Mr McCLELLAND (4:24 PM) —I am pleased to say that the opposition is fully supportive of the amendments to the Referendum Legislation Amendment Bill 1999 . Essentially, the bill is to overcome a hurdle that exists in section 11(4) of the primary act which prevents the government from spending money on promoting anything other than a formal yes or no campaign in a referendum. In order to spend the amount of money which the government has indicated—some $15 million—for two committees to present arguments in favour of and opposed to the referendum questions that will take place later in the year, it is necessary to overcome that impediment. Similarly, the government has indicated its intention to spend some $4½ million to conduct an education campaign about our system of government generally to Australians. We think that expenditure is also appropriate and hence we support the bill.

The other amendments are relatively minor but they are ones of which we approve. Currently, the act provides for the circulation of material only to voters. We think it is appropriate that there be a broader distribution of this historic material than that. Similarly, allowing the transmission through electronic technology brings the act into the 21st century. The other amendment is relatively minor and preserves the secrecy of votes by referring to a referendum question rather than to a voter. That also is supported.

But in supporting the bill there are a number of points that I would like to make. In the second reading speech of the Attorney-General on 11 March, he gave some background to this bill and specifically why it is needed in the context of the referendum which will take place later this year. As the Attorney-General pointed out, the referendum later this year will consider proposed legislation to amend the Constitution to implement a republic system of government based on last year's Constitutional Convention's recommendation for a bipartisan appointment of a president. We in the opposition are entirely supportive of that. It will allow an Australian citizen of some notoriety, fame and respect to be appointed by a joint motion of the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition and with a two-thirds majority of a joint sitting of the House of Representatives and the Senate.

Mr Slipper interjecting—

Mr McCLELLAND —My friend opposite said it will be a person of notoriety. It will indeed be a person of substance, a person who has cross-party respect. By definition, a person with cross-party respect will not be one of the political warriors for either of the parties. So Australians, through the Constitutional Convention model, will end up with an Australian as our head of state who will not be a politician and there will be no further changes to our system of government. That is the essential crux of what Australians should bear in mind when they are considering matters later in the year.

The government also proposes a public education campaign. As I indicated in my opening, that, we say, is entirely appropriate. It is clear that Australians need to be educated about our system of government. Regrettably, there is remarkable ignorance on the part of many Australians, not only children. For instance, in 1993, a report by Quadrant Research showed that some 50 per cent of people questioned either did not know or gave an incorrect answer when asked how the Australian Governor-General is chosen. Indeed, when asked the meaning of the term `constitutional monarchy', 70 per cent of those interviewed did not know the answer or gave the wrong answer. I understand a survey was conducted more recently on behalf of the government which disclosed similar results.

So there is a remarkable ignorance in our community about the structure of the Constitution, and I will briefly mention a couple of points that people commonly overlook. For instance, section 1 of our Constitution specifically says that our system of government is the Queen, a Senate and a House of Representatives. The Queen is very much a part of our system of government—that is, the Queen who is a citizen of Great Britain, not a citizen of Australia.

Mr Slipper —She is not a citizen of anywhere.

Mr McCLELLAND —My friend says she is not a citizen anywhere. She is certainly not an Australian citizen. The fact is that the Queen may disallow any law under section 59 of the Constitution within one year of the Governor-General's consent. Section 61 of the Constitution provides that the executive power of the Commonwealth is vested in the Queen.

These are all things that very much confirm that the Queen, who is not an Australian citizen, has a significant role in our system of government. It is important that people realise this. It is far more than a trivial issue; it is very much how we perceive ourselves, how we want to have ourselves governed and, in particular, whether we want a foreign citizen to be far more than merely a symbolic head of state for Australia. These are things that are worth while bringing out in an education campaign.

Equally, there is remarkable ignorance about the rules of succession applying to the British monarchy. It is commonly overlooked that those rules of succession, for instance, provide that Roman Catholics and persons marrying Roman Catholics are excluded by statute from the throne and, further, that the monarch must be in communion with the Church of England and declare himself or herself to be a Protestant and swear to maintain the established churches in England and Scotland.

These things commonly are not appreciated. These are principles that I would go so far as to say are objectionable to Australians and contrary to section 116 of the Constitution, which provides that no person shall be disqualified from any office or public trust under the Commonwealth by virtue of their religion. So it is important that Australians realise the historical basis to the rules of succession which do not have any relevance at all to how Australians perceive themselves and how Australians want to be governed.

