Talk:Australian head of state dispute

Official source for 'Two Heads of State'
The two heads of states is the author Hamer's opinon, not the Senate's. See discussion of this topic at here. GoodDay (talk) 08:59, 4 November 2018 (UTC)


 * It's becoming the Hydra of State.--Jack Upland (talk) 09:05, 5 November 2018 (UTC)
 * Scary. I'd been thinking of Beeblebrox, where I find:  "He was briefly the President of the Galaxy (a role that involves no power whatsoever, and merely requires the incumbent to attract attention so no one wonders who's really in charge, a role for which Zaphod was perfectly suited)." Actually straight out of Bagehot:  The English Constitution (Fontana), p 249. Wikiain (talk) 22:16, 5 November 2018 (UTC)

Updating sources
It is no longer correct to say that Government House claims the Queen as head of state."The Governor-General of Australia is the Queen’s representative. In practice, they are Australia’s Head of State and have a range of constitutional and ceremonial duties."On revisiting some of the links - or rather their current embodiments, as many of them were archived - we find that opinions are divided. some say it's the queen, some say it's the Governor-General, some are wishy-washy. Claiming in Wikivoice that there is a single unified view is unsubstantiated. And unsourced, anyway. Who is saying that? --Pete (talk) 12:04, 23 August 2021 (UTC)
 * Just make sure you're not trying to tip the article in favour of recognising the governor-general as head of state 'or' using the article as a vehicle to promote denial or doubt about the monarch being head of state. GoodDay (talk) 12:08, 23 August 2021 (UTC)
 * I suggest you read the article and check the sources. --Pete (talk) 12:10, 23 August 2021 (UTC)
 * This article should be deleted, per the reason I think it was created for. I may consider opening up a 'deletion discussion'. But, that'll be for another time. GoodDay (talk) 12:13, 23 August 2021 (UTC)
 * "In practice, ..." and "performs the role of..." are not the same as "is". - Ryk72 talk 12:16, 23 August 2021 (UTC)
 * Of course. But what the Governor-General is not saying is "Her Majesty the Queen is Australia's Head of State". In fact it is increasingly difficult to find a source that states it explicitly. Not even the Queen on her website is saying that she is the Australian Head of State. She links to the Governor-General, who isn't saying it either. This article isn't about saying it's one or the other, anyway. It's about showing that opinion is divided, which came to a head in the republic referendum, with the monarchists and the republicans holding opposing views as they sought the support of the voters. FWIW, the monarchists won that round in 1999 and we're set for another as the Queen's reign draws to an end. --Pete (talk) 12:23, 23 August 2021 (UTC)
 * Not seeing sufficient change in the sources to warrant changing the article text from The most authoritative sources published by the government of Australia have used the term "head of state" to refer to the monarch to The most authoritative sources published by the government of Australia are divided on the question. - Ryk72 talk 12:29, 23 August 2021 (UTC)
 * See discussion at this notice board, concerning the David Hurley article. It's just a ongoing 15+ years campaign to either deny or create doubt that the monarch is Australia's head of state. GoodDay (talk) 12:31, 23 August 2021 (UTC)
 * If you could limit yourself to discussing improvements to this article, that would be great. Thanks. --Pete (talk) 12:37, 23 August 2021 (UTC)
 * You're not my boss. GoodDay (talk) 12:41, 23 August 2021 (UTC)


 * BTW, wasn't this all settled at the 2016 RFC & thus this article's creation contradicts that RFC result? GoodDay (talk) 12:35, 23 August 2021 (UTC)


 * If you look at the old wording, it mentions Government House as listing the monarch as head of state. This is no longer the case. Other references are dead links and their current replacements have changed their wording. Looking at the current crop, they are divided. Perhaps we could make a list: • Queen • Governor-General • Wishy-Washy Would that work? --Pete (talk) 12:37, 23 August 2021 (UTC)
 * Also noting that the article text The most authoritative sources published by the government of Australia have used the term "head of state" to refer to the monarch is in the past tense - it's not necessarily necessary to "update the sources". - Ryk72 talk 12:51, 23 August 2021 (UTC)
 * If we go back far enough the question of the Australian Head of State becomes moot because there was no Australian nation. The debate and uncertainty continues; it is not something that happened once and then everyone forgot. The Governor-General's change of role noted on his website is a recent one, in 2019. The "creeping republicanisation" of Australia has been ongoing since the days of Whitlam, with every year a little nibble at the monarchy. Letters of Accreditation used to be addrerssed to the Queen, then to the Governor-General representing the Queen, and now to the Governor-General in his own right.


