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Bill: Produce Labeling (Reform) Act
Details
Submitted by[?]: Progressive Liberal Party
Status[?]: passed
Votes: This is an ordinary bill. It requires more yes votes than no votes. This bill will not pass any sooner than the deadline.
Voting deadline: July 2590
Description[?]:
| This Act amends the standing codes on labeling of dairy products in order to force certain chemicals to be listed in the labels if used. The Ministry of Health shall, based on hospital reports regarding the allergenic effects of chemicals, compile the list of chemicals whose use needs to be stated on the label. Any farmer or manufacturer can challenge the inclusion of a particular chemical in the list, both through the Ministry and the courts. |
Proposals
Article 1
Proposal[?] to change Government policy concerning the use of pesticides.
Old value:: There is no government oversight or regulation of pesticides.
Current: Farmers are required to list chemicals used on their crops.
Proposed: Farmers are required to list chemicals used on their crops.
Debate
These messages have been posted to debate on this bill:
| Date | 05:01:25, June 09, 2008 CET | From | Progressive Liberal Party | To | Debating the Produce Labeling (Reform) Act |
| Message | After a recent outburst of allergy cases in Cildania that were later tracked back to a farm where a particular, highly irritant pesticide was "generously applied" (to say the least), we the Progressive Liberals have come to think that it would be better if chemicals known to trigger allergic reactions in some groups of people (be it for genetic or environmental reasons) were listed on the product label, in the fashion some brands insert "might contain traces of peanut" labels into products celiacs might otherwise buy. We also believe that the Ministry should keep this list as short as possible, including only with chemicals that can become life-threatening to groups of people, as: 1.- We feel there is already control enough over the issue of pesticides, except for this point 2.- The State doesn't need to overstep itself, just guarantee public health 3.- Finally, we don't want product labels to become huge listings of chemicals. As always the Progressive Liberal Party is open to suggestions on this issue. |
| Date | 08:15:16, June 09, 2008 CET | From | Justice League of Cildania | To | Debating the Produce Labeling (Reform) Act |
| Message | "There is no government oversight or regulation of pesticides." Doesn't mean farmers are not responsible for their produce. We still have criminal codes against fraud of product, and farmers who fail to provide adequate knowledge to their consumers are liable just as in any business... not to mention the pre-existing private oversight and accredation boards for such industries. While your recent pushes for what may strike you as common sense regulation may be modest, they do violate property rights and further grant government power through preemptive action and control of the individual. While you say you espouse liberty as a moral standard, you need to be careful that you do not restrict it in practice. |
| Date | 13:52:02, June 09, 2008 CET | From | Progressive Liberal Party | To | Debating the Produce Labeling (Reform) Act |
| Message | When we learned that freedom is to be defended with life if need be, we thought it would be in a war. However, seems that in the name of liberty you prefer to have some corpses throughout Cildania (not a lot actually, the sensitive groups this law is trying to protect are quite small, with mostly genetic diseases making them sensitive to particular chemicals) than farmers having their freedom _not_ to inform buyers of the contents of their products curtailed. The Cildanian Penal Code, which is your answer to many of our proposals, isn't morally useful when the victim is dead in something akin to "negligent homicide", and we really don't want farmers to go to jail just because they didn't think this or that chemical might be allergenic to some people. We're not asking them not to use it, nor to know the allergenic properties of every chemical, just state which ones they use in the label so the public can _know_. As we've stated endlessly and will continue to, _information_ is the base of freedom, as it allows reasoned choices. As doublethink as it may seem to you, some times people need to be forced to be free - or, in this case, forced to let others be free informing them of the contents of some product. |
| Date | 15:57:37, June 09, 2008 CET | From | Justice League of Cildania | To | Debating the Produce Labeling (Reform) Act |
