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Senators, we have begun voting on the Positions Restriction Reform Act (2021) As Amended.
An Act that reforms and sets out new positions restrictions for government members.
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-- Written by Islonia, Brototh --
-- Sponsored by Nova anglicum, Toerana V --
-- As Amended by Marvinville --
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PREAMBLE
Noting, that many legislators have been forced to resign to give up their positions in Congress to become Ministers,
Believing, that this system is outdated and does not work anymore,
Understanding, that as time goes on, this will only hurt Thaecia by taking away competent legislators,
Congress hereby agrees,
Section I - The following positions of government shall be defined as Restricted Positions:
a. The Presidency
b. The Prime Ministership
c. Justice
d. Electoral Commissioner
Section II - Government members in Restricted Positions cannot hold any other position in government, this includes:
a. The Presidency
b. The Prime Ministership
c. Justice
d. Electoral Commissioner
e. Any Ministerial Position
f. Senator or Member of Parliament
Section I - Ministers must not hold any other Ministerial Position. They shall, however, be permitted to hold lesser ministerial roles in other ministries.
Subsection I - If a Minister is a member of Congress, they shall not hold any Chamber Leadership position.
Section II - Within Congress, Senators and Members of Parliament may only be allowed to hold their positions and extensions to them, such as Chamber Leadership. They may not be allowed to occupy more than one of these extended positions within Congress at once.
Section III - Secretary positions shall not be considered as Restricted. They shall be exempt from restrictions placed on other positions in this Act, and will face no restrictions on that position. However they shall still face other restrictions placed out in this bill on other offices.
Section I - The passage of this bill hereby constitutes the repeal of L.R.004 Positions Restriction Act.
Aye
Aye
Aye
We all know Islonia is fit for the job. I don't have any questions for the candidate.
What sort of direction would we see an Islonian foreign affairs department take in terms of foreign relations?
Thank you for your question Honourable Senator.
An Islonian Foreign Affairs Ministry is in practice already in place since I was Foreign Affairs Minister for about a month and then led the FA Council as the most Senior Member after my resignation (so in effect running the ministry). The changes I have already enacted during my tenure are:
- Training future MoFAs by not having only one Deputy Minister but several (not legally though)-- named Senior Diplomats (SDs). Each SD is in charge of a group of region, generally grouped around a theme (our closest allies and friends are all in one group for example). They basically act as mini ministers, overseeing the diplomats in the groups; being sure they do their job, and if that's not the case, to boop them/propose a replacement.
- As a followup to the above-- a fully involved FA Council (composed of the PM, MoFA, SDs + advisors) in every of our actions, because more heads is always better when taking important issues, and decision making is obviously part of the training.
- Closing embassy that stood there mostly for optics (topic still in discussion for some other embassies) and simply re-centering ourselves on relations with less regions but ones that truly matter.
- More transparency (which in effect translates to me declassifying information whenever I publicly post information about it).
You can pretty much expect a continuation of all the above for the remainder of the term.
Aye
Results:
Aye (6) 
Ashlawn Dendrobium Emazia 
Ermica 
Sevae 
Toerana V
Nay (0)
Abstain (0)
Islonia has been confirmed as Minister of Foreign Affairs.
Senators, we have begun debate on the Amendment to L.R.009.
-- Written by Toerana V, Of altonianic islands --
-- Sponsored by Toerana V, Nova anglicum --
1. A recall may be initiated by against a member of the House of Commons or Senate for reasons not listed in Article III;
2. To initiate a recall the citizen must do the following;
2-1. Publish a petition on the Regional Message Board that targets a specific, valid individual, stating an explicit reason for the recall, during the format in Article VI;
2-2. Obtain the signatures of five or more citizens excluding the proposer;
2-3. Submit a complete petition to the Electoral Commission within 5 days of the petition's start.
1. Upon receiving a petition, the Electoral Commission must trigger a vote that will follow the following procedure;
1-1. A Vote is opened upon receiving a complete petition;
1-2. The vote will last for 3 days;
1-3. The vote requires the support of 60% of the voters to pass.
2. Upon the successful passing of the recall petition, the target of the petition will be removed from their position;
2-1. If the position is elected, a bi-election will be triggered.
3. If the recall petition fails, the target of the petition may not be recalled for a period of 14 days.
1. A petition is declared invalid if it's reason is declared as being any of the following;
1-1. Problems with Policy
2. A petition is declared invalid if it fails to meet the criteria set out in Article I;
3. The Court may declare a petition invalid if it believes the reasoning is listed, or is a variation on what is listed, in Article III, Section I or II.
1. A recall may be initiated against a member of Congress by three members of Congress, or a citizen sponsored by three member of Congress, in either the House of Commons or Senate;
1-1. The members of Congress may be from either the Senate or House of Commons, regardless of which house the recall is initiated in.
1-2. A Recall may only be enacted against a member of Congress if they are deemed to have broken the laws of Thaecia or of NationStates, repeatedly subverted the official Procedures of their respective chamber, or endured a prolonged period of inactivity.
1-3. If the member cannot be found guilty of any of the aforementioned wrongdoings, a Recall may not be enacted against them.
2. Recall Procedure is outlined in Article V.
1. A recall vote commences in the Senate, lasting 2 days or until all Senators have voted;
1-1. It requires the support of 2/3rds of all incumbent Senators to pass.
2. If it passes the Senate, a recall vote commences in the House of Commons, lasting 2 days or until all MPs have voted;
1-1. It requires the support of 2/3rds of all MPs to pass.
3. If the vote passes the House of Commons, it is sent to the High Court for approval;
3-1. Approval from the court requires unanimous agreement from all incumbent justices.
4. If the recall is passed by the Senate, House of Commons and High Court, the individual is immediately removed from Office;
4-1. A Bi-election is triggered for the vacant seat.