 * It is rare that the public has any knowledge of changes, still less that they have any formal input, such as a referendum or indicative poll, such as when we changed the national anthem from "God Save the Queen" to "Advance Australia Fair". I would prefer that the processes be overt and transparent, with the direct support of the people, but in a representative democracy it is the province of the government to make such changes as they see fit, and Wikipedia notes them as they occur, so long as we have sources. If the sources change, then so too does the encyclopaedia; we cannot dictate what we consider to be an ideal world and have governments go out and make the necessary adjustments until we are satisfied, surely? --Pete (talk) 15:42, 23 August 2021 (UTC)

BRD is fine but "longstanding consensus text" that relies on sources that are mostly dead links and whose current replacements present a different view needs updating rather than retaining, wouldn't you say? --Pete (talk) 12:41, 23 August 2021 (UTC)
 * Side note - Wish you'd bring your republican passions over to Rideau Hall & Citadelle of Quebec, concerning who their official residence are. But, that's another topic. GoodDay (talk) 12:44, 23 August 2021 (UTC)
 * Pish. I have no strong feelings either way, nor any desire to insert myself into the political debates of a foreign country. My passion, if I have one, is to finding truth, beauty, and happiness, more of a task in these troubled times of plague and disaster than previously. --Pete (talk) 15:47, 23 August 2021 (UTC)
 * Too bad. You and Mies could've put on one heck of a long fight there. GoodDay (talk) 15:48, 23 August 2021 (UTC)

Ugh. The "official sources" section is a mess. We list a bunch of government offices that supposedly list the Queen as head of state, but in practice very few if any make that exact and unvarnished claim. A few do, but many divide the role, or list the Governor-General as a "de-facto" or "formal" head of state. It isn't enough to make the confected argument that the Governor-General represents the Queen and that makes the Queen the head of state. The representation of the Queen is not in doubt but it does not follow and is not stated in any official source that I can find that this automatically makes her head of state. Likewise, official sources stating that the Governor-General is the head of state are equally rare. Claiming that anything "in the middle" is an automatic goal for one side or the other is dubious. If a source claims that the Governor-General is the ceremonial head of state or some otherwise qualified description is not definitive.

Many of the sources are old and archived. The government.gov.au one would be great to have, but this seems to have hanished in favour of wall-to-wall Covid coverage and the unvarnished claim that the Queen is the head of state is now found under the Parliamentary Education Office brand. Some departments seem to have mixed feelings about the matter. DFAT, for example makes a solid claim that the Queen is the head of state, but also notes in the protocol section that Letters of Credence are to be addressed directly to the Governor-General, and not the the Governor-General representing the Queen, or before that the Queen herself as used to be the case. A Letter of Credence is a head of state level communication confirming to the head of state of the receiving nation that the head of mission has the authority to act on behalf of the head of state of the issuing nation.

I propose to tidy up the official sources section by listing those sources directly showing the Queen or Governor-General as head of state, along with those qualified in some manner. If abnybody wishes to wade through the morass of government websites and documents in search of sources, that would be great. --Pete (talk) 06:27, 24 August 2021 (UTC)

I have a doubt.
I count myself as a moderately politically aware Australian. When I first saw the title of this article, my thought was "Huh? What dispute?" Never heard of it. Then I found that it is written in the present tense. Is there an ongoing dispute? It would be news to me.

Nothing in this article suggests to me that there is a community level discussion, debate, argument or difference of opinion nor community-level awareness of such a dispute. The article has several references trotted out to suggest which side is correct, but they are entirely begging the question. The article fails to identify the parties in the alleged "dispute", neither does it describe any famous or vaguely notable instances of the dispute breaking out amongst factions in the wider public, other than mentioning the 1999 republic referendum. Is the dispute confined to academia? Political tea parties in Canberra? Sore losers at pub trivia nights?

This article seems to me to be a straw man, an attempt to say that a thing exists because there is a WP article about it.

NB: I will not be engaging in any discussion about who is the head of state. That is not the subject of this article, nor this topic under that article. Dinkenfunkle 11:43, 8 June 2023 (UTC)
 * I have removed the word "ongoing" as unsourced and unnecessary. StAnselm (talk) 16:37, 8 June 2023 (UTC)


 * I think this article shouldn't exist, but due to the sources amassed it would be hard to delete it.--Jack Upland (talk) 01:13, 9 June 2023 (UTC)


 * The very fact that you say won't be engaging in any discussion about who is the head of state, says that such a discussion would be possible. There is no (rational) discussion possible about who is the President of the USA, or how many wives Henry VIII had, or who painted the Sistine Chapel ceiling. Yet vast amounts of material have been devoted to arguing both sides of the Australian head of state dispute, each camp equally convinced of the rightness of their position. --  Jack of Oz   [pleasantries]  02:12, 9 June 2023 (UTC)


 * Thanks, StAnselm, but that edit to remove one word doesn't quite address the non-existence of the subject matter.
 * Jack Upland- There is quite a lot of refs, isn't there. And almost none of them discuss or support the existence of the alleged "dispute".
 * Now, Jack of Oz I'm confident that you could conceive of a situation where somebody, perhaps me, might have a sensible conversation about who is the Australian HoS ... say, with a high-school student in Africa, or a rice farmer in Laos. But, to my refusal, with a WP editor trying to defend why this red-herring of an article exists at all, agreed, not so much
 * So ... still hoping for a justification of why this article exists, and therefore why I shouldn't cull the irrelevancies and then initiate an AfD or similar. Dinkenfunkle 11:05, 9 June 2023 (UTC)
 * I also added a reference from an academic book summarizing the dispute and establishing that it exists (or used to exist). StAnselm (talk) 12:15, 9 June 2023 (UTC)


