Talk:Gough Whitlam/Archive 2

Bjelke-Petersen, Colston and Field
I have removed the "vow to bring down Whitlam" comments which were heavily slanted. Bjelke-Petersen wasn't part of Fraser's plans to block Supply, even though he was happy to see Whitlam humiliated (see the Gair Affair, which somehow doesn't get a mention in this article). The ALP's nomination for the casual Senate vacancy was Mal Colston. Bjelke-Petersen rejected Colston, noting that he was suspected of having deliberately burnt down the school at which he was a teacher. He asked for a list of three names from which to choose - for which there was a precedent, Sir Frank Nicklin having done this ten years earlier. The State ALP, hardly a model of organisation or clear thinking during those days, insisted on Colston, and Joh cast around for a Labor Party member willing to be appointed without Party approval. He found Albert Field, who was duly appointed, ejected from the ALP and found himself the target of Labor hatred in Canberra as a "rat". He took his seat for a day or so before taking leave and was therefore a vote that was not available to Whitlam (or Fraser, for that matter). Skyring 16:01, 3 Jan 2005 (UTC)


 * Replying to myself here. On researching this I cannot find any actual statement that he was ejected or resigned from the ALP. It is implied but not stated. Certainly the fact that he was an ALP Senate candidate in December 1975 is strong evidence that he remained in the party. It seems absurd that he would be booted out and then invited back in to stand for the Senate a short time later, so a reasonable assumption is that he stayed within the party. Presumably the ALP nominated him as a candidate in order to secure whatever votes could be gained and therefore deny those same votes to Coalition candidates. Skyring 16:01, 3 Jan 2005 (UTC)

At the 1975 election, Colston was placed by the ALP in a poor position on the Senate ballot, but was elected second, attracting support from conservative Queensland voters who disapproved of Joh's actions. The ALP also placed Albert Field on the same ticket in the unwinnable twelfth position. Fraser's later amendment of the Constitution to ensure casual vacancies were filled by the same party which had held the original seat was also heavily supported by the voters. Hugh Lunn's book "Joh", (UofQ 1978, pp215-229) is my reference for this, but the facts of the matter are readily available in most of the political histories of that time. Skyring 17:38, 2 Jan 2005 (UTC)

I have reverted Skyring's edit. I agree the paragraph in question could be better expressed, but Skyring's blatantly partisan edit is not the way to do it. His comments above are mostly irrelevent to the point at issue, but do serve to show his biases. A few points:


 * My bias is clear and that is towards substantiated fact. May I suggest to Adam (and indeed to any editor) that if something cannot be checked, it should not be included without a statement noting that it is an opinion. Skyring 08:03, 3 Jan 2005 (UTC)


 * I agree that the Gair affair ought to be mentioned.


 * The omission is glaring. It is the main reason why the normal half-Senate election of 1974 was turned into a double dissolution election. Skyring 08:03, 3 Jan 2005 (UTC)


 * Bjelke-Petersen did repeatedly vow to bring down the Whitlam government, and openly said that the Field appointment was a means to that end.


 * Please provide a source for this statement. I have looked in various sources and found nothing to this effect excepting Bjelke-Petersen's industrious and effective campaigning against Whitlam during Federal elections. Skyring 08:03, 3 Jan 2005 (UTC)


 * Bjelke-Petersen's "concerns over Colston's integrity" (a claim I don't recall from the time, but I will take Skyring's word for it) were a flimsy pretext for his actions. He would have blocked the nomination of any Labor candidate.


 * This is simply not true. The concerns over Colston's integrity in the matter of the school arson were raised by David Byrne in State Parliament on 27 August 1975 and expanded by Joh on 2 September: "The allegations of arson are common knowledge and Dr Colston would certainly have had to face up to them at some time or other if he had gone to Canberra. There are those in his own party who have voiced such accusations." (Hugh Lunn, "Joh: The Life and Political Adventures of Joh Bjelke-Petersen", University of Queensland Press, 1978 pp218-220.)


 * Joh asked for three nominations from the ALP and announced that State parliament would choose one. Lunn speculates that this was because Colston had proven effective in previous Senate campaigns, issuing press releases attacking the State government. It would also have caused internal fighting within the State ALP. As Lunn notes, "A smart move would have been to put up two communists and Colston."


