Michael Jeffery's Dilemma

Article by John Warhurst in the Canberra Times
11 November 2006

If any publicity is good publicity then the Governor-General has been doing well recently. But the message has been very mixed.

He was photographed receiving the Cole commission report from Terence Cole QC. He was reported, allegedly in his role as "Commander-in-Chief", as being of the opinion that a lack of troops on the ground in Baghdad at the time of the invasion of Iraq seriously weakened efforts to take control of the city. He was photographed with the Prime Minister welcoming back special forces troops from Afghanistan, and presenting bravery awards to two un-named soldiers.

Yet at the same time he was profiled in a weekend magazine as "The incredible shrinking governor-general". The story about his so-called identity crisis made clear that Michael Jeffery is unhappy with his continuing anonymity.

There is corroborating evidence. One Newspoll survey, commissioned by the Australian newspaper, suggests that his recognition factor, after three years in office, is only 14% (up from 7% in December 2003). 81% still don't know his name (down from 87%).

A second Newspoll survey, commissioned by the Australian Council for Education Research, suggests that an almost equal percentage of year 10 students (77%) don't know what the office is supposed to do. That is, they didn't know the main functions of the Governor-General.

Those polls should be put in context. Australians are a remarkably ignorant people as far as public figures and public offices are concerned. Major-General Jeffery would not be the only one with his nose out of joint if recognition factors for all public jobs and officials were made known. Nor should it be seen as a particular indictment of young Australians or of current methods of teaching history. The adult Australian population, taught by traditional methods, scores no more highly.

As far as public awareness of the office and personage of the Governor-General is concerned Jeffery is correct in pointing to structural problems. He is probably right when he laments that: "It's not me or my personality".

Jeffery blames the media but that is really just picking on an easy scapegoat. If he really believes that the media is the only or even the main culprit then he is mistaken.

The relative lack of attention given to him by the media only reflects general confusion about what he actually does, as shown in the second survey. The media doesn't know whether to report his activities in the news pages as hard news or in the social pages as soft news. Nothing he does seems important enough to be really hard news. Yet as soft news he is much less exciting than the hundreds of international and national celebrities that fill our media.

When he is reported as hard news, as he was last weekend, it only serves to create more public confusion. What role is he fulfilling, for instance, in receiving the Cole Report? It can only be a symbolic one because he was just an intermediary. We know that the whole idea of the commission, the choice of Terence Cole as the commissioner and the terms of reference for the enquiry were John Howard's idea. Howard didn't discuss the commission with Jeffery before announcing it and Jeffery will have no say in the government's response. It would be regarded as totally inappropriate for him even to express an opinion on its contents.

The same confusion surrounds the use by the media of the title Commander-in-Chief. Are we to really believe that he should be taken seriously as our Commander-in-Chief? Jeffery's distinguished service in Vietnam and elsewhere adds to the confusion because it gives his military opinions credibility. Some people might really believe that he is the Commander-in-Chief but other than in a narrow, literal constitutional sense they are wrong. Commander in Chief is an old-fashioned term with no clear meaning unless it means the head of government, the Prime Minister.

There are three structural problems far more relevant than the role of the media. First, Jeffery was chosen by John Howard as a safe choice, following Archbishop Hollingworth and Sir William Deane. Howard wants him out of the limelight, playing it safe. He doesn't want Jeffery to be either accident-prone or popular. He is happy with the present situation, although probably nervous about Jeffery's expression of unhappiness.

Second, the one big public role that could be Jeffery's salvation, as chief mourner and chief national leadership symbol, has been taken over by the prime minister himself. He waves away the departing troops and welcomes them back. I don't think Howard's enthusiasm for this is feigned or calculating. But it does leave less room for Jeffery to play a part and to become more widely known.

Third, the republican movement means that the whole idea of Queen's representative has been diminished in the eyes of many Australians. This is not a personal reflection on Jeffery. He is though, for many people, the representative of an archaic system they would rather do without. As an Australian he is all republicans have at the moment, and most wish him well, but it is not nearly enough to be satisfying.

Nevertheless, it is possible that one day a story will be written, after we become a republic, about "The Incredible Shrinking President". Some of the issues of role and presence in the community are not restricted to a Governor General in a constitutional monarchy.

But they are less likely to apply to a president in a republic. The incumbent, appointed or elected, will have a much clearer role to play with the Queen no longer hovering in the background as Head of State.