2017 Easters
Round 1
 That, as a socially conservative Coalition
Member of Parliament, we would join
Cory Bernardi's Australian Conservatives
Party
o 8 aff wins, 11 neg wins
 That, as the Labor Party, we would
remove Bill Shorten as the leader before
the next Federal election.
o 5 aff wins, 11 neg wins
 That we should implement a quota for
Indigenous Australians in Federal
Parliament
o 11 aff wins, 4 neg wins
Round 2
 That we support juries returning a
verdict of not guilty when they believe
the defendant is technically guilty but
that a conviction would be unjust
o 3 aff wins, 10 neg wins
 That non-violent crimes committed by a
significant proportion of the population
(e.g. internet piracy, jaywalking,
possession of marijuana, etc.) should be
automatically decriminalised
o 9 aff wins, 13 neg wins
 That we regret the rise of shows (e.g.
 For a socially conservative MP, the plan
would be (1) stay true to your principles,
and (2) exert more influence from the
crossbench. On the other hand, given the
tight numbers on the house floor, you
can plausibly accomplish both from
within the Coalition anyway – while
picking the prime minister. Slightly neg
weighted.
 Bill Shorten is relatively unpopular, and
maybe true Labor people want a more
left-wing agenda, but he’s brought
internal unity, and aren’t elections won
in the centre? Of course there are
transaction costs too, but in Opposition
these are lower and sometimes
necessary. In 2017 I think this was quite
balanced, maybe a smidge neg-weighted.
 This chestnut has changed over the
years, and it is coloured now by the
dismissal of the Uluru Statement’s “Voice
to Parliament” as a “third chamber,” and
the fact we currently have three
Indigenous Senators and two MPs. Aff
has no choice but to declare the SQ
insufficient and support a more-than-
proportionate share of Indigenous MPs.
The scale of Indigenous disadvantage
probably still makes this a good Aff, but
Neg clearly has a lot of political capital to
play with as well.
 Law students seem to have particularly
strong views on juries, presumably after
reading some disastrous case studies,
but I think most case studies of jury
nullification paint it in a good light. Jurors
take their role seriously and the
requirement for unanimity is a good
conservative check-and-balance.
 Seems like a bad metric – these acts
clearly cause various harms, and
widespread complicity may be caused by
lax enforcement among other things. If
any of them should be legalised, legalise
 Serial, Making a Murderer) that
undertake detailed investigations into
criminal cases
o 5 aff wins, 10 neg wins
Round 3
 That the Government should tax
companies’ use of technology that is
replacing human labour
o 19 aff wins, 8 neg wins
 That we should allow young people to
opt out of specific protections of
workers’ rights when applying for jobs
(e.g. minimum wage, maximum working
hours, penalty rates)
o 1 aff win, 8 neg wins (& 34 aff
vetos)
 That the Australian Government should
focus on increasing accessibility and
reliability of rental properties (e.g. long-
term leases, greater protections for
tenants), rather than on the accessibility
of home ownership
o 7 aff wins, 7 neg wins
Round 4
 That we regret the argument of identity
politics that you only have a politically
legitimate position on an issue if you are
a member of the affected group
o 14 aff wins, 16 neg wins
 That we regret the dominance of sex-
positive feminism
o 6 aff wins, 10 neg wins (29 aff
vetos)
them through a deliberative political
process that weighs up the pros and
cons. (The Aff case is a manageable
libertarian attack on encroaching state
power, but like most libertarian cases it
works best in the abstract.)
 Probably depends on whether the show
in question is authentic and rigorous
(perhaps even causing a cold case to be
reopened by police) or slanted and
presented more for entertainment.
There are of course (dubious) structural
reasons for both Aff and Neg to advance
about why one type or the other is the
predominant type. Not my favourite
debate but I think balanced.
 Debaters are fairly pro-worker, but the
intended effect is less innovation,
unintended effects can include worse job
losses if (for example) companies close
down and restart, and Neg can mitigate
the SQ job losses as well by counter-
modelling retraining etc. Slightly neg
weighted.
 Surely a recipe for exploitation. A more
balanced version is, “TWS substantially
lower labour regulations for young
people in areas with high youth
unemployment.”