 * In his book "November 1975", Paul Kelly notes on p108 the request for three nominations and goes into some detail as to how refusing to do so was a disastrous miscalculation for both State and Federal ALP. He also quotes Alan Reid. Neither Lunn, Reid nor Kelly suggest that Joh would not have made a choice from a list of three nominations. Skyring 08:03, 3 Jan 2005 (UTC)


 * Under the convention which had become established since 1949, Bjelke-Petersen was obliged to appoint the ALP nominee whether he liked him or not - a point which Fraser retrospectively admitted with his 1977 constitutional amendment. The "three choices" demand was a ruse.
 * The earlier Senate appointment Skyring refers to must be the Whiteside appointment of 1962. I have never seen any reference to a controversy about this, so I must assume that Nicklin eventually appointed the nominee Labor wanted. So far as I am aware every state government followed the abovementioned convention at every Senate appointment between 1949 and 1975.


 * The only convention cited by any authority is that a casual Senate vacancy should be filled by a member of the same party. In the 1962 case, "Sir Frank Nicklin had done a similar thing in the sixties by using coalition numbers to reject the ALP's first choice" (Lunn p216). Joh went to some pains to ensure that Field was a longstanding ALP member holding a current party membership and with a long union history behind him, he having been re-elected to the presidency of a union some months earlier. At the time of his nomination on 3 September 1975, Joh made sure that Field had his Labor membership card in his pocket and quoted the number and branch of issue in Parliament. Skyring 08:03, 3 Jan 2005 (UTC)


 * Again, replying to myself. It seems reasonable that if there was a convention applicable to the appointment of Senate casual vacancies it would be noted prior to 1975. Any discussion after this would necessarily be tainted by what occurred in that year. On looking into L J Crisp ("Parliamentary Government of Australia", Longmans Adelaide 1962, p187,188) he makes no mention of any convention, stating that the replacement Senator may be a member of neither the original party nor of the State Government, citing a case occurring in 1917 where Ready (Labour) was replaced by Earle (anti-Labour).


 * There is no doubt that NSW Premier Tom Lewis breached an existing convention when he appointed an Independent, Cleaver Bunton, to replace Labor's Lionel Murphy. The Senate passed a resolution urging Lewis to observe the convention that a casual Senate vacancy be filled by a member of the same party. This was passed unanimously, an indication of the strength of this accepted convention. It would be enlightening to see the precise wording of that resolution. In his excellent book "Acts of Parliament", Gavin Souter (p529) does not say that the resolution mentioned a convention whereby the nominee of a party need be appointed, merely that the appointment should be a member of that party. Odgers is of some help, although it refers to the post 1977 sitution, noting that a State Parliament is not obligated under the Constitution to accept a party nomination. One might reasonably assume that the 1977 constitutional amendment reflected the existing convention, and using the post 1977 s15 Patrick Field's selection and appointment was entirely in order. However I make the point that in the unlikely event of a recurrence the ALP (or any other party) would presumably take steps to cancel the party membership of any appointed replacement not nominated by the party before he or she could sit in the Senate. Skyring 20:18, 3 Jan 2005 (UTC)


 * The state of the Qld ALP in 1975 is irrelevant.


 * This is not the case according to Lunn, Reid and Kelly, who criticise the ALP strongly for their actions in this matter, and all of whom make the point that if the ALP had been thinking they could have had one of their own nominations accepted. Skyring 08:03, 3 Jan 2005 (UTC)


 * Field was an ALP member, but he said openly when the appointment was announced that he was a Bjleke-Petersen supporter and would vote against the Whitlam government. Labor did not need to expel him, he automatically ceased to be a member when he accepted nomination against an endorsed ALP candidate.


 * Please provide a source for this statement, especially in light of the fact that the ALP itself nominated Field as a Senate candidate in the December 1975 election. Skyring 08:03, 3 Jan 2005 (UTC)


 * He was indeed a "rat," but the article doesn't say that, so Skyring's indignation is beside the point.


 * I am hardly indignant on this point. It is a matter of fact that Field (and ironically, Colston many years later) was treated and described as a "rat". Understandably so. Skyring 08:03, 3 Jan 2005 (UTC)


 * My memory is that Field was absent from the Senate because his appointment was being challenged in court (I am in Malaysia at present so I can't check my references). In any case the point is that it was the loss of Milliner's vote that enabled Fraser to block supply. Field's appointment thus crucially benefitted Fraser, as it was designed to do.


