Neville Wran is a former Premier of New South Wales

It's just over nine months since Whitlam launched the Trade Union Education Foundation from this platform. Since then, there's been a tremendous turnaround in the outlook for the Labor Party and the Labor Movement throughout Australia.

There's no doubt in my mind that the historic occasion here on 9 February this year, and the inspiration we all took from it, helped set the stage for this transformation. So once again, as so often over the last 30 years and more, we are in Gough Whitlam's debt.

I also thank and congratulate the Trade Union Education Foundation, the ACTU and the Labor Council of New South Wales. The important issues canvassed in this distinguished series of lectures, like industrial relations and aboriginal land rights, have played a significant part in generating Labor's new momentum, and in strengthening the partnership between industrial and political Labor.

My farewell message as Premier of New South Wales to the ALP Conference in 1986 from this platform was this:

"Always keep our union links strong. Without the unions, there is no Labor Party".

I've always believed that, and I believe it as strongly as ever today.

I suppose Gough and I share some sort of post-war record for performances at the Sydney Town Hall. If you hear me addressing you as "delegates" it's only force of habit. But there couldn't be a better place to speak about the Australian Republic than Sydney Town Hall; or a better occasion than a lecture bearing the name "Whitlam".

This is far and away the most historic public hall in Australia. It can even make a claim as the birthplace of Australian republicanism. I don't mean the great meeting convened here by Donald Horne in 1976 on the first anniversary of the dismissal of the Whitlam Government. That rally launched "Citizens for Democracy", the forerunner of the Australian Republican Movement in 1991. I am referring to a much earlier event, 110 years ago in fact, in this very building.

In June 1887, the Mayor of Sydney, and my distinguished predecessor as Premier of New South Wales, Sir Henry Parkes, got together and called a public meeting here at the Town Hall. The idea was to drum up support for the celebrations of Queen Victoria's first fifty years on the Throne. All the heavies of Sydney assembled on this platform. But they forgot the ordinary people of Sydney. Three thousand of them packed this hall and hijacked the meeting

As the Sydney Morning Herald reported - and if it's the Sydney Morning Herald, it must be true, just like the ABC - on 11 June 1887:

"Fighting broke out in all directions. The press table was rushed and the chairs, table and reporters were swept bodily away - the reporters being forced to beat a hurried retreat to the platform. Cries of "Three Cheers for the Queen" were met with cries of "Three Cheers for Liberty". Every now and then, the enthusiastic monarchists on the platform burst forth with a verse of the National Anthem, met by a choir of groans and hisses. So great was the disturbance that the Inspector of Police, Mr Fosbery was driven to the necessity of calling in the street patrol, and it was only by this means that the hall was cleared."

So don't let anyone tell you there isn't a long tradition of the Republican debate in Australia.

Anyway, Henry Parkes and the official party took refuge in the Mayor's room upstairs, and Sir Henry said it was all the work of Irish malcontents and Sydney larrikins.

There are monarchists today, one hundred and ten years on, saying the same things about the Australian Republican Movement, with Tom Keneally and me cast in the respective roles of Irish malcontent and Sydney larrikin.

Well, ladies and gentlemen, Balmain boys don't cry. We just fight on.

Now I don't suppose Gough Whitlam was ever accused of being a Sydney larrikin. But the measures the Whitlam Government took to make Australia more independent met exactly the same response and resistance we get today. In April 1973, Whitlam told the House of Representatives:

"The changes we have made or propose to make, on such matters as the powers of the Governor-General, appeals to the Privy Council, a new national anthem, the Queen's style and title, and the amendment of the oath of allegiance are in no way directed against Britain. They are intended to put our relationship on a more mature and contemporary basis and to reflect the development of a more independent Australian identity in the world."

And later that year - July 1973 - to an American audience in Washington, he said:

"My great hope for my government is that it will see the end of old inhibitions, the self-defeating fears about Australia's place in the world, and the beginning of a creative maturity."

And just remember how every move by the Whitlam government towards a more independent Australia was denounced and derided.

Friends, those statements and efforts by Gough Whitlam nearly a quarter of a century ago still sum up the objectives and aspirations of the Australian Republican Movement today - an independent, mature, dynamic, creative, forward-looking Australia.

And we say that those objectives will never be met, those aspirations will never be fully realised as long as our Constitution asserts that Australia belongs to the Crown of the United Kingdom. We say that those aspirations will never be achieved as long as our Constitution insists that our allegiance is to the person - whoever it may be - who wears the Crown of the United Kingdom, according to the laws made by the Parliament of the United Kingdom.

Yet that is exactly what the Australian Constitution says. It's time to change it.

What is the meaning of the Australian Republic?

• It is about full nationhood for Australia

• It is about a true Australian identity

• It is about an undivided allegiance to Australia

• It is about Australian citizenship

• It is about a believable Constitution - a Constitution which means what it says, and says what it means

The Republic means that the Australian Head of State should be an Australian, chosen from among Australians.

