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Talk:Government of Australia/archive 1

The real issue

Skyring has repeatedly accused me of deliberately misquoting the Constitution. Here is section 2 of the Constitution, cut-and-pasted from the Parliamentary website.

2. A Governor-General appointed by the Queen shall be Her Majesty's representative in the Commonwealth, and shall have and may exercise in the Commonwealth during the Queen's pleasure, but subject to this Constitution, such powers and functions of the Queen as Her Majesty may be pleased to assign to him.

Now: does Skyring dispute that this is indeed the text of the Constitution? Does he deny that the Constitution says that (a) the Queen appoints the Governor-General and (b) the Governor-General is the Queen's representative? Given these two things, in what capacity does the Queen appoint the GG? And in what capacity is the Queen represented by the GG? If Skyring wants to deny that it is the capacity of head of state, he has to tell us what other capacity could it possibly be. Adam 01:11, 9 Mar 2005 (UTC)

You stated that the Constitution says something it clearly does not. You said "the fact is that the Constitution says the GG is the Queen's representative". This is not a fact. It is incorrect.

"SHALL BE HER MAJESTY'S REPRESENTATIVE" WHAT IS THE MATTER WITH YOU? CAN'T YOU UNDERSTAND PLAIN ENGLISH? Adam 02:02, 9 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Calm down, Adam. Please. You misquoted the constitution, as I pointed out above. I've quoted the exact words you used. In the same breath you accused me of circular arguments, and I asked you to provide examples, none of which have been provided. However, none of this seems to be getting us anywhere. Others have provided useful directions on how to proceed, and frankly I think you should either keep out of the discussion for a while or try to aim for a more professional manner. Skyring 03:18, 9 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I believe I am entitled to complain if you misquote the Constitution to suit your own purposes. Maybe you think the difference is minor, but if so, then why not use the actual words of the document? You can hardly be mistaken after several corrections, including an extended discussion on this very point in another article so I ask what is your purpose in deliberately misquoting the Constitution?

I suggest that you should really answer a few of the questions I put to you before demanding I answer yours. Be fair. Skyring 01:36, 9 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I said: "the Constitution says the GG is the Queen's representative." The Constitution says: "A Governor-General appointed by the Queen shall be Her Majesty's representative in the Commonwealth." How is that a misquotation??? I really have no idea what you are talking about. Adam 03:26, 9 Mar 2005 (UTC)

It's a misquotation because the words you used are not in the Constitution. Keep going. Skyring 03:46, 9 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I see. Such stupidity from someone of some evident intelligence is sad to see. Adam 04:05, 9 Mar 2005 (UTC)

It's not a misquotation, it's a paraphrase, and there's absolutely nothing wrong with it. Otherwise we would just copy the text of the Constitution and not write articles. --Michael Snow 04:00, 9 Mar 2005 (UTC)

It's a misquotation. Adam says it is a fact that the Constitution says words it does not. He should either use the literal text if he wishes to quote it, especially if he is insistent that it is factual to the extent of boldfacing his words, or use a form of speech which makes it clear that he is paraphrasing. This is standard academic practice and I must say that I am quite upset by the unprofessional behaviour displayed by Adam recently. Skyring 05:51, 9 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Fine. "The executive power of the Commonwealth is vested in the Queen and is exercisable by the Governor-General as the Queen's representative, and extends to the execution and maintenance of this Constitution, and of the laws of the Commonwealth." That's in chapter II: The Executive Government. See . What Adam said. - Ta bu shi da yu 06:12, 9 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Well I'm upset (really pissed off actually) by your deliberate obfuscation and timewasting, your dishonesty, your malicious misrepresentation of other people arguments, your rampant vanity and egotism and your general obnoxious fuckwittedness, so get used to it. Adam 05:54, 9 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Moving on to unprotection

I think we should be able to get past this often circular discussion and reach a consensus. Several people have indicated they think we have a consensus already, and I agree that we're pretty close to it. I suggest that it's possible we could get general agreement on the following points:

1. The Queen is head of state in the usual sense of that title, but the title is not actually used in the Constitution. The Governor-General acts as her representative, exercises the powers associated with the position, and is often accorded the type of recognition given a head of state, especially in the diplomatic context. The article covers this reasonably well; some of the finer details belong in the head of state article, where they are adequately explained already.
2. The article used to start with the sentence: "Australia is a constitutional monarchy, a federation and a parliamentary democracy." These are all basic characteristics that should be introduced at the beginning of the article. Why it was considered necessary to remove this sentence, I'm not sure, since I haven't seen anything to indicate that any of these assertions are seriously disputed.

   None of them were. However, it was also added that Australia is a republic! - Ta bu shi da yu 05:59, 9 Mar 2005 (UTC)

3. The notion that Australia is also, or effectively, a republic, might be mentioned at the end of the "Structure of the government" section, where the material on the republican movement currently is. An easy way to do this would be to quote Howard's "a crowned republic" line. To go beyond this would be lending excessive credence to the argument.

Using this as a general outline, I would like the article to be unprotected, and I think we can hammer out exactly how we want to express these points by collaborative editing in the usual fashion. It should be simple enough to revert edits that contradict the consensus view. --Michael Snow 04:53, 9 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I agree with that course of action. The sentence "Australia is a constitutional monarchy, a federation and a parliamentary democracy" was only disrupted by Skyring's egotistical insistence on inserting his own pet theories in the opening paragraph. It should be restored. Adam 04:58, 9 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I agree with Adam that this is an excellent solution. Go for it. - Ta bu shi da yu 05:59, 9 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Adam, please. We would all get on a lot better if you weren't quite so prickly. You removed the sentence IIRC, and I have no objection to its reinstatement in its original form. We had actually come to an agreement over this, if you look back. John Howard's 1997 quote on "a crowned republic" should be included. I think it was Bagehot who originally coined the phrase, but I must admit that I find it hard to swallow its application to the 18th Century United Kingdom. However, it is an apt description of Australia with our combination of republican form of government and the symbolic but powerless monarch.

My difficulty lies in the description of the Queen as head of state. Adam says it is convention, but the only convention he quotes in the article is that expressed by Howard to the opposite effect, and I quote: "As a matter of undisputed constitutional convention, the Governor-General has become Australia’s effective head of state."

I have quoted the views of several constitutional authorities, and the opinion that either the Queen or the Governor-General is the one and only head of state is a minority position, with most informed commentators inclining to the "two heads of state" view, using various words such as "defacto", "ceremonial", "effective" and so on to prefix the phrase "head of state". Clearly there is no consensus of opinion, and the conflict rages in genteel fashion in magazines such as Quadrant.

I also take expetion to the description of the Governor-General as merely the Queen's representative. The degree to which he represents the Queen and her government has been declining since Federation. Unlike other dominions such as New Zealand and Canada, the Governor-General does not draw any but the most trivial powers from the Queen - he is given his powers directly in the Constitution by we the people, and this is the single most republican aspect of our affairs. Quick and Garran pointed this out at Federation in their massive work of constitutional commentary.

I have no problem with the Governor-General of Australia article which covers much the same ground. Skyring 06:39, 9 Mar 2005 (UTC)

We have heard your views on these topics ad nauseam. We have decided that we don't agree with you. We are now proceeding to edit the article in accordance with the majority view. That is the way things work here. If you don't like it, feel free to leave. Is that clear enough for you? Adam 06:48, 9 Mar 2005 (UTC)