 * Please provide a source for that "designed to do" statement. The assumption that Joh played a deliberate part in Fraser's later plan is pure speculation. It is far more accurate to say that Fraser took advantage of Joh's action. Field applied for leave because in the case that his election was deemed invalid he would have been liable to pay $200 for each day he sat in Parliament. There was no question of the legality of Joh's actions, it was the possibility that Field had not resigned from public service before being appointed, and had thereby been holding "an office of profit under the Crown". Skyring 08:03, 3 Jan 2005 (UTC)


 * Colston's position on the ALP Senate ticket is irrelevant, but for the record he was in fourth place behind the three sitting Senators. In a double dissolution election for ten Senators, this guaranteed his election, so it cannot be described as a "poor" position.


 * If you can make this statement with any confidence, you will also know that Field was an ALP candidate on that very same ticket. Skyring 08:03, 3 Jan 2005 (UTC)

As a general comment I agree that this article is overly favourable to Whitlam, and if Skyring looks at the edit history he will see that I have said so before and edited accordingly. But I will revert his edits if he tries to skew the article in the opposite direction. Adam 02:50, 3 Jan 2005 (UTC)


 * I have reverted the article to remove bias and rely on checkable facts. Please don't revert it to the earlier incorrect version without allowing others to comment and yourself to supply the sources for which I have asked. You are, of course, welcome to edit the article and we will see if you can come up with something objective and factual. Skyring 08:03, 3 Jan 2005 (UTC)

I reverted because Skyring didn't leave in the mention of the Labor view of what happened which is equally POV. I have protected the article so you two can work out a consensus on how to proceed and this is my last involvement in this PMA 08:45, 3 Jan 2005 (UTC)


 * Paul, I removed "the Labor view" precisely because it is biased and unsubstantiated. The facts are as I state, backed up by reputable sources. Lunn and Kelly are beyond reproach for fair and even-handed journalism and if anything Reid is anti-Liberal. It is not a matter of a partisan POV, it is a matter of checkable facts. Adam's opinions above are mostly flat out untrue or wishful thinking, a matter of ALP mythology, much like the myth that Whitlam brought the troops home from Vietnam that you yourself tried to promote in an article, repeatedly corrected by me.


 * In any case, it is not a matter of Adam and I disagreeing, as you seem to think. This is something that can and should be discussed by many people. As the note below each edit box states, editors should cite their sources. I have done so, but as Adam himself states, he is unable to back up his statements at the moment. This is certainly not the position of other editors, who have access to extensive libraries of relevant political and historical commentary.


 * You have stated on my Talk page that "I only use my admin powers when requested". May I ask who requested you to use your admin powers in this instance? It looks to me that you are acting like a sockpuppet for AdamCarr by reverting the article, and becoming involved as an admin in an edit debate. I ask you to stop abusing your admin powers, to unprotect the article, and to revert to my last edit so that the normal Wiki processes can take place as intended through interested community discussion. Skyring 10:27, 3 Jan 2005 (UTC)
 * The reason it is protected is to facilitate discussion about the article without there having to be a futher edit war between you and Adam. This is normal wiki process on cotroversial issues and articles where an edit war has been raging or an admin has been asked to intervene. To imply that i am Adam's "sock puppet" is both misleading and insulting - i have never met Adam and i am no one's sockpuppet. The debate on a controversial article takes place on its talk page and when consensus is reached the article is unprotected. Although since you think i have erred i will do as you request PMA 12:07, 3 Jan 2005 (UTC)


 * Please do so. As it stands you have only unprotected the article. I did not say that you were Adam's sockpuppet and I welcome the opportunity to reject that interpretation entirely. I said it looked to me that you were acting like a sockpuppet by reverting the article. You say you only intervene if requested and as you do not specify who made this request, one might reasonably assume that it was at the request of Adam Carr, who presumably does not want to fall foul of the 3RR. I trust that you can see the point I am making here? Skyring 13:08, 3 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Reply to Skyring: I am currently travelling in Asia and cannot access my references on the matters under dispute, except the point about Field's status at the 1975 election, which can be checked at my own website here. Under ALP rules in all states, any person who nominates or accepts nomination for election (or in this case appointment) against an endorsed ALP candidate automatically ceases to be an ALP member. This would have applied to Field immediately it became public that he had accepted Bjelke-Petersen's invitation to be nominated. It would then have been confirmed by the State Executive. Field was thus no longer an ALP member when he was formally nominated for the casual vacancy by the Qld Parliament.

