Governor general John Kerr canvassed Queen and her personal secretary about his powers to dismiss Gough Whitlam but did not forewarn them
Comment:
This post highlights the inevitability of a constitutional monarch’s interventions in politics, even by omission, and even when appearing impartial.
In mid-2020, after an extensive legal battle, and against the Crown’s desires, the Australian National Archives were authorised to release the 1975 exchanges between the then Queen’s representative in Australia, and Palace officials, relating to events surrounding the Crown’s dismissal of an elected Labor Prime Minister with a lower house majority.
Not all the exchanges are detailed here: for instance, as this blogger understands it, the then Prince Charles discussed a looming constitutional crisis in Australia with the Queen’s representative at the 1975 celebrations surrounding Papua-New Guinea’s independence.
In any event, the letters show that the Queen was able to argue plausible deniability on any particular issue by having her staff answer all correspondence even as they offered support to the governor-general.
Extract 1:
[T]he palace letters show that Kerr wrote to the Queen’s private secretary, Martin Charteris, raising an intention to intervene and his power to sack Whitlam and dissolve parliament.
On 4 November 1975, a week out from the dismissal, Charteris told Kerr that he was “playing the vice-regal hand with skill and wisdom”.
“Your interest in the situation has been demonstrated and so has your impartiality,” Charteris wrote.
He said the fact that Kerr had the powers to dissolve parliament “is recognised but it is also clear that you will only use them in the last resort and then only for Constitutional – and not for political – reasons”.
Extract 2:
The release of the palace letters is likely to spark renewed debate about the role of the monarchy in an independent Australia. The secrecy alone has been seized upon by the Australian Republic Movement as evidence of the “absurdity” of having a foreign monarch interfere in an independent democracy.
