It is as well Bill Hayden has only a few months to go. It is unwise for a viceroy to cross a Prime Minister, as an experience in Ireland between the wars illustrates.
Hayden has questioned the republican model endorsed by Prime Minister Paul Keating. Hayden questioned the wisdom of having the President once elected by a two-thirds majority of Parliament only removable by a two-thirds majority of Parliament.
He thought a President supported by a mere one-third of the Parliament could act in a way detrimental to good Government and the Government could do nothing about it.
There are a range of republican arguments to the contrary which Hayden did not put, so commentators are saying that it is an entry into party political debate by the viceroy which is against convention.
Maybe it is enough to warrant Keating taking Hayden up on what Hayden obviously sees as an advantage to the present system: that the Prime Minister can sack a Governor-General who oversteps the mark. But Hayden has only a few months to go.
Mr Hayden’s other remarks also had some self-substantiating elements. He argued (when talking about the President, but he could just as well have been talking about himself) that convention alone cannot be relied upon to bind office-holders and that it might be necessary to have clearer stipulations about what a head of state can and cannot do.
And again, Hayden said that a future head of state could not be relied on to always act sensibly. He said, “”You have got to account for the uncertainties of human nature and the way in which certain positions, in particular where there is status or power involved, can affect personalities.”
Of course, written rules or guidelines will not prevent the smooth running of the relationship between head of state and head of government. But they are certainly better than relying on convention. With rules, it is easier to see when the mark has been over-stepped, whether by the head or state or the head of government. Once that is seen, the action which either takes as a consequence carries more legitimacy.
Without rules, Keating will just have to put up with Hayden’s speeches and interviews until February. It is not worth the aggravation of doing anything about it. But if he really wanted to, he could.
In 1932, the Prime Minister of the Irish Free State, Eamon de Valera, engaged in a concerted attack on the office of Governor-General and the incumbent, James McNeill. At that time, the Indian solution of being a republic in the Commonwealth had not been thought of. So under the Anglo-Irish Treaty, the Irish Free State was a dominion in the Commonwealth with a Governor-General, like Canada, Australia and New Zealand.
However, de Valera and most of the Irish wanted a full republic and saw the Governor-General as a unwarranted and unwanted English entity. What could be done?
According to biographer Tim Pat Coogan, De Valera said privately that he would make a Sean naScuab out of the Governor-General. That is, a Sean of the Brushes or a figure of contempt.
After two members of de Valera’s Government snubbed Governor-General McNeill at a social function, McNeill demanded an apology. De Valera suggested that he should submit social arrangements to the Government first to prevent a recurrence. McNeill said no. He had already invited various overseas guests to stay with him during a eucharistic congress in Dublin after having sought clarification from the Government on what it thought of such invitations. The Government delayed giving a response until after McNeill had committed himself to the guests and then said the guests were an embarrassment to the Government.
After the congress McNeill told de Valera he would send the correspondence to the press unless he got his apology. De Valera ordered him not to publish. McNeill did so. De Valera demanded his resignation. The King backed De Valera … the king must follow the advice of his ministers.
De Valera wanted McNeill’s function done by the Chief Justice, Hugh Kennedy, until a replacement could be found.
Kennedy did not like the idea because it could compromise the independence of the judiciary. This has some similarities with the ACT Chief Justice’s concern in the lead up to self-government at precisely what role his office might have as Administrator or nominal head of executive. It does have one and incidentally offers a model for an Australian Republic.
But Kennedy offered De Valera a better solution … one he got from an eminent Englishman whose name he could not divulge.
Biographer Coogan quotes Kennedy: “”I mentioned to him that one of the great objections in Ireland to the Vice-Regal and Governor-General position was the inevitable re-creating of the old sham Court, gathering around it all the hovering sycophants and certain social types alien to the national life of the country and the rotting the effect of this on social life generally by creating false social values.”
Some of Hayden’s critics … especially of his renunciation of democratic socialism … might say the same thing.
Kennedy continues: “”He said to me, “Why should not the office be conducted as a purely formal office by a man residing in an ordinary residence in the city in such circumstances that nothing of the kind could arise. Then there should be no expectations created either of entertainment or social privilege round the position. He should be an officer with a bureau for transacting the specific with which he was entrusted, and his office would begin and end there”.””
De Valera seized on the idea. He appointed a colourless party hack, Donal O’Buachalla. O’Buachalla was a retired shopkeeper. After being sworn in he was installed in a modest Dublin house. His salary was cut to a 12th of McNeill’s.
Could this be the very model of a modern Governor-General? (Subs: do not change a word of this par it is a quote from Gilbert and Sullivan)
In Australia, Hayden has argued that the president could cost more than a Governor-General, and he has come under fire over the costs of his office.
He spent $517,000 spent on the trip to Gallipoli. It cost $12 million in total last year to maintain Government House. That includes renovations and extra security, but even without them, the office costs 50 per cent more than in Sir Ninian Stephen’s day.
To give Hayden his personal due, he has not drawn a concurrent parliamentary pension, and at the time of his appointment the Government was going through a wage-restraint period and he agreed to $20,000 less than he would otherwise have got. No; the extra spending in his time, he argues, has been to fix Government House to make it better for staff and visitors.
None the less, there is no reason that a President need spend more than a Governor-General. Parliament might decide on one of the de Valera models: an official in a bungalow, or the people might decide of the other de Valera option: doubling the office up with the Chief Justice. The later is similar to the ACT model with no Governor, Administrator or head of “”state”.
After each election the Chief Justice swears in the elected MLAs and presides over the election of a Speaker. The Speaker then takes over and the first business must be the election of a Chief Minister. The Chief Minister signs Bills into law (presumably the Assembly would dismiss her if she refused to sign into law a Bill it had passed … using the same majority).
Residually, the federal Governor-General has a role if the Assembly becomes unworkable … say, if it voted no confidence in one chief minister and failed to elect another. That could be resolved without a Governor-General by demanding that all no-confidence motions must nominate a successor.
Nor does the ACT model require a Governor-General-type role in agreeing to early elections. It simply has fixed-term elections on the third Saturday of February every three years.
As de Valera and the ACT model show, if we want, Australia can have a republic without a President or with a very simple one … no more half-million-dollar overseas trips and no more questioning of the Prime Minister’s policy.