It follows from this that Field was most definitely not an ALP candidate at the 1975 election, as the link I have given shows. (And I am amazed that Skyring, who seems to be generally well-informed despite his biases, could suggest otherwise.) He was an independent candidate. He was of course allocated a place on the ALP's how-to-vote card, as all candidates have to be under the exhaustive preferential system, but he was not an ALP member or an ALP candidate. If Hugh Lunn says otherwise he is wrong.


 * Lunn says that Field was number twelve on the ALP Senate ticket (p229) It looks like I was misled by this. As the election was for ten Senators, I see now that Field must have been number twelve on the HTV card. As for his membership of the ALP, I'd like to see a reference rather than an inference. Certainly his ALP membership was current at the time he was nominated by Parliament.

As to my biases, I must confess that I am learning more about myself every day. Despite my membership of the ARM and a long history of public statements arguing for removal of the Queen from our affairs, I learn that I am a monarchist. How fascinating. Skyring 11:04, 5 Jan 2005 (UTC)

On Colston, as I say I have no recollection of these allegations against him at the time, but I am happy to take Skyring's word that they were made. Certainly I have no desire to defend Colston - although it is curious that these allegations were not raised again either when Colston was elected in 1975 or when he ratted on the ALP in 1996. But Colston's character is irrelevant to the point, which is that under the convention which had applied since the introduction of proportional representation in the Senate in 1949, Bjelke-Petersen was obliged to appoint whomever the ALP nominated, and not any other person. Here is a list of Senate nominations, which shows that the convention was followed at every Senate appointment between 1949 and the Lewis-Bunton appointment of 1975. (Appointments in 1917 are not relevant, by the way, since at that time the Senate was elected on a winner-take-all basis.)


 * The convention is merely that Senate casual vacancies be filled by a member of the same party. A different convention applies in the USA, apparently, where State Governors may appoint members of their own party to fill a vacancy created by another. I have yet to see any pre-Field description of a convention stating that a replacement Senator must be nominated by the party. It is only after Field that the question of party nomination creeps in. Bjelke-Petersen can hardly be said to have breached convention if that convention did not yet exist. Be fair.

If convention meant so little to Joh, then why did he go to such lengths to ensure that Field was a current and respected member of the ALP at the time of his nomination? Why not simply follow the example set by Lewis and Bunton and nominate an Independent? Or even someone from his own party? The Constitution gave him the power to do so, so obviously some other force was guiding his hand. It is not as if Joh was hesitant to give offence to his political opponents. Skyring 11:04, 5 Jan 2005 (UTC)

More generally, Skyring's comments about Bjelke-Petersen are evidence of either gross bias or extreme naivety. I don't know how old Skyring is but if he is old enough to remember 1975 he will know that nobody, whatever their politics, had any doubt about Bjelke-Petersen's motives, of which he made no secret. The Field appointment was an obvious device to create a Senate which would block supply, and I don't know why Skyring even bothers denying this - nobody denied it at the time. I don't allege that Fraser was party to this device, and my memory is that it caused him some embarrassment, but equally he was quite happy to profit from the stacked Senate that resulted from Bjelke-Petersen's action.

Adam 06:49, 5 Jan 2005 (UTC)


 * Interesting to see that I am having words wedged into my mouth. A strawman attack. What denial am I supposed to have made? None that I can recall. What I said was "Bjelke-Petersen wasn't part of Fraser's plans to block Supply, even though he was happy to see Whitlam humiliated".


 * My position is that Joh was not deliberately seeking to appoint a replacement Senator who would deny or delay supply and was therefore not part of any plot, even if Fraser later made use of the Senate numbers. Again I make the point that if he had wanted to appoint a specifically anti-Labor or anti-Whitlam Senator, then he could have done so, given the precedent set by Lewis a few months earlier. Nobody suggests that Joh would have refrained from choosing a Labor nominee if Labor had provided the list of three names requested. In fact, Field approached Joh seeking appointment after Colston had been rejected, and was initially regarded with some suspicion.


 * It would be instructive to see whether there was any widespread agreement at the time, in the media or in political discourse, that Joh was deliberately engineering a Senate that could block Supply. I think it was just Joh being the "bible-bashing bastard" that Whitlam called him a short time later, the same Joh who took great delight in his role in the Gair affair.


