Hmm. The constitutional nonsense of the Australia-wreckers hasn't taken that into account. They are trying to herd us into an even bigger mess than we thought we would be by dumping the monarchy. Although, with our train-wreck Federation, we already have the federal government going one way, and the states wherever their loony premiers decide on whim.

Forget republicanism. Fix the Federation! Don't bugger up the country any more than it is buggered up now.

Well it looks like this none sense isn’t to happen.

Three cheers for the Queen…(and Donald Trump).

Dan

Absolutely disagree! A two stage referendum would first ask WE THE PEOPLE what model we wanted!? Then when that was done and dusted! Followed by stage two, and the question put to WE THE PEOPLE is a republic based on the publicly popular model! With WE THE PEOPLE asked if we want a republic based on that model!?

Nothing else is required! Certainly not elements taken off the table by various political power brokers trying to control outcomes or handicapping them! Or steer them in a direction where like the last time, the question as constructed would be, automatically rejected!
Alan B.

Yes Alan, a typically republican approach. First try to get everyone locked into a apparently simple vote, then hit them with the catastrophe afterwards.

Such a catastrophe would make hundreds of lawyers, thousands of academics, & tens of thousands of bureaucrats collecting extremely high incomes for decades, for absolutely no useful result, what ever it might be.

When the Queen passes I suspect the royals will have lost their social licence. They need to be cut back to basics. Perhaps Prince Charles can have a job officiating at republicanisation ceremonies as he did recently in Barbados.

The worst scenario would be to appoint a self righteous oik as President who lectures us on rights and wrongs while making heavy use of limos and VIP jets. Whatever arrangement ensues the Commonwealth Auditor General should be charged with ensuring it costs no more than the GG system. Ditto the states.

I don't know why Charles went to Barbados. To make sure they did it perhaps?

Barbados had an advantage over Australia - the politicians decided to do the deed without reference to the people. I'll bet Pirate Pete wishes that his mob could do the same here. If it were not for the Constitution, our politicians would buckle under the pressure too. They might even have led the charge.

Who knows what Australian politicians would get up to if they didn’t have to refer to the people.

A republic would not charge the fact that Governments no longer represent citizens, but treat them as subjects, who provide a reservoir of funding to perpetuate their own authority over those subjects. People used to be the subjects of monarchs; now they are the subjects of career politicians - whom they actually choose! We ceased to be British subjects in 1949 and became the subjects of self-serving career politicians.

That's what needs changing; not getting rid of a harmless monarchy that has no say in our affairs at all, and costs us nothing.

I'm at a loss to understand why this bloke thinks that it is nonsensical for a higher level of government to be structured differently or of a different form to a lower level.

Indeed there are plenty of successful working examples of such layered inhomogeneity throughout the world. Take the European Union for example. At the top level the Union is a de facto sovereign state on the international stage (ie: what most consider to be an independent/sovereign country) of a unique and complicated governmental form, while its the member polities, which were originally sovereign countries, are now de facto states (states in the sense of Australian or American states)*.

But Union's states are a disparate collection of forms of governments: we have monarchies (eg. Netherlands), unitary republics (eg. France), federated republics (eg: Germany), etc. Basically the only restriction to membership to the Union, in terms of acceptable forms of governemnts, is that the entity is some sort of democracy.

And if you want a real quirky example then roll back to 2007 and consider Sark. Sark was at that time the last fiefdom of Europe and contemporaneously the UK was still part of the EU. So then you have:
Sark at the lowest level, which was a royal fief, (fief: 1st form of government)
which is part of the Bailiwick of Guernsey, (bailiwick: 2nd form)
which is, by some peculiar way that I don't know much about, overseen/controlled by the UK (representative democratic constitutional monarchy of a united kingdom: 3rd form)
which was a member of the EU (a unique and complicated modern form of government: 4th form)

[*: Indeed if its name were changed to the "United States of Europe" then it would better reflect the current reality of the situation.]

The real factor that is never mentioned is the general deep distrust among the general public of the whole gaggle of politicians, and the great comfort that they derive from the fact that that Her Majesty and her representatives are standing by, ready to sack and ready to disallow. How fortunate we are that our constitution can only be amended by the people, and not by the politicians. I can remember the time not long ago when politicians were compared to used car salesmen, and the salesmen had to complain at the invidious comparison. Perhaps the best approach could be to change the title of the GG to "Prime Ministerial pisser-offer in Chief"

I have a solution to the republican debate that should please both sides.
Why not just nominate a local Royal Family and keep everything else in place?

We can pick a family at random (ideally an immigrant one like the pre-Windsor Saxe-Coburg Gothas), build them some castles, put their heads on our coins, write endless articles about them and discuss any scandals.

All they need to do in return is pose for the occasional photo, cut ribbons and open each new session of Parliament.

We would thus have an Australian Head of State as well as all the protections and soothing nostalgia of being ruled by our betters.

rache: I once had that same basic idea many years ago, but with a slight difference. We should chose three random orphan infants and regard them to be siblings (not an existing family like you suggest). Then the public could drew close to them as they watch them grow up and become our future Royal family. It's my opinion that the whole point of having Royals is so that the general public can be voyeurs/big brother watchers.

I never understood this years ago and was very much a republican but then I watched the marriage of our Mary to Prince Frederick of Denmark in 2004. I didn't plan on watching it, it was just of the telly, and I was captivated by it- and that's when it struck me that exactly what what the value having a of a royal family is. It's a personal/human face of the government that the general public can relate to at a human level- by watching all the ups and downs of their lives. It was quite the epiphany! For example, all those magazines with pictures of Royals and the BS stories about them at the checkout that I never understood why people buy, made sense (I've never bought one- but I now understand why people buy them). Without Royals a society has to invent something to replace this, such as an over-the-top celebrity culture.

thinkabit

It took you a while then?

And that is exactly the point to Donald Trump.

Who wants an insipid Mummy’s Boy like Morrison or Albanese in charge of the nut house Australia has become?

Dan

Ttbn nailed down the situation: "A republic would not change the fact that Governments no longer represent citizens, but treat them as subjects".

As a mock democracy we are given the choice - the orange whip or the purple whip, both identical except for their colour.
"Oh is there not enough choice?", say our tormentors, "would you rather we beat you with a green whip? a red whip perhaps? You choose dears, this is democracy after all!"

- Give the mob some entertainment, distract them with shiny ribbons with lots of colours to choose...

Nay, unless we are masochistic by nature, any constitutional change should start by tearing down the Canberra regime with its "commonwealth" hump, not a different puppet-ruler so they could now claim, "but that's what YOU chose...".

diver dan,
It takes some very devoted people to want to run the un-runnables in this nut house ?

I don't want to be ruled by foreigners, but there's no escape from it now anyway, which makes this discussion completely irrelevant.