Philo, here are some remarks by Ninian Stephen on the matter, made in 1983. They confirm your point about the Governor-General, but the point remains unanswered: why should the Queen's representative wield this power in the name of the monarchy?
“In 1983, writing of the independence of the Governor-General and of the example which, in this regard, the United Kingdom might provide, the writer of a series of Canberra Papers on Strategy and Defence commented:
“As an extreme example of this the Sovereign has the power to influence or even to deny the use of the armed forces if it is clear that the government of the day intends that the armed services should be used for purely political ends of a domestic nature”.
Section 68 of our constitution, he writes, “should be read as vestment of a command authority exactly the same as that enjoyed by the Sovereign in the United Kingdom”; and later “But in the command sense the Minister has no part to play in the actual command of the armed services. The chain of command must be direct from the Senior Service Officer vested with command direct to the Governor-General”. The conclusion arrived at is that:
“Parliament must control the armed services but command of the armed services must lie to the Governor-General acting without the advice of the Executive Council”.
Views much at variance are, then, to be found about the position of the Governor-General as commander-in-chief; they range all the way from “no more than a glorified patron” to one who, as the ultimate possessor of the command function, waits, finger on the fatal button, for the report of the Senior Service Officer.”

Philo, could you please tell me why the Australian Prime Minister should not have the right to dismiss the Westminster Parliament if he considers that the party in power is not serving the interests of the British people?

Bail Up,
You ask, "why should the Queen's representative wield this power in the name of the monarchy?"

It would appear you are not familiar with British history, and the power of the people as vested in the crown. The power of the monarch was taken away and given to the people. The Monarch now merely represents the people to protect them from dictators and bad law introduced by Governments. The monarch is the signatory for the people of laws introduced by parliaments, and the keeper of the keys of the parliament, able to install and dismiss governments on behalf of the people. She no longer has direct power to rule over the people. The Queen represents the people, and the Governor General holds that role of representing the people of Australia.

You ask, "could you please tell me why the Australian Prime Minister should not have the right to dismiss the Westminster Parliament if he considers that the party in power is not serving the interests of the British people?"

The Prime Minister in Britain and the Prime Minister of Australia are ministers of two different Governments and of two different nations. They are independently appointed upon Party political agenda and form laws independently for two different peoples/nations. The Crown cannot of itself form laws to be administered over the people. The Australian Governor General representing the crown of Australia can only act on behalf of the people of Australia. The limit of powers and role of the crown are separate and different between Australia and Great Britain. One parliament cannot override the power of another; their powers are not linked.

I realise you want a popularly elected President, but in the current World climate there is not much more than 50% support of the democratically elected President by the people of any Nation. The Crown offers a consistent stability not changed by volatile political situations.

Philo,
if you read my previous contributions carefully, you'll note that I'm not at all for a popularly elected Australian Federal President. I don't wish to change our voting system, nor do I see the need for this (unless one can find some way of using a well-proportioned dose of proportional representation in combination with our present preferential voting system - but that's quite another argument for quite another day).
No I would like to see an Australian Federal President elected by a joint sitting of the members of both Houses of Parliament in Canberra for a term of five years, and with the proviso that a maximum of two such 5-year terms of office may be served. Candidates for such an election should be independent, non-party-affiliated individuals who have excelled in some way in Australian public life, and who can be seen as standing above party politics. They should be nominated by MPs of the Federal Parliament, but must not be members of parliament themselves. The job of the successful candidate would be, in the first instance, to oversee and protect the rights of the Australian Constitution.
For the decking out of such an office with certain powers (and the attendant limitation of such powers), please see my previous postings.

Pity all the energy spent on the republic debate could not have been devoted to improving our system of government.
We seem to have settled for a system of government where we are consulted once every three years and ignored for the rest of the time.
If we could change the present system so that we(the people), would have to be consulted more often (by referendum), then we would have a system nearer to a democracy than the present system.
The Swiss have not been to war for over 150 years and this may be because their politicians would not be allowed a war without first haveing to hold a referndum.
It would not be necessary to choose between a figurehead or an elected head.

As I suspected, this discussion has absolutely nowhere to go. What is sad is the complete lack of originality in the argumentation - even the obligatory reference to Saint Gough's electoral ghost was inaccurate...

"the Australian representative of the UK's monarchy sacked a government democratically-elected by the majority of the Australian people and turfed it out of office"

Well, almost, Bail Up, almost. Gough scored 49.3% of those who turned out in 1974, but only 95.4% of eligible voters did so. The full story is that 3,644,110 people voted for the ALP, and 3,889,658 didn't. And when they went back to the polls the next year, the story was 3,313,004 voted for him and 4,568,869 didn't.

If you rely on the voting public to support your argument, exactly at what point do you determine your working definition of democracy? If you make the assumption that those who weren't supporting him were against him, John Kerr did the Australian electorate proud.

The point here is not to attack Whitlam or defend Kerr, but to point out that constitutional issues can so easily be reduced to the mundane.

The only way we will achieve a republic in Australia is if an elected government first defines and describes it, then succeeds in pushing it through our parliamentary process.

And forget "the people's president", we would be the laughing stock of the civilized world.

"Candidates for such an election should be independent, non-party-affiliated individuals who have excelled in some way in Australian public life, and who can be seen as standing above party politics."

Just for interest's sake, and to demonstrate the difficulty of such a simple-sounding process... name one.

Sir Les Paterson?
http://www.postnewspapers.com.au/20030621/impressions/images/imp_paterson.jpg