We need a better system for preselecting election candidates

Primaries would also make it more difficult for candidates to hide their policies and win an electoral contest by ambush. They would have to reveal their hand well before the general election to win their primary.

The logic underlying primaries is that in safe seats the same party almost invariably wins because voters tend to vote for governments, not individuals. A primary gives electors an opportunity to choose between individual candidates representing the party that they want to elect to government, without compromising the possibility of their party becoming the government because the candidate they like is running for the opposing team.

There are some bugs to this system. One of them is that a rich person could virtually buy themselves a primary - New Jersey Senator, Jon Corzine spent $30 million winning his primary. But rich people can almost buy themselves an endorsement here under the current system. One solution would be to put limits on permitted spending in a primary. The electoral commission could also help out, as it does in a referendum, by publishing a booklet for each electorate giving each of the candidates space for a one page personal explanation and message.

Others would point to the dangers of populism. Members of Parliament could be driven by short-term concerns that appeal to their primary voters rather than taking the longer-term view they can under the party system. This is the type of argument that has always been employed against expanding democracy - the people can't be trusted.

This proposal is not a concluded one. Many factors need to be considered, and perhaps a scaled-down version might be more acceptable in Australia. In just 10 years a lot has changed in Queensland. The gerrymander has been dismantled, and as a result of Shepherdson, enrolment and voting procedures will be tightened to prevent casual fraud. But there is more to be done. Kudos will go to whichever leader - Borbidge or Beattie - takes the further step and provides electors with a preselection system that gives them a real choice.