is okay with the Chair and then Motion this version to vote.

The change I made was to the appointment of MoFA and MoA.  I have changed the text to allow for a little flexibility in names for those Ministries.  I've also added internal affairs which would cover all possible regional affairs areas.

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I agree with you in part, Tsu. But it's not like our system right now isn't without major flaws. There's a real likelihood of infighting. There's rarely a central vision coming from the Cabinet, because the Delegate is barely the leader most of the time, yet the Cabinet is expected to act with unity. We have a regular issue with special elections, which I think we've partially solved by making the court a single appointed position.

Then there's what I think is also an issue: elections aren't very welcoming to newcomers. Most of the time, new players need the support and endorsement of well-respected old players to successfully win an election. I think appointments can be geared towards giving the jobs to newcomers who otherwise feel they can't run in and win an election.

But we still need to give people starting positions. Where not going to randomly pull someone from a pool of 5000 nations and be like "Here! Be the minister of Minister of Whatever!" So, I think to say that we'll be better positioned to bring players in is a bit misleading. The delegate will be better positioned to put them where s/he wants them (and dismiss them if s/he wants).

I'd also point out that under the current suggestion, all of our Cabinet positions are essentially going to be junior positions. Is that really what we want?

Also, part of what I think is that I personally don't *want* the Cabinet to have a central vision. I want the Cabinet to represent what the Assembly wants — and what the Assembly selects. I'd sooner have voters have a hand in each separate ministry rather than vote for a delegate/vice ticket that ultimately dictates the rest.

Finally — we've previously had discussions about how the Cabinet, if voting as a body, can block much of the Assembly's goals. The likelihood of that only increases here. If we go through with this, I think we need to alter our laws to remove the executive branch from the Assembly.

-tsunamy
[forum admin]

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But guys the only people who will be able to run for Delegate will be players with influence. Those new players who get appointed to the Cabinet would get the backing of that old player so noting is changing. The fact is there is noting wrong with getting the support of an old player or slowly working through the ranks before you decide to run at an election, that is how life works both here in NS and in RL.

Europeian Ambassador to The South Pacific
Former Local Council Member
Former Minister of Regional Affairs
Former High Court Justice

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But guys the only people who will be able to run for Delegate will be players with influence. Those new players who get appointed to the Cabinet would get the backing of that old player so noting is changing. The fact is there is noting wrong with getting the support of an old player or slowly working through the ranks before you decide to run at an election, that is how life works both here in NS and in RL.

I'm sorry, I'm really not sure what you're saying here. Is this an argument for or against appointing the cabinet?

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But guys the only people who will be able to run for Delegate will be players with influence. Those new players who get appointed to the Cabinet would get the backing of that old player so noting is changing. The fact is there is noting wrong with getting the support of an old player or slowly working through the ranks before you decide to run at an election, that is how life works both here in NS and in RL.

I'm sorry, I'm really not sure what you're saying here. Is this an argument for or against appointing the cabinet?

I believe that was he (she?) is saying is that this change is unnecessary, as the things we view as 'issues' under our current system will be present under this system as well.

I believe Punch is also saying that the issue of senior players controlling who gains rank is not an issue at all, which I support, to a point.

Greetings, I am The Serres Republic.

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I know you all look forward to when I complete my grand quest ;P.

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Heck I was MoFA, Now Im PM. I must be loved owo

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But we still need to give people starting positions. Where not going to randomly pull someone from a pool of 5000 nations and be like "Here! Be the minister of Minister of Whatever!" So, I think to say that we'll be better positioned to bring players in is a bit misleading. The delegate will be better positioned to put them where s/he wants them (and dismiss them if s/he wants).

This is just taking the game too seriously. Yes, experience has its value. But it's not like anything any of us do here is all that difficult. So yeah, we can pick complete newcomers and give them head roles in government. Plenty of regions do that!

What I'm seeing in our election for MoFA right now is what we've seen for years here. We're probably going to elect a long-time player from Europeia, who's been gone from TSP for the last 6 months and was never all that active before then, because he has "experience." Instead, what we could be doing is approaching one our new citizens and giving them the job. It's not that radical of an idea, really.

But the way this region elects people is exactly what's wrong with us. We cry all the time about how we need to get new players involved. But then we lock away the actually consequential positions from them. We force them through loops in deputy positions, and the Fellowship Program, where they have to wait months and months and months until we decide they have enough "experience." Feirmont on Discord last night was saying how the stress of the MoFA job would burn players out, and we would be doing a disservice to letting a new player have the position. I think our current system of gaining enough "experience" to be elected is a far bigger disincentive.

Allowing the Delegate to appoint Cabinet members means we break that cycle by force. I have zero faith that the majority of players here are going to change the way they vote in elections. But when the Delegate wants to appoint a new player, that's a big endorsement and I don't foresee the Assembly worried so much about their "experience" relative to other players. So for me, this amendment would be a way to sidestep the long and probably doomed process of changing our regional culture in a way that allows more new people into the top roles of government.

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I believe that was he (she?) is saying is that this change is unnecessary, as the things we view as 'issues' under our current system will be present under this system as well.

I believe Punch is also saying that the issue of senior players controlling who gains rank is not an issue at all, which I support, to a point.

Exactly. Oh and yes I am a guy.

Europeian Ambassador to The South Pacific
Former Local Council Member
Former Minister of Regional Affairs
Former High Court Justice

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