David Latimer,

I did not say that the Queen could sack the Prime Minister. I said that the Queen, either directly or through her representatives, could do so. It is the representative who does the sacking, the only direct action the Queen could take is disallowance. However, since the representatives hold office during the Queen's pleasure, in practice it amounts to the same thing.

You asked me to clarify why many people find the Queen's residual constitutional powers a comfort. I believe there are four basic principles in Australian politics, which come directly from the Rum Corps. They are:

1. The Government is the enemy of the People, and can never be trusted.

2. No taxation with or without representation, with any deficiency being made up from the sale of politician's assets.

3. In an election, no matter whom you vote for, a politician is ALWAYS elected.

4. Always vote NO in federal referendums.

As a result of these attitudes the monarch has been seen for many years to have a role in protecting the people from the politicians.

I would not be totally opposed to any form of republic, but I would require increased protection from the political elite. The Swiss republic is one that comes to mind in this regard, as we already have the constitutional approval procdure that they use. What we don't have is citizen initiated referendum, which the Swiss have and which allows the people to overrule the elite.


Since we are talking about different sorts of republics, I thought I would lighten the discussion by passing on a joke from a Polish friend.

Question: What is the difference between a republic and a people's republic?

Answer: It's the same as the difference between a chair and an electric chair.

Alexander Drake: I should know by now that nothing is ever as easy as my uneducated logic, in this instance, would have me believe.
Looking back over previous instances of referenda bears out your explanation of the conventions of what is presented for public scrutiny.
Thanks for clearing it up.

Cheers

Rex,

I wasn't objecting to a Democrat having Lyn's opinions... that is fine... even as a polly she is entitled to free speech...ha!

My point is that Lyn should concentrate on the core issues that are facing our democracy and put forward viable alternatives to what are being presented. That is role as I see it for all political parties.

Side issues would be fine if the Democrats were growing as a party and increasing their vote at elections but the reverse is actually happening.

Lyn is the boss in the Democrats at the most crucial time in it's history. Her leadership over the coming months could just be the final determining factor as to whether the Democrats survive as a party.

So if Lyn allows herself to be diverted on issues that really have not much importance in the whole scheme of things then she may be missing her greatest opportunity.

Lyn and the Dems have to use tactics that get their message back into the minds of voters. She has to strictly adhere to the policies that actually can help her party regain strength. A window of opportunity has opened with Govt'sc trampling of the senate, the Greens t-shirt mistake and the shamozal that is the alleged AWB fiasco.

There are heaps of Aussie hurting out there all throughout Australia and Lyn should be focused on fixing what is hurting those Aussies. That way her party may again seem relevant to the people who abandoned them last election.

I want a strong, sensible, relevant 3rd alternative to Labor & Liberal. The Dems may be good legislators (at times) but are they good politicians who can rebuild a damaged party?

To David Latimer and all other posters. I was working on a colleague's computer this morning, replying to various other posts, and failed to notice that his computer was logged on to his nickname of "Joh_bjelke", instead of mine. Please accept my apologies, I will try and make sure it doesn't happen again.

Response to Alexander Drake:

You make some good points. Not only do we have the 'blank cheque' argument but an actual cheque of about $100 million to run a plebiscite. $200 million for two plebiscites. At the very least, we should be asking all the necessary questions of the people in one session (be it 2, 3 or 5 questions) so we only pay once and get the answers at once.

Yesterday (updating a wikipedia article) I was reading the transcript for Clem Jones at the 2004 Senate republican inquiry. He was dismissed for suggesting a plebiscite of 12 to 15 questions. (That's $7 million per question.) The Senators thought it would be too hard or complicated for people. He made the excellent point that if the people can't handle 15 modest questions, why expect them to be able to answer 1 major question correctly.

As a republican, I certainly not motivated by giving an 'up-yours' to anyone; not even to monarchists; not even to Plerdsus! I am interested in the best possible republican reform (or constitutional system) which best matches what the Australian people want. A plebiscite could be part of that, but not with just one broad question.

Response to Plerdsus:
We've gone over this territory before, but I expect people vote for a referendum based on the merits of the proposal. If you are voting NO for worthwhile proposals then you're helping to send the country backwards.

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For my wikipedia article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Process_model_%28Australia%29

For the John Howard transcripts, they are on his website: http://www.pm.gov.au/news/interviews/index.cfm

I know I have been getting stuck in over the issues that the Dems should be taking up to win back support with the Aussie electorate... so I decided I had better go check out their website to see if I was being a little too critical.

http://www.democrats.org.au/ is worth a visit daily to keep informed.

The Dems have been getting stuck in and on many of the issues we have been jumping up and down about also.

Guess what the media aren't reporting on their press releases and why would they ... the Howard Govt is about to deregulate the media to the benefit of the mega rich media barons. They will be controlling everything we see, read and hear.

So it is only natural they aren't going to rock the boat now by giving the minor parties a fair go.

The Dems Senators have been press releasing their hearts out and being totally ignored by the media. See here http://www.democrats.org.au/news/

Is it in the mega rich moguls interest to have only two parties? It seems so with the new media laws that are being suggested.

I repectfully suggest that all thinking voters on realising this, should visit the Australian Democrats pages, the Greens pages and any other minor parties pages to find out what they are really doing. We owe it to our democracy.

Here are two links just for starters

The Dems http://www.democrats.org.au/

The Greens http://www.greens.org.au/

I'm sure you can visit the others by yourselves.

If the media can't be relied upon to tell us the full story then we had better start going and getting it for ourselves. You may save a few bob... you may not need the media as much as you think