The Australian Republic means that the sovereignty and ownership of Australia does not belongs to the Crown of the United Kingdom, but belongs to the people of Australia. This is what the Australian Republic means - nothing more and nothing less.

In one sense, the change to a republic will be symbolic. There will be no change in our system of parliamentary democracy. Australia will still be a member of the Commonwealth of Nations and our Australian Head of State will have very much the same powers and ceremonial duties as the Governor-General, who at present is merely the representative of the Monarch of the United Kingdom.

In another sense, the change to an Australian republic, and to having one of our own as Australia's Head of State, will lift and invigorate our spirits at home and will earn us respect and dignity abroad. Australia is not an appendage of Great Britain, or any other country, and in our maturity and freedom we should recognise this, and give our country a chance to relate to the people of our region and to the countries with whom we trade, uncomplicated by the mystique of empire or impeded by colonial hangovers.

In short, let Australia be Australian. I'm not anti-English. After all, my own forbears were English. But I just don't believe that my ancestral background defines my being Australian. In this nation of immigrants, the only definition of being Australian, the one that really matters, is commitment to the future of Australia.

I am not anti-the Queen or the next King of England, or anti-the monarchy, which is absolutely fine for England, but of little or no relevance for Australia. Indeed, I am not particularly anti-most things - except monarchists who advocate that it is better to have the Monarch of the United Kingdom and Ireland as our Head of State, than to have one of our own - an Australian man or woman of distinction - to occupy that high office.

I don't believe, as the monarchists believe, that there is no Australian fit to be our own Head of State.

I genuinely believe that a change to a republic will be a change for the better for Australia and Australians. I believe it will introduce a new dynamic into our national life. I believe that we will command more respect and dignity in the Asia Pacific region where our future lies. I believe that it would give a fillip to our morale and our economy. I believe that it will be a stimulus to present industries and the creation of jobs and, most of all, I believe that the time has come for the change.

That's my answer to those, like Mr Howard, who say that the Republic is a "distraction from higher priorities". In fact, when Mr Howard listed his priorities in his address in Melbourne on 11 November, he just gave a catalogue of every failure and shortcoming of his own government, from jobs to hospitals.

The highest priority for this country is for its present political leadership to be jolted out of its hankering after the 1950s, as demonstrated not least in its confrontational approach to industrial relations. And the forward looking Australia - the Australia of the future - is republican Australia.

Friends: The current campaign for the Convention has at least two advantages.

Firstly, it forces the monarchists to make a case. To test the quality of their case, I just note that their campaign director has given the order - he said it on the ABC, so it must be right - "Never mention the Queen". Or as Basil Fawlty said: "Don't mention the war".

Another advantage of the campaign is that it makes us take a closer look at the Constitution - to see what it actually says and realise what it means. Now I won't go through the whole document, you'll be relieved to hear. I just ask you to look at the two bits at the beginning and the end - the Preamble, and the oath of allegiance.

The Preamble of the Constitution Act states that the people of New South Wales, Victoria, South Australia, Queensland and Tasmania:

"have agreed to unite in one indissoluble Federal Commonwealth under the Crown of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland".

Now, ladies and gentlemen, as a statement of historical fact, that is factual and unobjectionable. But it's wasn't put there in the Constitution Act as a piece of potted history. It is a deliberate declaration of Australia's dependence.

That is, at the very head of our basic document, it is declared that Australia belongs to the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. Is that a statement about Australia you want to hand down to our kids and our grandchildren for the 21st century?

The standard authority on the Australian Constitution is Quick & Garran - their massive book The Annotated Constitution of the Australian Commonwealth, written in 1900. Dr John Quick helped draw up the Constitution. Sir Robert Garran was the greatest Australian public servant before Nugget Coombs. So they knew what they were talking about.

Listen to what Quick and Garran say (pp 292-294). The declaration that the Union is "under the Crown" is fundamental. They say:

It is a concrete and unequivocal acknowledgement of the principle which pervades the whole scheme of government: harmony with the British Constitution and loyalty to the Queen as the visible central authority uniting the British Empire.

And that, of course, is the whole point of the debate in 1997: What on earth has the future of Australia in the 21st century got to do with the British Empire of the 19th century? Don't be under any illusion that it's not important. Don't fall for the monarchist line that the words of the Constitution don't matter.

The monarchists want to have it both ways. On the one hand, they are trying to say that we are a republic already - in the nonsensical phrase concocted by John Howard "a crowned republic". On the other hand, they depict the move towards the Republic, now gathering strength by the day, as nothing short of a red revolution.

Sometime the monarchists say: "The British Monarch must remain our Head of State". In the next breath they say: "Oh - we already have an Australian Head of State. The Governor-General is our Head of State."

The former Chief Justice, Sir Anthony Mason, demolished that for all time. The Governor-General is not the Head of State. He is what the Constitution says he is: the representative of the Monarch of Great Britain and Ireland.

