Should Australia have a referendum on asylum seekers/immigration policy?

It would work in the case of a natural disaster like it has in Queensland. But in the case of the UK government over the last say 20 years it wouldn't have worked. Nobody likes paying tax - so if any government during the boom times (say 1994 - 2007) suggested increasing the tax to save for a rainy day, the opposition at the time (regardless of tory or labour) would have opposed it and the population would not have voted for that party.

You couldn't have increased taxation during the bad times (2007 - to present) as governments need to stimulate the economy as private companies and individuals cant. If you take money out of the economy to fund the stimulation you remove even more money out of the economy leading to a prolonged and deeper recession. Even the threat of higher taxes causes the economy to constrict which is what has happened over the last quarter in the UK.

The government has increased VAT (a sales tax) which has lead to a decline in the economy in the busiest quarter of the year. The next quarter will also constrict because the tax rise has taken effect as will the second quarter of this year because there is another tax rise (National Insurance) taking effect in April. Which leaves a government little choice but to borrow during the bad times and payback during the good times.

Something every other nations government appears to grasp with the single exception of the one lead by Cameron and Osborne.

Works well in theory. But when you've only got 20 million full time workers and 8 million part time workers, with many of those requiring tax credits due to low wages and already struggling to make ends meet, working for a living would be even more of a mugs game than it already is. Red Top: And if everybody saved for everything they bought the whole economy would grind to a standstill.

The UK is a consumer land of mediocre wages and high prices where purchasing anything over a couple of hundred quid would be permanently out of reach for most if they had to pay cash and with wages failing to keep pace with rising prices at the fastest rate and longest period since the 1920's the possibility of it happening is getting worse - not better.

I cant really gove you an answer,but what I can give you is a way to a solution, that is you have to find the anglde that you relate to or peaks your interest. A good paper is one that people get drawn into because it reaches them ln some way.As for me WW11 to me, I think of the holocaust and the effect it had on the survivors, their families and those who stood by and did nothing until it was too late.