 * This article is an obvious candidate for biased viewpoints, and looking at it I can see numerous examples where the text is heavily slanted towards Labor Party myth. It is interesting to see that in attempting to remove blatantly partisan material, I am accused of bias. The truth is that despite the lionising of Whitlam over the past thirty-odd years, we see in the release of Cabinet documents from those times that Gough was far from being the hapless and innocent victim of implacable opponents and wide conspiracies. Despite his abundant charm and abilities, on many occasions he made difficulties for himself either through incompetence, arrogance or simple bloody-mindedness. He created enemies, not just amongst the ranks of the opposing parties, but also within the ALP. Patrick Field was not the creation of the Coalition - he was an excellent exemplar of the traditional Labor supporter, made uneasy by the sort of Blue Poles-buying behaviour coming out of Whitlam's Canberra.


 * I support no bias in this article, but rather a full, objective, substantiated and even-handed approach to one of Australia's most important, influential and respected political leaders. Skyring 11:04, 5 Jan 2005 (UTC)


 * That Lunn could make such an egregious error as supposing that Field was an ALP candidate should warn Skyring that he is an unreliable source - he is a tabloid journalist not a historian.


 * The mistake is mine, not Lunn's. He used the phrase ALP Senate ticket and I assumed that he meant the official candidate list. I should have checked. Lunn was at the time the Queensland correspondent for The Australian and highly regarded by Rupert Murdoch. Skyring


 * Which is as good a definition of a tabloid journalist as one could hope to find. Adam 04:07, 7 Jan 2005 (UTC)


 * I have demonstrated that Field was not an ALP member at the time he was formally nominated to fill the casual vacancy, because he ceased to be a member the moment he accepted Bjleke-Petersen's offer. (Obviously I can't document that - the only documentary evidence will be the minutes of the Queensland ALP State Executive, although a trawl through the Courier-Mail archive would probably confirm it.) The convention was thus unambiguously breached.


 * You have proved no such thing. You have made an assumption. Colston was twice rejected by State Parliament and could hardly be said to be any sort of candidate but a defeated one.


 * Why did Bjelke-Petersen go through the charade of finding a nominal ALP member willing to be his agent? Because he was a cunning political operator, and he knew this would provide a fig-leaf for the tender consciences of some of his Liberal colleagues - as it evidently has done for Skyring.


 * Heh. I'm a Liberal now, am I? Bzzzt, wrong! Stop guessing about Joh, me, the ALP and everything else. If you can't provide a source, don't bother. As I have pointed out, there was nothing at all nominal about Field's ALP credentials, and Joh didn't hunt him out, Field made the approach. Skyring


 * Skyring says: "My position is that Joh was not deliberately seeking to appoint a replacement Senator who would deny or delay supply and was therefore not part of any plot." Well he is just plain wrong about that, and my source for that is my own clear memory of events, which is as good a source as any other.


 * Obviously not, as it conflicts with my clear memory. May I suggest that you find a source that we (and everyone else) can accept? Skyring


 * I have said that I am not alleging that Fraser was party to Bjelke's plan - Bjleke was too smart to implicate Fraser directly. This allowed Fraser to have it both ways: to deplore Bjelke-Petersen's action while profitting from the corruption of the Senate elected in 1974.


 * Are you saying that Joh didn't cook this up with Fraser, but he sent Field to Canberra to block Supply? Field was a latecomer to the scene. Joh had already indicated that Colston was unacceptable, and rejected him twice over in State Parliament. Again I point out that neither Lunn, Kelly or Reid entertain the possibility that Joh wouldn't have sent a Labor nominee if Burns had knuckled under and provided a list of three names. With the example of Tom Lewis fresh in everyone's minds, why didn't Burns or Whitlam or somebody in Labor authority work out what is now glaringly obvious - that Joh would do exactly what he promised and appoint his own Labor man, sticking by the established convention. The papers were full of speculation that Joh might do a Lewis. I don't think you can really pin this all on Joh and say it was a dastardly plot. If Joh had been given a list of three names as he requested and then ignored them, then you might have some justification. But the incredible stupidity of the ALP in not providing an alternate choice, especially after Colston was rejected by Parliament a second time, has to count for something. What was more important to the ALP at the time - getting a Labor nominee to fill a Labor vacancy, or standing on some sort of principle that had already been dismissed by Nicklin twelve years earlier? Skyring


 * Skyring says: "Nobody suggests that Joh would have refrained from choosing a Labor nominee if Labor had provided the list of three names requested." I am suggesting it for one. In fact just about everybody but Skyring knows perfectly well that that is what Bjelke would have done. But he knew the situation would not arise, because the ALP quite rightly refused to allow Bjelke in effect to choose who would and would not be an ALP Senator.


