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Chancellor,
Vice-Chancellor, distinguished academic staff, friends,
parents and graduates.
Now that you and I are graduated Westies, and I hope
enjoying ourselves, may I end by urging you to vote
for the Constitutional Convention which John Howard
has called for this December. The Convention will consider
the question of whether, and by what means, Australia
will proceed to become a Republic. But the membership
of the Convention will be part appointed, and part elected
by a voluntary postal vote later this year. Your graduation
today, like mine, commits us to be engaged in the community,
and I hope you will vote in that postal ballot, according
to your opinion.
At an event similar to this less than a week ago, Governor
General Sir William Deane called for tolerance in the
republic debate. He argues correctly that it should
not be considered un-Australian to hold either opinion,
pro- or anti-republican. And it would be wrong if any
particular group, including British migrants, felt disinherited
by a move to the republic. It would be wrong if historic
attachments, honourably achieved imperial titles, honourably
cherished traditions were obliterated. For a republic
should make us more tolerant, not less. Otherwise it
is would not be worth the trouble some of us have -
purely from conviction - have put into it.
The only problem with Sir William Deane is something
utterly beyond his control, but within our control as
a people. He has the gifts to speak for us, but he is
not recognised as our head of state. The well-meaning
members of Australians for a Constitutional Monarchy
went to the trouble to mount a stand at the Royal Easter
Show to tell people we have a head of state, and it
is the Governor-General. If that be true, why is it
that no government on earth recognises him as such?
Why is it that in response to a toast to the President
of the United States, Bill Clinton has to offer a toast
to the Queen of Australia? If the Governor-General is
head of state of Australia, Bill Clinton would have
been constitutionally incorrect. But in fact the officers
of the United States State Department where exactly
right in advising him to use the formula he did.
So there arises a question which will not leave us,
and we ask it without any enmity and without prejudice.
But who speaks better for us? The Queen of Great Britain,
Canada, New Zealand, Australia, Tobago, St Kitt's and
Nevis? Or an Australian, independent of party, such
as Sir William Deane? If we can devise a satisfactory
formula - and the Australian Republic Movement and the
Republic Advisory Committee have done so - who would
we choose to have speak for us? A person who through
no fault of her own is permitted only to open British
trade fairs, only to represent British interests, only
to speak of British concerns? Or an Australian, one
like Sir William Deane, who raised so eloquently last
Australia Day matters of racial tolerance, and who spoke
last week of the Aboriginal catastrophe in health; who
knows what we are and what we would like to be? Obviously,
many would like to see an Australian recognised by the
world as the person who expresses our chief concerns,
to us and to the rest of the planet, a person who lives
amongst us, who knows the sub text of our society, and
who tries to express our particular hopes.
I have promoted the idea of a republic neither because
I have some anti-British twitch, nor for mere symbolism.
I have argued for a republic, as a member of the Australian
Republican Movement, so that we can have in our highest
institution of state, directly or indirectly elected
by us, one who speaks for our fraternity here today,
for our community of interests and our desire for a
peaceful and unmolested life, whatever our ancestry,
Aboriginal, Cambodian, Vietnamese, English, Turkish,
Egyptian, Italian, Polish, Lebanese, Malaysian. So that
we can have such a one - one of our own - particularly
in an age where the garish old phantoms of race hate
are as such in place in the world and even in Australia
as they were when I was a kid in Homebush. It would
be of great significance to us to have as head of state
a non-political fellow Australian, and the structure
of a Commonwealth republic, to stand for our sense of
particular community and our hope for equality across
the lines of gender and race.
Do vote for that Constitutional Convention, and do encourage
your friends to vote! If you want a Republic as a unifying
principle in our lives, you must realise that a low
voluntary postal vote will enable some in government
to say, "There you are, the young and the educated have
little interest!" I hope you will show that the young
and the educated have the greatest interest.
Enough seriousness, and enough from an aging windbag
from Homebush! I shall, like you, always remember this
day, and be grateful to this university. I hope this
day is the beginning of enriching careers and fascinating
journeys for all of you. And to the parents of the graduates,
thank you for giving our community such brilliant children.
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