| Message | The same farmer that defrauds the consumer is the same farmer that defies your regulations. Again, your appeals to emotion with your pile of corpses would occur regardless of preemptive restriction or retaliatory punishment. The crux of our disagreement is not on the practical limits of principled freedom, for there is no mutual exclusion. The problem seems to me to be a lack of respect for the human individual. You don't want the poor farmer to worry about the effects of all the chemicals he uses, so you want to create the safest playpen possible for all the little people to play nicely inside. It's the timeless technique of the benevolent dictator: Infantilize the populace so they no longer have to think so hard. The less they think for themselves, the more they rely on the government to tell them what to do and how to behave. The more laws that get passed, the more ignorant they will become, the more laws that need to be created to keep them safe and happy. It's a negative feedback loop, and a gold mine for the statist that wishes to bend human nature to his will. I really doubt that you are that Machiavellian, I just wanted you to see the road you travel. No, you probably just think that it is barbaric to hold someone responsible for not knowing the consequences of his actions. But all actions do have consequences, and unless we do hold ourselves accountable for the results no matter our prior knowledge, human civilization would very well collapse in on itself. Unless reducing men to cattle is your concept of an ideal civilization, lobotomizing a man in with regulation does not solve the problem nor help the man. |
| Date | 20:16:53, June 09, 2008 CET | From | Progressive Liberal Party | To | Debating the Produce Labeling (Reform) Act |
| Message | First of all, we admit that the argument ad mortem was a bit off. Thus, we back away from it, even when there are indeed groups of people that can suffer allergic reactions deriving into anaphylactic shock and death. Second, we do not lack respect for the individual nor for human intelligence. As you have probably noticed, many of our bills only try to ensure that the public is given as much information as possible in their choices, because freedom is not possible without information: how could someone choose between A and B if he just know those names? Maybe, the additional information that A contains traces of copper sulphate would turn him towards B - or maybe not, because he's not allergic. To this, someone may point "hey, I don't want to buy anything with a long list of chemical names on it - it's scary", but that is _the_ insult to intelligence: or do we not ingest liters of dihydrogen monoxide each day? If the general public, given that information, chooses to do nothing with it, we can do nothing but scream at the top of our lungs: we can try to educate the people to cherish knowledge and information, to try and extract everything they can from books, labels and such, but if they choose not to know, we ought to respect their choice, even though we know they are lobotomizing themselves. In other words, we do not want people to _rely_ on the government, we just want the government to "be there" ensuring that they receive all the information (any maybe help?) they need: if that makes them lazy, dependent and just plainly cattle-like it will have been their choice, and to prevent it we should close all charities too! In other words, the ugly truth is that you cannot _impose_ freedom, you can only offer it; and people usually (and lazily) chooses not to be free. Third and last point: "the same farmer that defrauds, defies the regulations". True, but then - and this is the proof that we believe in retaliatory punishment - he would be indicted on two charges: indirect murder (instead of imprudent homicide, because the information was readily available) and violation of the produce labeling regulations. Sometimes, people are held responsible for consequences they did not foresee, and in this cases the punishments are usually lighter. However, we're trying to make sure that they _do_ foresee the consequences and are held fully responsible for any consequences. |
| Date | 15:02:39, June 10, 2008 CET | From | Justice League of Cildania | To | Debating the Produce Labeling (Reform) Act |
| Message | We completely agree with you that knowledge is essential in a free society. Those who trade in goods and services should provide all information pertinent to the product, and those that purchase the product should take responsibility for their choice in garnering the adequate information. This was never our dispute. Where we argue is why you are convinced that this needs to be the purview of the Cildanian government. Look at our airline industry. There is zero regulation in our law books, yet air travel is efficient and statistically extremely safe. The Cildanian Aviation Authority is a private oversight board, established by the airline companies themselves, all of whom have a very vested interest in not having their passenger jets crash into each other. Are these companies prosecuted for negligence and fraud when situations arise? Absolutely, but there is no government initiation of force here. The industry regulates itself. Farmers are no different in this respect. Killing people with your produce is criminal and definitely bad for business, so it is in the farmer's own best interests to be as knowledgeable and forthcoming as possible about their product to remain in business for the long term. Since private quality control boards already oversee the farming industry including its usage of chemicals, our government should not be creating its own regulating agencies and restricting freedoms so we can tell them how to do their jobs. |