Further, Australians need to be educated about our system of government, which is based on a principle of responsible government whereby ministers who constitute the executive are responsible to the parliament rather than a head of state. For instance, in the United States of America, the President appoints the executive, but the executive in Australia must first be elected as members of parliament before they can be appointed as ministers. Their responsibility is demonstrated most graphically, I suppose, in circumstances when a minister misleads the parliament. Custom has it that such a minister has an obligation to resign his office. That is a manifestation of the principle of responsible democracy that we have in Australia. These things will not be changed by virtue of Australia becoming a republic, and it is important that the education campaign the government will be conducting makes that clear.

As the Attorney-General indicated, the referendum bill which has now been put on the table for public comment—and we indicate our agreement that that is the appropriate course for the government to follow—proposes the Constitutional Convention model whereby, as I have said, there will be a bipartisan appointment of a president based on the recommendation of a nomination committee. That committee will be constituted by representatives of the federal parliament, representatives of the state parliaments, representatives of the Territory parliaments and 16 citizens who will be chosen from the community.

We have some concerns with the fact that, under the bill which has been circulated, the Prime Minister will have the role of selecting those citizens. We say that is contrary to the bipartisan spirit that should apply to this whole process. Perhaps a preferable model would be one whereby each of the major political parties has the option of ruling out some of those persons proposed by the other side of the political fence—much the way a jury is selected, for instance. In that way, a core of 16 people who are more acceptable to both sides would be selected. These are things which we would like to discuss with the government in the coming months and through the processes that will be set in train.

The Attorney-General, in his second reading speech, spoke of the three phases of this referendum proposal. The first will be the education function, which I have already addressed. The second will be the campaign phase. The Attorney-General indicated that that will be a period of some three to four weeks immediately before the referendum, where two committees that have been chosen will expend their money in communicating their opinions to the Australian people.

We are a little concerned that that period of three to four weeks may be too short. We are of the view that the committees should be given a broader discretion should they wish to commence an earlier campaign than that. However, we think the amount offered is appropriate and, equally, we think the independence given to the committees to choose the manner and mode of advertisement is appropriate, noting that the government will require them to comply with any statutory regulation or advertising code and, of course, we surmise some auditing and accounting obligation. So that procedure is appropriate.

It is noteworthy that the government found it unnecessary to further amend section 11 of the principal act to provide a mechanism for preparation of the `no' case in each of the referendum questions that will take place later in the year, presumably on the assumption that a coalition member or coalition members will oppose the bill to provide for Australia to become a republic and also oppose the bill for a new preamble to the Constitution. That is something the government must consider, but presumably they have those methods worked out.

The third point I note from the Attorney-General's address, which I have referred to, is why there is a need to amend section 11(4) of the principal act. As the Attorney-General said, that section was established as a statutory prohibition against the government of the day funding partisan involvement in campaigns surrounding a referendum proposal. We say that is a sound principle that should not lightly be departed from and, in supporting this bill, we note that the bypassing of the existing restriction will apply only to this referendum and only to this year.

In our view, it is a fundamental principle that the government of the day should not be allowed to advance party political issues through the expenditure of taxpayers' funds. Indeed, the High Court has said that, while a minister has an extremely broad discretion in how they perform their duties, that discretion is not unfettered; they have an obligation to exercise their duty bona fide in the interests of the Australian people. That duty is akin to the fiduciary obligation owed by company directors to companies and trade union officials to trade unions, and it is a fundamental principle of that fiduciary obligation that such an officer is unable to use the resources of the company or the organisation to support their own candidature in an election or their own party political position.

We say that it is appropriate for the Attorney-General to acknowledge the importance of that provision in section 11(4) of the principal act. However, in noting that in form, we would ask the government to have regard to it in substance. I note that the Courier-Mail published an article yesterday comparing the expenditure of major corporations in Australia to the government's expenditure prior to the last election—some $19 million on its GST campaign to promote a party political position. This expenditure rivalled any of the major corporations in Australia. The $8 million of that amount which the government spent in the two weeks before the election was in excess of that spent by Toyota, McDonald's and Coca-Cola combined. That was a massive amount of taxpayers' money spent. So it is somewhat hypocritical for the government to note the importance of section 11(4) in the context of this debate but depart entirely from those principles in the context of its overall conduct as a government. They are fundamental principles that the government should apply right across the board.

The other noteworthy thing in the Attorney-General's speech was that the funding of the campaigns will not apply to the question as to whether Australia votes to have a new preamble. That, we anticipate, is on the assumption that there will be bipartisan support for a preamble which will be advanced in the government's bill. However, the conduct of the government to date has been more than disappointing. It is extremely concerning that there has been a lack of bipartisan input to the drafting of a preamble and, indeed, a lack of appropriate consultation with the community.

