Secession by Western Australia: Book launch
A separatist vision for a resource-rich state
Since Covid happened, or more specifically, the government response to the virus, it’s hard to conclude anything other than that the system is broken.
Guard rails in place to protect citizens from government overreach were mown down. The individuals who did most of the wrecking have moved on to cushy jobs, and courts have consistently thrown out cases seeking justice for inflicted harms.
Drawing on “lessons learned,” our leaders have mostly reformed the system in the wrong direction: more centralised control (a new CDC, WHO pandemic reforms), more mRNA factories, and more resources allocated to the pandemic industry.
What if you could divorce from the broken system and start over?
A new book, Secession by Western Australia, lays out a vision of how it would work.
Like Alberta in Canada - where separatism is currently a hot topic - Western Australia is rich in natural resources, and pays more than its per capita share to federal coffers.
Legal expert and lead author Julian Gillespie argues it’s not a good deal, and that West Aussies would be better served by leaving the federation and going it alone.
A collaboration with economists Professor Gigi Foster and Michael Baker and medical expert Professor Ian Brighthope, Secession by Western Australia sets out a blueprint for sovereignty encompassing fiscal independence, a new constitution, currency and defence strategy, major institutional reform, and a health system focused on preventative care rather than ‘sick care’.
All this will be funded by a 20 percent resource royalty which would replace almost all other taxes, including personal income tax and payroll tax. This will benefit some mining companies, but others would lose out and so would likely not be in favour.
Bureaucratic bloat would also be slashed, drastically reducing overheads for running the newly established nation.
It’s a bold vision, and will be expounded on in more detail at the book launch next week.
Yours truly will be there to run a Q+A with Gillespie and Prof Foster. Perth friends, details for the launch are below.
The book Secession by Western Australia is available for purchase now in hard copy or digital format here.
Book launch: 6:30pm Friday 13 March, Adam Armstrong Pavilion, Dalkeith. Tickets available here
What a fantastic idea. Tax the resource companies. Get away from the idiots in Canberra.
Secession assumes there was a right of central control.
There seems to be more than a measure of doubt about the legitimacy of the federation since it is a Westminster fabrication with no connection to any of us here in the dystopian down under.
Asserting the obvious right to break a failed federation seems appropriate.