17 February 2023
Today, another record-breaking National Assembly session was held. During today's session, representatives were presented with seven different bills, five of which were eventually passed. Most of those bill were presented by Minister Owen Itzen, who has been attempting to pass a lot of legislature recently. During the session, two incredibly important bills were passed by representatives that will radically change the National Assembly.
The first of these bills is the "Redistricting of the National Assembly Bill" presented by Minister Cooper Norfolk. The bill proposed a major change in the way that representatives are elected to the Assembly. Currently, representatives are elected by residents of the district that they reside in. In many cases, representatives will run uncontested due to a multitude of different factors, such as lack of interest in other residents. This bill seeks to eliminate part of that problem by creating a new type of electoral subdivision called "voting districts". A voting district consists of a minimum of five citizens, but can hold up to nine. These districts are categorized by the population of governmental subdivisions. Some citizens would not be represented by a representative from their subdivision, as their voting district would consist of residents of a different subdivision. Below is an example of what that will look like:
2nd District of Phillip:
Port Phillip-Calabaza District:
A resident of the Port Phillip District will be placed in the Port Phillip-Calabaza joint voting district because the minimum of five residents in Port Phillip's 2nd district was reached. This bill will take place in April at the start of the 2nd General Election of Phillip.
The second most important bill to pass the Assembly today was the "National Assembly Maximum Seat Bill" presented by Minister Itzen, VP Luke Fitzgibbins, and Governor Walker Von. This bill restricts citizens of Phillip from holding more than two seats in the Assembly. It's in direct response to the controversy over Rep. Iyan Seeker being able to have three seats.
The Assembly also passed other bills: a revised version of Minister Itzen's "Business Bill Part II", the "Mint Cabinet Change Bill", and the annexation of two new subdivisions. The two proposed subdivisions, named Neva Galicia and Nueva Andalucia, were put together in the same bill. Both pieces of land are more than eighty-five kilometers away from Port Phillip, which under the constitution classifies them as dependencies. These two new dependencies would almost sextuple the size of Phillip;
The final bill passed by the Assembly today was VP Fitzgibbins' Mint Cabinet Change Bill. This bill removes the constitutional requirement for political parties in Phillip to have a seat on the Minister of Mint's advisory board. It's meant to allow smaller political parties to not have to worry about finding people in their party without any other positions to join the Mint board.
The only bill vetoed during today's session was another potential subdivision presented by Minister Itzen. The subdivision, called the Leuchtturm Territory, consists of a small private light house at the end of an island. Many people in Phillip were opposed to claiming the territory as its on private property that isn't owned by a citizen of Phillip. Minister Itzen was determined to annex the territory, even planning an expedition to go onto the property and plant a flag on the lighthouse. Unfortunately, the bill did not gain enough support from representatives. Minister Itzen plans on re-presenting the bill in future Assembly sessions.
President Jaxson Renny passed three of the five bills presented to him into law: the "Redistricting of the National Assembly Bill"; "Mint Cabinet Change Bill"; and the "National Assembly Maximum Seat Bill". Due to the latter, Rep. Seeker was forced to resign his position as Representative of the Territories. The Ministry of Elections has called for a special election to fill the vacant seat that will begin on the 21st of February. Currently, Minister Norfolk, Supreme Judge Madison Marcos, and Minister Reed Von are the only candidates. It's unclear if the Butter Butta Bentley Party will be putting up a candidate for this election. They have recently seen a large decrease in power in the National Assembly after Rep. Seeker resigned from the Territories seat and Minister Von switched over to the newly established Richardson Party. Because of how many political parties are represented in the Assembly, there is no real majority. Below is the current seating chart of the assembly.
A special assembly session has been called by VP Fitzgibbins for tomorrow in order to vote on several bills presented by Minister Itzen. Overall, today was a day of reform in Phillip. The bills passed into law by President Renny will hopefully benefit Phillip's political stability.