I believe that the Constitution under which we live must be the foundational document of our federal parliamentary democracy. And I believe that, when its all-pervading principle, in the words of Quick and Garran, is loyalty to the Central Imperial Authority in London, the Crown of the United Kingdom - and that's what the Constitution says - then I believe with all my heart:

We must change that Constitution.

And of course the question of loyalty is at the heart of the matter. That is where we take the monarchists head on: is your loyalty to London or is it to Australia? The question is: where does an Australian's allegiance lie?

We say that the only allegiance any Australian citizen owes is to Australia. We say that Australian office-holders and elected members of parliament owe only one allegiance - to the Australian people. But our Constitution, as it stands, says something very different.

It enforces - not implies, not suggests, not permits, but positively demands - allegiance to whoever wears the Crown of England as decided by the British Parliament. That is what our Constitution says.

Section 42 requires every member of parliament, every member of the House of Representatives and every Senator, to take an oath of allegiance. Other sections require the same oath of the Governor General and High Court Judges. The Australian Defence Forces also require it.

The Constitution prescribes a specific oath or affirmation. Let me read it to you; in its affirmation form:

I, A.B. do solemnly and sincerely affirm and declare that I will be faithful and bear true allegiance to Her Majesty Queen Victoria, Her Heirs and successors according to law.

Then the schedule at the end of the Constitution adds a thoughtful note:

The name of the King or Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland for the time being is to be substituted from time to time.

That's the pledge of allegiance still required of every Australian member of Parliament. There wouldn't be a fifth of them who now believes in it - but they have to swear it anyway. This is, ladies and gentlemen, at the outset of every elected Parliament of Australia, the men and women you elect are forced to swear to a lie.

As you know, it was the same pledge of allegiance demanded from every Australian immigrant seeking naturalization, until Nick Bolkus, Minister for Immigration in the Keating Government, passed the Australian Citizenship Amendment Bill in September 1993.

I'll quote the new pledge of allegiance, taken by new citizens, because it sums up what the whole debate is all about:

From this time forward, I pledge my loyalty to Australia and its people
Whose democratic beliefs I share
Whose rights and liberties I respect; and
Whose laws I will uphold and obey.

That should be the only pledge of loyalty Australians shall ever make - even us poor politicians! Our allegiance must be to Australia - simple and undivided.

Needless to say, the Liberals and Nationals in Parliament, voted against the Bolkus bill - just as they twice rejected Al Grassby's Citizenship Bill during the Whitlam Government.

But, after the 1996 elections, a funny thing happened on the way to Yarralumla. Because, although the Constitution insists that every member of Parliament pledge allegiance to the House of Windsor forever, it doesn't impose the same obligation on Ministers.

So Mr Howard dreamt up a new form of oath for himself and his Ministerial colleagues. The one they take in the privacy of the Governor General's study is this:

"I swear that I will well and truly serve the people of Australia and I will be faithful and bear true allegiance to Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth the Second."

And there the new Howard oath ends. Nothing about the sons, or the heirs, or the successors, or the laws of the British Parliament, which, for example, say that a Catholic is barred from the succession, and if the heir marries a Catholic, he is automatically barred from the succession.

Now, ladies and gentlemen, you'll realize at once the significance of what Mr Howard has done - for himself. He has dumped the heirs and successors - not for ordinary members of parliament - they're still bound for life to the House of Windsor by the Constitution. But for himself and his ministers, it's a different matter.

And isn't it obvious that the reason why John Howard changed the old formula is because he doesn't believe in it himself? He must have been reading the opinion polls.

In other words Mr Howard is saying: "It's OK for members of Parliament to have to give a pledge which hardly any of them believe. It's OK for the Australian people to live under a Constitution which makes the future Head of State whoever happens to be the hereditary heir to the throne of the United Kingdom. But that's not for me. None of that nonsense for me or my Ministers."

So let me ask Mr Howard this question: If he won't commit his conscience and his allegiance to King Charles the Third, with or without Queen Camilla, by what right does he expect the people of Australia to do so?

So that brings me to Mr Howard's Constitutional Convention which you are now electing. It may be that the Prime Minister's intention is just to muddy the waters. But it doesn't have be that way.

The task before the Australian people is to make the Convention a real opportunity, a positive step towards the Australia Republic. The supporters of the Republic elected to the Convention must make sure that it is always focussed on the central point: The Australian Republic and the ways by which it can be established.

This Convention can't re-write the Constitution. It is not about the federal system, It is not about Commonwealth-State financial relations. It is not about the relations between the House of Representatives and the Senate. It is not about a Bill of Rights. It is not about religious beliefs. It's not about the Commonwealth of Nations. It's not about the Commonwealth Games. And it's certainly not about the flag.

It is and must be about the Republic.

Whatever the outcome of the February Convention, there will still be two basic questions for the Australian people:

The first is: do you want an Australian Head of State?

If the answer to that question is "Yes", the second question is "How Should the Australian Head of State be chosen?

That is what we have to concentrate on; and the great task and challenge before us is to get those questions put to the Australian people. And we should use the coming Convention as a springboard to put it into operation.

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