The Corowa People’s Conference which met at the weekend has recommended a long process towards another referendum on whether Australia should become a republic.
The process will necessarily be long and fairly complicated. In any event, no action will come from the Federal Government while John Howard is Prime Minister.
While opinion polls suggest that a majority of Australians would like to see the severing of the remaining constitutional ties with Britain, the stumbling point arrives when the question “what sort of republic” is asked. Some people are committed to having a direct election that they will campaign and against any other republican model. Other people are wary of a direction election for a new position in the Australian constitutional framework. Whichever model is proposed enough of one or other of these two groups of people will side with monarchists to form a majority in favour of no change – even though a majority would like a republic.
It will take quite some time and a process involving several steps to devise a model that a majority are comfortable with. Clearly, the powers of a directly elected head of state would need to be codified to give comfort to those who see dangers in a directly elected head of state claiming some sort of popular mandate to act. Alternatively, any indirect election would need to engage the broad community who worry that an indirect election is undemocratic – though obviously more democratic than the present system under which the Prime Minister selects the Head of State without the necessity of consulting anyone.
The process agreed upon at Corowa at the weekend has some merit, and some possible pitfalls.
The conference – attended by 450 delegates, including monarchists — was convened by the Victorian Council for the Centenary of Federation and a former Victorian Governor, Richard McGarvie. Its patron is former Governor-General Zelman Cowen. That two former vice-regal office holders are keen on promoting a referendum on the republic is significant.
The conference called for proposals and settled upon one devised by Professor George Winterton with some elements from proposals from film-maker Bill Peach and Canberra constitutional lawyer Bede Harris.
Under the proposal, There would be a non-binding indicative vote. The first question would ask whether Australians wished to sever Australia’s link with the Queen and become a republic with an Australian head of state. A second question would ask their preference for the method of selecting the head of state from four basic models: prime ministerial appointment; two-thirds majority of Parliament; electoral college of federal, state, territory and local government representatives; or direct popular election. There would also be questions on whether the head of state should be called president or governor-general and how the head of state’s powers should be codified.
If a majority vote for a republic, this process has the advantage of involving everyone, including monarchists, in the critical question of what sort of republic, the details of which can be refined after a period of public discussion. Further, those republicans otherwise inclined to vote No because they did not like whatever model was on offer, might be expected to accept whatever model the majority had preferred in the indicative referendum.
The disadvantage of the proposal is that the question might prove too complicated and turn people off.
The proposal has gone to a committee of the people’s conference which will prepare a report for Federal Parliament next year. It may well be that the Government, under the direction of Mr Howard, will ignore the report. But the next Liberal leader is likely to take it up because – as the Corowa conference indicates — the question will not just go away.