 The security v flexibility trade-off here is
quite balanced – people have relatively
few intuitions about which is more
valuable, all else being equal. This topic
did receive some 27 neg vetos, but I
suspect that is because neg teams
thought the other two motions were
weighted in their favour.
 One of my all-time favourite topics and
in my view exceptionally balanced. The
argument has created spaces and
platforms for marginalised groups to
have a voice, but it is has also deepened
divides between groups and arguably
helped spur a white nationalist backlash.
There were 14 aff vetos compared to 7
neg vetos – an example, I think, of
debaters’ progressive sympathies getting
 That we should force sporting leagues
that have both male and female
competitions to pay the players equally
regardless of gender
o 3 aff wins, 1 neg win (40 neg
vetos)
Round 5
 That we should allow patients to access
treatments which have passed safety
trials, but have not been proven to be
effective
o 17 aff wins, 12 neg wins
 That the cashless debit card should be
expanded to all welfare recipients in
Australia
o 5 aff wins, 9 neg wins (24 aff
vetos)
 That we should remove all legal
protections on the confessional seal
o 3 aff wins, 4 neg wins (29 neg
vetos)
Round 6
 That centrist US media outlets should
actively combat the notion of American
exceptionalism
o 7 aff wins, 4 neg wins (29 neg
vetos)
 That, as a progressive person or
organisation, we would not advise or
ahead of their strategic judgement.
 The victims of sex-positive feminism
always seem more sympathetic to me
than the beneficiaries, so I would expect
this to be aff weighted. The word
“dominance” also tends to help the
regret side because they can take the
low burden of liking sex-positive
feminism (or whatever else) in principle
but merely wishing it did not crowd out
so many alternatives.
 I think the arguments against this tend to
be pretty unpalatable so I would also
expect aff weighted.
 Placebos are real, and autonomy is
prized in medicine, although the idea of
millions of middle-income customers
shelling out cash for vitamin water
strikes most of us as mildly exploitative.
If taxpayer dollars were involved this
would be clearly wasteful and maybe
worse, but if it’s customers’ own money
(and ads are regulated, which aff can
model) then most of us are liberal
enough to accept this state of affairs.
Slightly aff weighted.
 Debating is sympathetic to welfare
recipients so any measures to restrict
their autonomy tend to have an uphill
battle. Neg weighted.
 Obviously no one wants crimes to go
unreported, but if the seal is known to be
only semi-confidential then criminals are
unlikely to confess to priests at all. At
that point I think there remains a fairly
marginal and speculative discussion
about the impact within the church of
confidential confessions of crimes.
Probably balanced.
 This might not be the clearest topic in
the world, but I read it as, “Is American
exceptionalism bad, and if so, should
media outlets – at least those without
pre-existing political commitments – play
a role in combatting it?” I suspect most
Australian debaters are sceptical of
American exceptionalism, although not
 support the Trump campaign in any
capacity
o 10 aff wins, 13 neg wins (18 aff
vetos)
 That, as China, we would aggressively
sanction North Korea
o 10 aff wins, 6 neg wins (21 aff
vetos)
 Aff gets the moral purity of a boycott,
 I believe a new spate of successful
too much. Also the burden on media
outlets here sounds more onerous at
first glance than it really is: if it is
established that American
exceptionalism = bad, then it would be
very unfashionable to say independent
news sources should passively propagate
it. So I’d expect Aff weighted.
Neg points out someone worse will take
your place, and Aff replies you can work
for change from outside. The question of
which approach is best for making
change is a central question in politics
and I think a very balanced clash.
missile tests were in the headlines at the
time, and China was (and still largely is)
perceived as being the pivotal actor in
altering Kim Jong Un’s behaviour. But
what does China gain? It certainly stands
to lose big if the Kim regime falls: a mass
migration crisis and perhaps a shared
border with a US ally. So the Aff case
must be that the regime will be deterred
but not destabilised, and China will get
the credit (as well as the security) for at
least pausing the nuclear weapons
program, while gaining even more
leverage over NK. The burden seems
more complex for Aff so I’d rather be
Neg (I suspect the veto count is inflated
by the IR aspect).