Liberal Democratic Party (Aust)

[austfreedom]

Hello all,

 

This is a great community website. Just wanted to introduction everyone with Australia's only libertarian party the Liberal Democrats (LDP - www.ldp.org.au) As believers in free will the party promotes liberty in social and economic issues.

 

•libertarianism - a political philosophy maintaining that all persons are the absolute owners of their own lives, and should be free to do whatever they wish with their persons or property, provided they allow others the same liberty

 

•libertarianism - The view that governments role should be minimal, rarely interfering in the personal lives of private citizens.

 

The LDP is difference from "civil liberty" parties such as ASP who wish taxpayers to fund endless programs in education, health etc. These parties are socially liberal but economical socialist. LDP is both social and economic liberals, it is your body, your life, your property and your money government should be limited giving humans a greater role in their own lifes.

 

LDP is registered federally, ACT and in NSW (under the outdoor rec party name for NSW only)

 

Example:

LDP - you can smoke in your own property or in businesses that let you, however health cost, if any is individuals responsibility - eg health insurance may cost more with certain providers

ASP - only use for medical use, small amounts not criminal, government money into policing, education and regulation of drugs, government to get the bill = taxpayers to get the bill.

 

From LDP website:

 

The LDP opposes programs that seek to impose particular values or correct perceived disadvantage through affirmative action.

 

 

Over the last 30 years we have seen a diminishing appreciation in Australia of the principle of personal responsibility. The growth of the welfare state, poor rulings by courts on personal damages claims and the growth of numerous government funded commissions, councils, authorities and boards have all eroded the notion of individual responsibility.

 

This reduction in the acceptance of personal responsibility has been replaced by an expectation that someone else (in most cases the Government) will take responsibility. Such has come at the cost of personal freedom.

 

In recent times we have seen this trend manifested in ever louder calls for the Government to assume responsibility for Australia's obesity problem. It has been suggested this be achieved by regulating the advertising of food on television, restricting the number of fast food outlets within a certain area and allowing fast food outlets to be sued for "making" their customers overweight.

 

This trend, of Government making rules on matters that should be left to individuals, ranges from smoking to gambling, child discipline, outdoor recreation and eating habits, and has been referred to as the rise of the nanny state. It is a trend to which the LDP strongly objects.

 

The nanny state has also given rise to a number of government programs designed to assist individual disadvantaged groups. Hundreds of millions of dollars have been spent on health, education and cultural programs specifically for Aborigines, women and various ethnic and special interest groups. Despite the cost, such programs have rarely made any tangible difference apart from those who were directly funded or employed by them.

 

The LDP is fundamentally opposed to programs that seek to impose particular values on society or to correct perceived disadvantage through affirmative action. We believe all Australians deserve to be treated equally well by the Government and all to be held responsible for their own individual choices and actions.

 

The LDP would:

 

•Abolish all affirmative action programs on the grounds that they are discriminatory, patronising and unfair.

•Abolish all government funded programs and bodies that cater to particular ethnic, religious or gender groups. All Australians should be regarded as equal before the law.

•Abolish government funding for bodies such as the Anti Discrimination Commission and Federation of Ethnic Communities' Councils of Australia.

•Remove the power of all bodies except courts to issue binding decisions on matters such as Discrimination, Harassment, Unfair Dismissal and Vilification.

 

 

The LDP does not generally support the criminalisation of victimless crimes and seeks to reduce the intrusion of government into these areas.

 

 

 

Victimless crime is a term used to refer to behaviour that is illegal but does not violate or threaten the rights of anyone else. It can include situations where an individual acts alone as well as consensual acts in which two or more persons agree to commit a criminal offence in which no other person is involved.

 

The issue in situations of victimless crime is the same. Society has created a formal framework of laws to prohibit types of conduct thought to be against the public interest. Laws proscribing homicide, assaults and rape are common to most cultures. Thus, when the supposed victim freely consents to be the victim in one of these crimes, the question is whether the state should make an exception from the law for this situation.

 

Take assisted suicide as an example. If one person intentionally takes the life of another, this is usually murder. If the motive for this is to collect the inheritance, society has no difficulty in ignoring the motive and convicting the killer. But if the motive is to relieve the suffering of the victim by providing a clean death that would otherwise be denied, can society so quickly reject the motive?

