Egalitarian Republic

The approach taken by this Copernican model is to replace the Queen in our Constitutional arrangements with a regularly and periodically elected Australian citizen. The elected head of state will have the same powers as the Queen does now. The office of Governor-General would remain and the conventions with regard to the Governor-General will be preserved. The Governor-General will be appointed only on the advice of the Prime Minister and the Governor-General will still have the discretion to exercise the reserve powers if needs be. An elected head of state will, however, not be able to dismiss a Prime Minister.

This egalitarian model for a republic proposes that a change to a republican form can be achieved by changing the rules for succession to the seven existing Australian Crowns. The proposed rules for election of our head of state, who will replace the Queen in our Constitution, would be drafted as new Sections of the Constitution and only after passing a referendum vote would these new Sections be added to the Constitution. We would then have to formally request all the other Commonwealth Realms (such as the United Kingdom, Canada, New Zealand, etc) to accept the changes to the rules of succession for the seven Australian Crowns as set out in the new Sections of our Constitution.

Once agreement is granted from all the Commonwealth Realms (and this should be a formality) there will be a date and time where the rules for succession for the Australian Crowns will mean that the Australian Crown will be transferred from the person of the British monarch (Queen Elizabeth II at the moment) to the person who is elected as the first Australian head of state. From that moment on, new titles for the head of state and Governor-General could take effect and we would have an elected Australian as our head of state.

The egalitarian model for a republic proposes a term of ONE calendar year only for an elected head of state. It also proposes that the states and territories have an equal share of time for the head of state elected in each of the states and the territories combined. The seven equal shares mirror the seven Australian Crowns (one each from the six states and one for the Commonwealth). This means that there would be a state-based round-robin for a rotating presidency (the terminology is still provisional at this stage). The elections for head of state would be conducted in turn in each of the states and once per round for all the territories combined. A state-based election and term of one calender year means that an elected head of state could NOT claim a political mandate.

The proposed new Sections of the Constitution could specify the minimal conditions for the election of our head of state and the process of the round-robin. It would be up to the states to determine the methods of nomination and the processes for campaigning within their state.

This model proposes the addition of a Bill of Human Rights into the Constitution as a new Section. The egalitarian model also proposes alternating the office of head state by gender from year to year, and also so that the gender of the representative from a particular state or the territories alternates with each seven year round.