 * This is not supported by the facts. As I have noted, Nicklin asked for and received a list of three names in 1962 and he used this to reject the ALP's preferred nominee. And if you disbelieve Lunn, then both Paul Kelly and Alan Reid are of exactly the same opinion. Page 108 of Paul Kelly's excellent "November 1975" refers. Skyring


 * Skyring says: "It would be instructive to see whether there was any widespread agreement at the time, in the media or in political discourse, that Joh was deliberately engineering a Senate that could block Supply." Of course there was. Go and look at the Age files.


 * Shall do. Please indicate date and page. The National Library is just over the lake from me and I can easily check your source. Skyring


 * As I have said, I agree to a considerable extenr that this article is overly deferential to the Whitlam legend. I suggest Skyring look at it as it was before I last did a general edit. No doubt it can use more work in the same direction. But whitewashing Bjelke-Petersen, an old crook who did more to corrupt Australian politics (in every sense of the word corrupt) than any other politician in living memory, does nothing to improve this article.


 * Your partisan views are noted, but again may I suggest that we stick to facts, rather than suppositions? Skyring


 * The Blue Poles purchase has been gloriously vindicated by time, both aesthetically and financially. Adam 06:44, 6 Jan 2005 (UTC)


 * Something upon which we can agree. I visit the National Gallery on a regular basis and I always look in on Pollack's mighty painting. I have a 1000 piece jigsaw puzzle of it, as it happens. It is a great sight. http://www.bookcrossing.com/journal/2137098 describes a recent encounter of mine with the real thing. However, I think you miss the point I was making, Adam. At the time, the purchase of Blue Poles was seen as an act of lunacy by many ordinary Australians. Proof that Whitlam was wasting the hard-earned money of taxpayers. One example of incredible waste amongst many. As I said: "Patrick Field was not the creation of the Coalition - he was an excellent exemplar of the traditional Labor supporter, made uneasy by the sort of Blue Poles-buying behaviour coming out of Whitlam's Canberra." If you think I am whitewashing Joh, you are dead wrong - I am removing the whitewash applied to Gough Whitlam.


 * And again, may I request that you stop assigning views to me which I do not hold. This is a cheap, nasty and ultimately useless tactic, and every time you do it, I know for a fact that you have made yet another mistake. Stick to the facts and we will get along just fine, but if you insist on pushing unsubstantiated opinion, you may expect to be called on it. Skyring 08:54, 6 Jan 2005 (UTC)

I am operating under a disadvantage here because I am not in Australia and cannot access references. But even if I was at home I doubt I would spend the time and energy necessary to do this level of research (such as finding the Qld ALP State Executive minutes), because I remain of the view that Skyring's agenda is motivated by politics and not by a concern for factual accuracy. I frankly don't believe his denial of this, and (as I have said before) his sarcastic tone makes me further disinclined to debate matters of fact with him.


 * Heh. You should have a good read of your own comments, Adam, including what you have just said. I've altered your revisions to include the correct name of the union, but otherwise left it alone. A good job and thanks for including the Gair affair. Skyring 05:53, 7 Jan 2005 (UTC)

So I will make one further comment on the Field appointment, and then confine myself to editing the article itself in the hope of finding an acceptable text. This is after all a biographical article about Whitlam and it doesn't need to go into fine detail about the events of 1975.

As I have said I don't know and can't check what happened in 1962. But I do know the outcome: it was the appointment of Whiteside, an ALP Senator in good standing. In other words the appointment preserved the proportionality of the Senate, which was the purpose of the convention which had operated since 1949. Both the Bunton and Field appointments violated that convention because they robbed the ALP of a Senate seat. The Qld ALP may or may not have been wise to refuse Bjelke-Petersen's demand for a list of candidates, but they were quite within their rights to do so, because any political party has the right to decide who its candidate for any post will be. The stakes in 1975 were much higher than they had been in 1962, and what had possibly been acceptable then was no longer acceptable given the situation in the Senate. Once the ALP took that position, Bjelke-Petersen should have backed down and appointed Colston, because any other appointment would breakthe convention and upset the proportionality of the Senate. And of course that was manifestly what happened. Had Milliner not died, there would have been no supply crisis and no dismissal in November 1975. I maintain that this was Bjleke's intention all along, but of course I can't prove that at present. I have not used words like "dastardly plot." My recollection is that Bjelke was perfectly open about what he was doing, and this was understood by everyone at the time. Adam 04:07, 7 Jan 2005 (UTC)


