The left has completely forgotten or disregarded the entire purpose of plebiscites.

Going completely under the radar recently has been South Australia’s utterly farcical citizens’ jury, which was convened to assess the merits of building a nuclear waste storage facility – or a ‘dump’ as the media has neutrally put it.

Anyone can see that the storage of nuclear waste isn’t a simple subject – which made the entirely fruitless outcome of the citizens’ jury entirely predictable:

The proposed nuclear waste dump in South Australia is too complex and technical for a citizens’ jury to make an informed decision…

Business SA chief executive Nigel McBride says the jury format is better suited to local issues like speed limits, not something ‘ extraordinarily complex’ like a nuclear waste storage facility.

‘The organiser admitted this was the most complex and ambitious jury process they had ever undertaken,’ Mr McBride said on Tuesday.

‘There was no way, in that time frame, that ordinary people without any kind of technical background could come to a truly informed decision.’

Jury member Caroline Moran tended to agree, saying the jury format might work better for smaller-scale projects like parks and bikeways.

 

But Ms Moran, a clinical researcher, said the jury had difficulty understanding the technical details of the proposal, with many not reading the royal commission report thoroughly beforehand.

‘It’s really technical, scientific stuff,’ the 28-year-old said. [TMR: how profound. Worth every penny of taxpayers’ money spent].

‘If the government wants it to go ahead they’ve got to explain it a bit more I think.’

She said the jury was largely made up of people with more free time, such as retirees and students… [TMR: what happened to the left’s diversity?].

Did the South Australian government seriously think the result would be any different?

Now you would think that the obvious thing to do from here would be for the government to carefully assess the views of nuclear experts and make an informed decision in the peoples’ best interests. About the last thing even the most mentally challenged of people would do is amplify the jury process. Right?

The problem is that Jay Weatherill is not your average mentally challenged person: he’s a Labor politician:

South Australian Premier Jay Weatherill has committed his state to a referendum on whether to host Australia’s first nuclear waste dump, saying he will push ahead despite lukewarm public support.

The referendum will effectively be a plebiscite, because it will seek an opinion rather than change the state’s constitution.

So, in the bizarre world occupied by Labor and the left, it makes perfect sense to hold a plebiscite on something regular people have little to no idea about – but having one on a very simple topic that affects almost everyone, like marriage, is inappropriate and a waste of money.

Why hasn’t someone asked Bill Shorten what he thinks about the nuclear plebiscite – particularly given that he weighed into the issue earlier this year?