5. If a recall vote fails to pass in either the Senate, House of Commons or High Court, the recall vote is dismissed.
1.
Petitioner:
Reasoning:
Additional Signatories:
1. The Entirety of L.R.009 is replaced with the above proposal.
I am happy to answer any questions Senators may have, but to preempt this I am going to give some explanation behind each Article/Section
Article I
The Major feature of this amendment is the introduction of a citizen recall for members of the Legislature.
Article 1 Details how a citizen may begin the recall process.
Article II
Article two details how a recall works, assuming it meets the minimum requirements.
I'm not going to explain how it works, that's clearly set out in the legislation itself.
I chose 3 days larger as a filler to be changed by the Senate/House, but it's a decent amount of time for a recall on its own.
60% for recall was largely a compromise to reassure concerned legislatures that it'll be harder for them to be removed because of a lack of popularity. This is also true for the 14 day cooldown
Article III
Section I and its subsections are deliberately a 1 item list to allow the House/Senate to add to it. I believe it is fine on its own, as it blocks problems with policy/platform as it is, and Section III already allows the court to rule on more vague reasons.
Article IV & V
Articles IV and V are largely aesthetics overhauls of the existing bill. This preserves the current recall procedure the legislature has to govern itself
Article VI
As a reference for aesthetics purposes, to stop a fairly ugly looking format being listed in the middle of the bill
Article VII
Functional to enact the amendment
1. A recall vote commences in the Senate, lasting 2 days or until all Senators have voted;
1-1. It requires the support of 2/3rds of all Senators to pass.
2. If it passes the Senate, a recall vote commences in the House of Commons, lasting 2 days or until all MPs have voted;
2-1. It requires the support of 2/3rds of all MPs to pass.
3. If the recall is passed by the Senate and House of Commons, the individual is immediately removed from Office;
3-1. A snap election is triggered for the vacant seat.
4. If a recall vote fails to pass in either the Senate or House of Commons, the recall vote is dismissed.
Article I, section 1., is amended to:
1. A recall may be initiated against a member of the House of Commons or Senate;
First amendment is just aesthetic but necessary to avoid another court case
Second one removes the Court from approving a recall because that is a clear case of court overreach imo. It gives the court too much power and we all know that power corrupts, especially people that aren't really accountable.
Third one is a long shot and it probably won't be approved, but my reasoning is: firstly, that's court overreach again and it can get to arbitrarily decide which petition is valid, and we all know that afterwards they'll just reject the appeal because "they don't have to accept all appeals". It's better to have a bad petition reach voting stage than have a good one not reach it because the Court decided so. The other requirement is already in Article I so it isn't needed
As for the removal of policy disagreement as something you can't be recalled for - well, duh, it's a political game, of course it makes sense that you can be recalled over policy disagreement if 2/3 of Congress hates your policy so much that they want to recall you and vote to recall you. "Minority protection" is something very often talked about but if you're in the minority, you have to be good enough to be elected instead of relying on your social popularity. For example, I doubt that anyone would vote for Marv hadn't he been so popular, and he probably would have been recalled under the new system - but he has friends in the Court - social friends - who would say "no, no, this is a policy disagreement" and scrap the petition. On the other hand, I doubt Bow would have been recalled because he really is a good Senator, one of the best, and doesn't, you know, disrupt things, while also being in a minority, so this still makes it easy for people like Bow not to be recalled.
I have made my case and I hope all 3 do pass, but there's so much I can do
I completely support the three amendments proposed by Sevae
They weren't in the original bill because of compromise, a lack of ability to read, apparently, and the fact the later articles are just a rewrite.
I support the removal of Article III because I believe that to ensure the citizen's right to recall is enshrined it needs to be no strings attached. The people fighting this amendment are people who have opened stated that they would abuse it to remove political opponents (Marv) and people fearmongering about giving the citizenry power (Brototh) - claiming that citizens *will* abuse this because apparently Thaecians can't be trusted with a right to recall.
Naturally, Amendment A is a no brainer
Amendment B I am cautiously in support of. The Court has an immense amount of power in this region, and we keep handing them more. Removing the requirement for the court to approve a recall makes it a proper recall, instead of impeachment with a different name.
Brototh has retracted their objections to the proposed amendments, and thus I retract my statement about his fear mongering to be polite.
I think it's borderline. The proposal in front of us is not a bill, it is an amendment. Passed legislation are not bills (unless L.R.037 claims that laws are still bills) so it shouldn't result in this being an illegal move on the part of the Senate - it's just a de facto repeal and replace amendment of existing legislation, not an amendment to a bill current on the Senate floor - that would make it illegal.
Sorry about my absence here we go
As I mentioned in our messages I personally don't feel that this Amendment qualifies under Article II since Section 1 of that article says "Amendments may be put forward by any Senator at any time during the debate process." The current business was obviously not put forward during the debate process and therefore the rest of Article II doesn't apply to it.
Senators, we have begun voting on the following amendments to the Amendment to L.R.009.
1. A recall vote commences in the Senate, lasting 2 days or until all Senators have voted;
1-1. It requires the support of 2/3rds of all Senators to pass.
2. If it passes the Senate, a recall vote commences in the House of Commons, lasting 2 days or until all MPs have voted;
2-1. It requires the support of 2/3rds of all MPs to pass.
3. If the recall is passed by the Senate and House of Commons, the individual is immediately removed from Office;
3-1. A snap election is triggered for the vacant seat.
4. If a recall vote fails to pass in either the Senate or House of Commons, the recall vote is dismissed.
Article I, section 1., is amended to:
1. A recall may be initiated against a member of the House of Commons or Senate;
Aye to all
Toerana V and Dendrobium
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