Mr St CLAIR (9:31 PM) —What a historic occasion tonight is, and I think that is reflected on both sides of this House. It is certainly one of the great issues that I have looked forward to since coming into parliament last year. Having talked to the people in the electorate of New England for the last two years, I have found no-one particularly enthusiastic about any change from the system we have. The interesting part about it is that we have proposals put up and bills put up—and we have another one today—but as far as I am concerned I have not yet seen a system being put forward that is any better than the system we have.

My family came here from Ireland in about 1842. They went to Ireland from Scotland because they had been fighting the Poms for hundreds of years. Some say that they should have stayed in Ireland. Thank goodness they came here.

There has not been any great change wanted. Unlike some of the city electorates which have one or two schools, my electorate has just over 100 schools. As I go around my electorate, it is quite amazing that, as I speak to year 11 and 12 students in particular and address their regional conferences where they discuss issues of the republic, the preamble, et cetera, there is no-one looking for change. Everyone seems to be comfortable. So I am certainly looking forward to the people of Australia making that decision on 6 November.

I have a belief that we should be looking at the Constitution in the way that the nation is governed, rather than worrying about whether or not we go to a republic. I believe that the nation, as it goes into the next millennium, should be saying, `We have three levels of government in Australia. Is that the way we want to do it? Do we want to have states? Is it quite comfortable to have regional government?' et cetera. I think there are far more important things to be discussing rather than simply looking forward to some sort of change that some people are proposing. I look forward, with the rest of my people in New England, to voting no on 6 November.

Mr DEPUTY SPEAKER (Mr Nehl) —Before I call the next speaker, I want to make it quite clear that Mr Speaker has indicated that his expectation is that this debate will see every member heard in silence. If anybody wants to ignore the request of the Speaker, it can easily be arranged that you are not here for the division.