| Date | 00:09:41, June 11, 2008 CET | From | Progressive Liberal Party | To | Debating the Produce Labeling (Reform) Act |
| Message | While we reckon that private self-regulation is cheaper and more efficient, the need for State regulator/overseer agencies is still there. Why? A single word: cartels. Remember that private companies exist just to make money. The JLC might argue that, just as private enterprises can get corrupt and "do evil", the same can happen to politicians and State regulators, with the additional danger that the latter have the power of the State in their hands. However, we find that the government can be more responsive against "small-scale" (i.e. a full agency) corruption than private enterprises, as the head of a State regulator can be "summarily" deposed by the executive chief (from your party) or the relevant Minister, while private regulators might (if supported by corrupt enterprises) continue to do mischief until a proper antitrust trial is mounted. As we said, we are painfully aware that corruption in the public sector can have worse consequences than in private regulators. However, even in the worst scenario (whole government corrupt), there is a chance that we might not have with private regulators: replace the government through fresh elections. We also think that the government, precisely due to its direct dependence on the people's will, is more sensible to pressures like strikes and demonstrations, which, when dealing with possible misdeeds, is a Good Thing (tm). Last but not least, State-dependent regulators are legally bound to function with RAND (reasonable and non-discriminatory) terms, while the private regulators (though not completely free) have more leeway in their actions. Thus, we reaffirm ourselves in our scheme of private regulators plus State overseers, and put this bill to a vote, no matter its probable rejection. |
| Date | 00:22:17, June 11, 2008 CET | From | Progressive Liberal Party | To | Debating the Produce Labeling (Reform) Act |
| Message | OOC POST, though related to the debate Another argument on the accountability of private regulators: I just read a BBC article which said that three major US ISPs have decided to block access to child pornography sites - an example of private regulation, and I think one we all agree with. However, this shows that private regulation may be less accountable to the citizen than public regulation. What if they decided to block, say, Google or any other random part of the Internet? There's competition, you might say, so let's just turn to other ISPs and tell other people what's happening. But, what if there was virtually no competition because the involved ISPs have a dominant market share? If it were an official, governmental agency order, it would have been published and you'd be able to go to the courts over it, but these kind of agreements between private ISPs need not be publicized - you might just wake up one day and find that you can no longer access Wikipedia, and the courts can be very slow to act on this since they need proof that the ISPs are blocking the site and that they are acting jointly (again, the pact need not be public). Furthermore, the government _cannot_ act on this since the regulator doesn't depend on it. Private regulators have a creeping tendency to turn into trusts, and when they achieve the needed market share, they try to shun others out of the industry. Besides, courts are usually more keen to act against a government agency than against a private enterprise/regulator. |
| Date | 19:15:57, June 11, 2008 CET | From | New Socialist Left Party | To | Debating the Produce Labeling (Reform) Act |
| Message | We think that the use of pesticides should be forbidden, only biological and natural "pesticides" should be used! |
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Voting
| Vote | Seats | ||||
| yes |
Total Seats: 74 | ||||
| no | Total Seats: 70 | ||||
| abstain |
Total Seats: 31 |
| Random fact: RP laws follow the same passing rules as in-game variable laws. Laws that are not of a constitutional nature require a simple majority "Yes" vote from active parties currently holding seats. Laws that are of a constitutional nature require a 2/3 majority "Yes" vote from active parties currently holding seats. RP laws may be abolished a simple majority vote this applies to ANY RP law. |
| Random quote: "I think the environment should be put in the category of our national security. Defense of our resources is just as important as defense abroad. Otherwise, what is there to defend?" - Robert Redford |