 * The article Republicanism in Australia seems a little confused about who Australia's head of state is. Some parts of it are written as if it's definitely the monarch. Others seem to hint at it being the Governor-General. And yet others talk a lot about the role, but avoid the issue as to which position it currently is. This is not an deal state of affairs.
 * A common sequence of statements in debates about a republic for Australia involves a republican declaring that Australia needs its head of state to be an Australian, followed by a royalist saying that the head of state already IS an Australian, because the Governor-General is an Australian. (Although that's only a modern day convention, not a rule. A crazy, royalist PM could still theoretically and quite legally choose Prince Andrew, for example, as G-G.)
 * So, while there may not be a current, vigorous dispute about who the head of state is, there IS confusion, and doubt. Maybe a name change for this article would be appropriate, to something like Who the bloody hell IS Australia's head of state?. That's obviously tongue in cheek. Helpful suggestions are welcomed. HiLo48 (talk) 23:51, 9 June 2023 (UTC)


 * Thanks for the ref StAnselm. Unfortunately Google Books wont show me pg209 in the preview, so I'll have to wait until I can get to a suitable library. Perhaps ad interim you could advise which it supports, 'exists' or 'used to exist'.
 * (User talk:HiLo48) You've touched on some salient points. There seems to be some differences of opinion on the definition of HoS. In the article and its refs we also canvass 'effective' HoS, HoS 'for practical purposes', u.s.w. And indeed the "GG is HoS so we don't need to have a referendum" is a time-tested response. That there might exist a deal of confusion, real or confected, about the issue does not ipso facto warrant a WP article. There are a great many issues in life that are not settled, without the not-being-settled-ness having dedicated articles in WP. (I look forward to the WP article: "Existence of God Dispute") Dinkenfunkle 04:25, 10 June 2023 (UTC)
 * You can launch an AfD. I would support it, but I don't think it's likely to succeed.--Jack Upland (talk) 03:19, 10 June 2023 (UTC)
 * It may come to that, but I'm still at the 'let's talk about this' stage of thinking so far. And I agree an AfD would be unlikely to get up, if for no better reason than somebody/ies has wasted invested a deal of time of effort into it. Still weighing that up. Dinkenfunkle 04:33, 10 June 2023 (UTC)
 * The book says in part, "Nonetheless, there has been controversy in Australia and Canada about whether the Governor-General is the head of state. In Australia, one monarchist group argued at the time of the 1999 republic referendum that the Governor-General was the 'head of state' in order to rebut the republican argument that an Australian should be head of state. ... She is also regarded as Australia's head of state by the British Government, the Australian Government, the United Nations, and most legal and constitutional experts, even though some of her most fervent supporters, for political reasons, still profess that she is not." The last bit is in the present tense, and cites Smith and Flint. It was written in 2018 (before Smith's death) but Flint is still alive. StAnselm (talk) 13:54, 12 June 2023 (UTC)
 * Bear in mind we had a RfC which found the then queen was the head of state:--Jack Upland (talk) 01:44, 13 June 2023 (UTC)
 * I conclude in the light of the above, that no significant, notable "head of state dispute" in Australia exists or has ever done so. There have been discussions, certainly, and people have pretended that there is an important point to be made, largely in furtherance of some political agenda. But a dispute worthy of a Wikipedia article? Yeah, nah. Out. Dinkenfunkle 07:52, 31 July 2023 (UTC)

Various opinions needs some cleanup
The "Various opinions" section is broken out into sections for "Official", "Scholarly" & "Political" sources. There are a few pieces which aren't necessarily aligned to the section that they are in. e.g. David Hamer's work was originally published by the Centre for Research in Public Sector Management at the University of Canberra, but is included under "Official sources", not "Scholarly". Will do some shuffling.

There are also some inclusions which, while describing someone as "head of state" (either the monarch or the GG), do not do so in the context of a debate or argument; nor in the context of answering the question "who is Australia's head of state?". The compilation of these, from sources which do not document a debate, disagreement or argument, along with the implication that they were engaging in debate on the question, appears to interact poorly with WP:SYNTH. Thoughts? Rotary Engine talk 05:59, 14 June 2023 (UTC)
 * Yes, I agree it's SYNTH.--Jack Upland (talk) 06:25, 14 June 2023 (UTC)
 * I think the court cases & tribunal decisions should go. They're all referencing only primary sources. And it's not a justiciable question. It would be preferable to have a summary statement referencing a secondary source; assuming one can be found. Rotary Engine talk 06:49, 14 June 2023 (UTC)
 * Similarly, the article text The issue has been occasionally raised in the High Court of Australia but never directly ruled on by that court. seems dubious. Certainly some judgements have used the term "head of state", but that doesn't imply that the question "Who is Australia's head of state?" was considered by the courts. Rotary Engine talk 07:09, 14 June 2023 (UTC)