 

It is a case of balancing the harms. On the one hand, society could impose pain and suffering on the victim by forcing him or her to endure a long decline into death. Or society could permit a system for terminating life under controlled circumstances so that the victim's wishes could be respected without exposing others to the criminal system for assisting in realising those wishes.

 

But victimless crimes are not always so weighty. Some examples of low level victimless activities that may be criminalised include:

 

•Riding a motorcycle or bicycle without a helmet

•BASE jumping from city buildings

•Individual purchase and consumption of recreational drugs

•Driving a motor vehicle without a seatbelt

•Prostitution and/or soliciting for prostitution

•Public nudity and fornication

•The consumption of pornography (not involving children or coercion)

Victimless crimes usually regarded more seriously include:

 

•Abortion

•Unlicensed prizefights and similar activities of a sporting nature where the players consent and the audience actively approves of what they see.

•Assisting someone to die at his or her request.

This includes the elderly and seriously ill as well as less obvious scenarios. For example, helping someone such as a celebrity facing exposure for socially unacceptable behaviour who seeks a gun or other means to end life; a driver trapped in a burning tanker full of gasoline who begs a passing armed police officer to shoot him rather than let him burn to death; a person who suffers traumatic injury in a road accident and wishes to avoid the humiliation and pain of a lingering slow death.

 

These situations are distinguishable from soliciting the cessation of life-sustaining treatment so that an injured or ill person may die a natural death, or leaving instructions not to resuscitate in the event of death.

 

Consideration of victimless crime involving more than one participant needs to take account of whether all the participants are capable of giving genuine consent. This may not be the case if one or more of the participants are:

 

•Animals

•Children (normally measured as being under the legal age of consent)

•Severely mentally ill

•Not fully informed about the issues involved

•Suffering from mood swings

•Acting under duress

•Addicted

•Intoxicated

•Unconscious

Libertarianism focuses on the autonomy of the individual, asserting each person's right to live their lives with the least possible interference from the law. Libertarians do not necessarily approve, sanction or endorse the victimless action that is criminalised. Indeed, they may strongly disapprove.

 

Where they differ from non-libertarians is their belief that the government should be exceedingly reluctant to intervene. People are entitled to live their lives and make their own choices whether or not those choices are wise or the same as others would make, provided they do so voluntarily and without infringing the rights of others.

 

LDP Policy

Without necessarily supporting, advocating or approving of them, the LDP does not generally support the criminalisation of victimless crimes. Wherever possible it will seek to reduce the intrusion of government into these areas.

 

It nonetheless recognises that not all victimless crimes are capable of being entirely de-regulated. It acknowledges there may be unintended coercive consequences from re-legalisation and that some regulation may be warranted in specific instances.

 

Specific policies

1.No criminalisation of activities in which the participant is the only person likely to suffer adverse consequences. Examples include dangerous and unwise actions such as failing to wear a seatbelt or crash helmet, BASE jumping and bungy jumping.

2.No criminalisation of consumption of pornography involving adults by adults (with safeguards to protect children).

3.No criminalisation of abortion other than for later term abortions where the foetus would be viable if born naturally.

4.No criminalisation of prostitution involving adults.

5.No criminalisation of assisted suicide where a free and informed choice has been made.

6.Re-legalisation of recreational marijuana use by adults (subject to prohibition on involvement of minors, etc) and a review of prohibitions on certain other drugs. [Note: a more detailed policy on drugs is under development.

 

The LDP also favours strong sanctions against crimes that infringe the rights of others, whether deliberately or through negligence.

 

Further information

 

Mandatory bicycle helmets - not only are such laws offensive to liberty, but they do not achieve their aim.

 

From ASP website:

 

Drugs

 

Decriminalisation, not legalisation, of purchase, possession and consumption of all drugs for personal use, such quantity to be defined as an amount equal or less than 14 day’s supply for one person.

Infractions are to be treated in an administrative framework and not in the criminal justice system.

Immediate cessation of the use of drug sniffer dogs in public.

Legalise and regulate cannabis for specified medical uses.

Trafficking and dealing in drugs to remain a criminal offence.

Supply of any drugs to a minor is to be a criminal offence.

Laboratory quality drug testing stations to be provided at all music festivals and the like.

Subsidised and high quality drug testing kits to be made available through pharmacies, age restricted premises and mobile distribution centres.

Legalise and increase the number of medically supervised injecting rooms

Legalise the prescription of heroin to registered and habitual users.