 * Regardless of what you believe should have been the case, the fact is that the Constitution placed the power to appoint replacement Senators squarely in the hands of State Parliament, not the losing party. This remains the case and all that a party can do is nominate candidates until one acceptable to Parliament is found. Under the 1977 amendment, Field might not have made it all the way into the Senate, but Joh still wouldn't have accepted Colston.


 * The end result is that the 1977 amendment doesn't work as one might think on a casual reading (something that applies to much of the Constitution, it should be said). In a crisis a hostile State Parliament can refuse to appoint a replacement Senator, thereby depriving that party of a vote in the Senate. If the 1977 amendment can be said to make into law whatever convention had obtained previously, it merely has the effect that a replacement Senator must belong to the same party, not that the replacement be the preferred nominee of that party. Skyring 05:53, 7 Jan 2005 (UTC)

I'm glad that we have found an acceptable text. I won't rehash the arguments about Field, since neither of us is going to persuade the other. I agree with Skyring, however, that the 1977 amendment has if anything made the situation worse, because the Constitution now flatly contradicts itself. Section 15 still leaves the State Parliaments the right to "choose" Senators filling casual vacancies, but now purports to tell them whom they must choose. This matter nearly came to a head in 1987 when Robin Gray refused to support the ALP nominee John Devereux following Don Grimes' resignation. The matter would have finished up in the High Court had not the 1987 double dissolution intervened. Sooner or later this will happen again, and the Court will have to decide what the word "choose" means. I presume Skyring supported Gray's right to choose which ALP member he would appoint to the Senate, while I supported the Tasmanian ALP's right to select their own candidate. (I may be wrong in that presumption.) Adam 11:21, 7 Jan 2005 (UTC)


 * I think the 1977 amendment is the most awful crap, quite out of place amongst the sparse wording of the Constitution. However, in that it was approved by we the people it can be said to represent a popular desire that replacement Senators belong to the same party, which is only fair and right. As to who gets the final say if there is a difference of opinion between party organisation and State Parliament, I think that this should properly belong to a democratic assembly. As it stands, Parliament can't appoint someone the party expels, and I guess that this is a fair compromise between Party and State. Skyring 04:42, 8 Jan 2005 (UTC)

why is there no mention of the cia,s funding of the opposition parties during the whitlam years. The speculation over wheather whitlam was going to renew the pine gap lease is central to the dissolution of the whitlam government. Why are Sir John Kerr's links to the inmtelligence community not discussed. His affiliation with organisations such as the secret Direcorate of research and civil affairs. Whos job it was to counter " enemey elements during the second world war. And his subsaquent second ment to the office of strategic services during his tenure in washington. Kerr was also an enthusiastic member of the Australian Association for the for cultral freedom.. Which has been described by Authur Jonathan Kwitny in his bookItalic textThe crimes of patrioitsItalic text as an elite invitation only group. Which was exposed in congress in 1967 as an founded founded and run by the cia. Also the track recored of the ambasador of the united states at the time marshall green. Who in fact had been ambassador in indonesia  and chile  when there democratically elected governments where over throwen and military dictatorships installed. Why  has the fact that Andrew peacock  briefed the indonesian governement on what would trasnpire  in 6 weeks


 * if such points had a firm factual basis, which i dont know whether they do or not, this article would not be the appropriate place for them. they are far too off the topic of gough whitlam and in the realm of something quite different. Xtra 09:58, 9 Jan 2005 (UTC)

I have never seen any evidence that the CIA funded the opposition parties - why would they need to? Kerr's career is discussed at the relevant article. Personally I think all the stuff about Marshall Green and Pine Gap etc etc is nonsense, but the anon editor is free to put this material in an appropriate article and see what happens. Firstly he or she will need to improve their spelling. Adam 06:24, 10 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Skyring, I have not previously contributed to a discussion page but I must say that you were either not of a sensible age in 1975 or have taken the conservative arguments at face value. To say things as 'Field was on the ALP ticket' and 'Joh would have accepted one of three ALP nominations'  shows a lack of insight into what was happening. One of my favourite memories of those terrible days was when This Day Tonight took Field to his old union pub when he was campaigning as an independent in 1975. The scene of chaos that followed with Field being pelted with beer and chased out of the pub warmed the hearts of many who were distressed by the conservatives abuse of the democratic process. porturology

It was a mistake on my part to state that Field was on the ALP ticket. He was on the ALP How To Vote card in a favorable location. In the discussion above, my error was pointed out to me and I admitted it. I don't mind admitting error. However, no competent commentator disputes that Bjelke-Petersen would have accepted one of three ALP nominations. He objected to Mal Colston specifically.

