The "Australian as Head of State" is a false appeal to patriotism: those who coined it could not care less whether the Head of State is Australian or Martian. Rather, all they want is to get rid of an authority who cannot be bought. For it is too difficult to buy off someone who is the richest woman in the world, and who couldn't care less about party politics, and who lives across the ocean.

The "Australian as Head of State" also comprises false logic: the Queen, being Head of State over Australia, is by definition, Australian. She is also English, no doubt, but she is Australian too.
And if she wanted to live here tomorrow, she could do so without need of anybody's permission. Accordingly, it is ridiculous to imply that Crown land, being part of Australia, is owned by a Crown which is not Australian.
The Queen is English. She is also Australian.

We do not vote for a Prime Minister, as he is the one who the Governor-General chooses. Generally the leader of the party in power.
The Queen is not head of State of the Commonwealth of Australia and never was. The Queen neither was ever head of any of the colonies (now States). She is and remained to be the head of State of the United Kingdom and we are by this living in dominions (the States) subjects of the Queen.
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We cannot change the preamble because it is not a part of the Constitution to which Section 128 referendum power lies. Neither so how the Queen deals with matters and who she married.
How to lawfully create a REPUBLIC has been set out in details on my blog at http://au.360.yahoo.com/profile-ijpxwMQ4dbXm0BMADq1lv8AYHknTV_QH .
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Those who desire an independent Commonwealth of Australia certainly should not listen to the nonsense of the Australian Republican Movement or the Monarchist as neither has a clue what really is applicable and how it changes everything.
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We have seen how John Howard unconstitutionally authorised a armed invasion into IRAQ and that for the illusive WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION.
Constitutionally only the governor-General has this power and refused to exercise this!
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Now those who like to place in hands this kind of powers in a prime minister obsessed with power may have to think twice as it might very well be that some nation one day may decide to give us the same in return and invade us and bomb us back into the stone age and with the compliments of those who were our victims in the past.
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If you desire to change, then at least do it for the right reasons and not ridiculous excuses

Gerrit, you are right. The problem though is that very, very few Australians know much about their Constitution or what relevance it has on our political and legal process.

But surely, discussing whether Australians want to sever links with the British monarchy and become an independent republic is legitimate? Discussion will only improve knowledge. Surely that can only be a good thing seeing we are regularly being told that 'our way of life' is worth fighting and dying for.

If the majority of Australians do want a republic I think it could only be a good thing because it will give us a chance to rewrite our constitution in a much tighter fashion and determine which of our many 'conventions' so important to many things we take for granted we want to spell out. Not many Australians realize how loose our Constitution really is. It will also give us a chance to debate without hysteria whether a Bill of Rights along with a Constitution has a place in our nation.

Of course not all democracies have a constitution, Great Britain being an example, so do we need a constitution at all? Why do we need to keep our constitution? Many would say Yes, but it is important to articulate why this is a good thing. Ideally without too much emotive language, just facts on which rational opinions can be formed.

Indeed some very funny things have been stated by both Republicans and Monarchists, but I think there are two issues at hand. One the importance of having our own Head of State to represent the nation Australia, two, the political/legal implications. Both are important issues to think about and discuss in a mature democracy. After all, it is related to the whole notion of nationhood and what it is we actually want to 'protect'.

Yvonne,

The issue is not if people can debate it but rather that they should place some sensible arguments before us.
Unless people present what they deem is wrong with the current system and what they seek to do about it we are basically getting people to go crazy about wanting to be a republic without even grasping what it is about.
For example, currently the Commonwealth of Australia is no more but a POLITICAL UNION, and if you are going to make it a REPUBLIC then it will change the legal system also. Currently, there is a certain requirement of funding of States, but if you are going to make it a confederation then you could end up that some States might end up getting less financial return and others will get more pending how politicians decide to spend the monies. The commonwealth has currently no constitutional powers to place anywhere nuclear reactors, but if we become a REPUBLIC it could simply dictate and nothing you could do getting one, so to say, in your backyard.
Currently (constitutionally) the armed forces are prohibited to be called out against protesters, but with a REPUBLIC those kind of limits no longer apply. I published on my blog “How to lawfully create a REPUBLIC” and it indicates it cannot be done within Section 128 of the Constitution!
It is like wishing it rains and then you get flooded and your house is being destroyed by it. People wishing for a REPUBLIC or being independent may not realise how this will end up in reality.
What is needed is a proper investigation as to what a REPUBLIC will amount to and what changes there will be to the State’s powers and other legal provisions, etc.
The Queen never was "Head of State" of the Commonwealth of Australia as we are under the Crown as the States remained to be dominions! If people do not understand this then they better learn this first!

It would appear from all these arguments, that rather than dispute endlessly on either side we should simply have a member of a royal family transferred here to be our new monarch. No change to the constitution whilst our head-of-state would be Australian.

Anyone who in fact believes that our monarch must be that of the UK must be bonkers.

Gerrit, you did not make a sensible argument why this should not be discussed either and why changes cannot be made to our Constitution. I disagree with you that many do not realize that a change from a monarchy will mean changes. That is the whole point. It is also a fact that throughout our history since Federation several Acts have been passed to strengthen Conventional practices creating greater and greater distance between the authority of the Australian Federal Executive and the UK. Especially so in 1985 and 1986. Up until then, theoretically the UK parliament could legally legislate for Australian States. These changes have been made without the sky falling in. The UK parliament, with Elizabeth as her head, no longer has any legal power to safe us from ourselves.

Meaning, that if the Federal Government wanted to build a nuclear power plant in your back yard it could do so right now if it could convince parliament to pass the necessary legislation authorizing it to do so and on challenge by the States is upheld to be constitutional by the High Court of Australia. Commonwealth v Tasmania (1983) is a precedence set on far rockier ground than a nuclear power plant would be. We just ratified Kyoto remember.

So the issue about becoming a republic is not about independence. We are independent and becoming increasingly so. That is why it is no longer appropriate for us to have a Governor-General representing the British Queen enacting any Australian legislation. What is wrong is that it does not acknowledge the gravitas of our actions as citizens. For some it appears to afford a weird kind of false safety blanket.