In particular, the draft preamble, which the Prime Minister issued at about lunchtime today, departed from the Constitutional Convention's recommendation in respect of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders. The Constitutional Convention recommended that the preamble be amended to specifically include acknowledgment of the prior occupation of Australia's shores by native Australians and the custodianship by those indigen ous Australians. The government has overlooked that very important and, one might say, fundamental principle that the Constitutional Convention recommended in attempting to have this preamble as an important step towards reconciliation with indigenous Australians. We hope the government has circulated its document very much as a draft and not as a fait accompli.

In that context, we note that the Attorney-General, in a speech that was televised on 6 February, gave a commitment that there would be a parliamentary committee—probably a joint select committee—established to review the two bills which will contain the referenda questions to be submitted to the House. We hope that that committee process will be permitted to be one which is bona fide and open and that the government will have regard to the outcome. If that does not occur, it will be a farce. The proposal of a preamble that does not specifically recognise prior indigenous Australian occupation and custodianship of the Australian shores will be something, I am sure, which will be offensive to many Australians and certainly to indigenous Australians.

The concluding points I would like to make are in the context of the purpose and nature of a referendum. It is commonly overlooked that section 128 of the Constitution, which prescribes how a referendum is conducted, provides that it is not the submitting of different options to the Australian people, it is actually the submission of a proposed law, passed by the parliament, to the Australian people. So those who suggest that there can be a canvassing of views of the Australian people as to what model of republic they want, are fundamentally mistaken. There will be a bill—which the government has put on the table—which will be passed by the parliament and that will be the question. That will be the only game in town, effectively, that voters should consider. So, with respect, some people are misleading the Australian public to say that they will have any broader options.

At the same time, it is important that Australians realise, as I have indicated, the significance of the bipartisan model of selection of the president. They should be reluctant to vote against the proposal or to conduct a spoiling action if they favour Australia becoming a republic.

Mrs Bronwyn Bishop interjecting—

Mr McCLELLAND —I am not sure that the minister at the table favours Australia becoming a republic, but those who intend to vote no—while still wanting Australia to become a republic—simply because they favour a direct election model, should think very carefully about those issues. They should think about what model they are proposing. Is it the United States model? Is it the Irish model? How do they intend to define the reserve powers that currently apply to the Attorney-General? All these things would have to be resolved before the Australian people could legitimately consider such a model. Such a model will not emanate from this House—the issues are too party political and it simply will not occur.

So the only prospect of Australia becoming a republic is effectively this bipartisan model where there will be a non-politician selected by both houses of parliament. In other words, the referendum is not a dress rehearsal; there is no realistic opportunity to have another bite at the cherry in the foreseeable future.

Mrs Bronwyn Bishop interjecting—

Mr McCLELLAND —The minister says, `Of course there is.' I am not sure how much of the Australian taxpayers' money she wants to spend on going around the world again. Last year's Constitutional Convention cost somewhere in the vicinity of $28 million; this bill will facilitate the expenditure of $19½ million; the referendum itself, later on this year, will cost some $55 million. So, if the minister is suggesting that any responsible government will lightly commit $100 million for a re-run of a similar referendum proposal in the near future, she—with respect—is ignorant of what the Australian people will tolerate in respect of the allocation of their funds. We say the expenditure which has occurred and which will occur is appropriate and, indeed, must be expended for a very historically significant event. But it is something that a government of any political persuasion would not lightly do again. So any person who argues that there can simply be a re-run of this referendum is deluding themselves and, worse still, is deluding the Australian people. This is certainly not a trial run; this is very much the real thing.

We are approaching this matter from the point of view of cooperating with the government. We hope they will display more cooperation towards us in this process than was given to us in the preparation of the draft preamble. There is still time for us to work together to come up with a form of words that the Australian people can genuinely feel ownership of. If the government is serious and fair dinkum about the overview parliamentary committee that will look into these issues, then there is a possibility for a sensible and unifying outcome to take place.

Essentially, Australia has evolved from the time of Federation when we were still very much dependent on the United Kingdom. In this century, we have obtained our judicial and, indeed, our statutory independence—for instance, with the Statute of Westminster and the Australia Act of 1986. All these things have been very significant in our becoming an independent and sovereign nation. But the final step in that process is to obtain our own head of state who is an Australian—a position that any child born in this nation can aspire to. There is an opportunity for Australians to engage in that process later in the year. We will have an opportunity to have an Australian citizen as our head of state—an Australian citizen who is a non-politician—without any other changes to our structure of government which we cherish so dearly.

In summary, the opposition supports this bill and looks forward to a series of cooperative interchanges with the government on these very important and historically significant issues.