Hugh Lunn mentions the televised visit of Senator Field to his local pub. It happened some time before the election and Field stayed for his usual four glasses of beer, despite being assaulted. He was assisted by several ALP supporters, who thought the attacks and abuse were rude. See pp215-229 of "Joh" by Hugh Lunn. Pete 21:33, 29 May 2005 (UTC)

Request for references
Hi, I am working to encourage implementation of the goals of the Verifiability policy. Part of that is to make sure articles cite their sources. This is particularly important for featured articles, since they are a prominent part of Wikipedia. Further reading is not the same thing as proper references. Further reading could list works about the topic that were not ever consulted by the page authors. If some of the works listed in the further reading section were used to add or check material in the article, please list them in a references section instead. The Fact and Reference Check Project has more information. Thank you, and please leave me a message when a few references have been added to the article. - Taxman 18:25, Apr 22, 2005 (UTC)

Looking at my first reference: Paul Kelly: November 1975, (Allen & Unwin 1995) p108 states "Given Bjelke-Petersen's animosity towards the Whitlam Government it is very doubtful that he would have found any of the three ALP nominees satisfactory, even if Labor had submitted a list." He also comments that despite this Labor should have submitted a list and taken the high moral ground. I have plenty of other references about the dismissal, which I will gladly search, but as you said no commentator believes Joh would have rejected the entiree list, I feel that one exception is enough. Really, this is a case where you had to be there. The passions of the time mean any commentary is going to be tainted. I am glad to admit I was a Whitlam supporter and as soon as Joh said he would not guarantee supporting the ALP candidate we assumed he had someone like Field up his sleeve. Gough's description of him as a "bible bashing bastard" summed up how we felt - there was no way this guy was gouing to follow the conventions. Porturology 30/5/5

Whack in four tildes in a row or click the "signature" button above the edit box. That'll do the trick. OK, I stand corrected on Kelly. He's about as good a commentator as we've got. Good on you! A quick cite of an objective source is all anyone should need. However, on that point, it's been thirty years, Kelly was watching politics at that time and has been ever since, and yet you say that "any commentary is going to be tainted." I don't think Kelly is tainted. Pete 00:44, 30 May 2005 (UTC)

Please add references section to this article, or it will have to be removed from Featured Articles list pending a FARC process. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus Talk 20:52, 4 Jun 2005 (UTC)

The Dismissal
The previous wording was highly POV, giving the impression that Whitlam was the victim of a Coalition plot and betrayed by the media during the campaign. While this is mostly true, it is also true that Whitlam set up the conditions for his own downfall with a string of ministerial failures and resignations. A year after winning the 1974 double dissolution election, the Bass by-election in June 1975 was a savage defeat for the ALP. That wasn't the fault of a snubbed Sir John Kerr, a traitorous media, or a Machiavellian Malcolm Fraser.

On the matter of advice, there is a clear distinction between advice given to the Governor-General in the execution of his constitutional powers, which are generally exercised only on ministerial advice (though the reserve powers remain free of the need to act on advice) and advice on other matters, such as seeking expert legal opinion on constitutional matters. Kerr notes in his autobiography that he was not provided by the government with any satisfactory advice and that he felt the need to consult in order to determine a course of action. Consulting with Barwick is seen by some as yet another spadeful in the plot to bury Whitlam, but as Paul Kelly makes clear, Kerr was more interested in covering his own bum than looking out for Whitlam, and wasn't dancing to anybody's tune but his own. Pete 11:27, 12 Jun 2005 (UTC)

CIA
There's a bit in the Christopher Boyce article that mentions the CIA and Whitlam. I'm just wondering how reliable the account is, and whether it should be incorporated here. &mdash;The preceding unsigned comment was added by 220.238.91.195 (talk &bull; contribs) 04:18, 20 September 2005 (AEST).