Professor PATRICK O'BRIEN - Mr Hayden, I support 100 per cent of the things you said but there is a question and one that confuses many people: you sort of indicated that you are a constitutional monarchist yet you have put up a model supporting what I 100 per cent support. Will you vote for your model?

CHAIRMAN - I think that is not necessarily a question.

Mr HAYDEN - Wait a minute, let me make a point. I do not belong to the constitutional monarchist group. I have never been to one of their meetings. I have never joined them. I have consistently said I stand for the status quo because I am worried about the implications of processes of change. Those worries are still there but I have no problem at all in voting for this. The dismissal procedure satisfies a worry I did have about a demagogue. But, if it is defeated, I am not going to vote for the other half-bred sorts of things that have been put forward because they are gratuitously offensive to the Australian public and what it rightly expects to happen.

CHAIRMAN - Professor Winterton, I suggest you ask a question. We are not really at the stage of debating. The last one, I am afraid, was a debate and I do not intend to allow you to make that sort of contribution on this model.

Professor WINTERTON - A question on dismissal of a president: Mr Hayden, how do you plan to overcome the problem of a Prime Minister who has been dismissed? I just wonder whether you might not simply provide that the parliament can dismiss, not require it on the motion of the Prime Minister, in case the Prime Minister is gone. Also, what do you think about the issue of convening parliament if it is not sitting and preventing its dissolution or prorogation?

Mr HAYDEN - I agree that is a deficiency. All the models, as I look at them, have deficiencies, as you have already pointed out in respect of the one presented before mine. I presume from what the chairman said earlier that whatever is chosen will go back for some sort of scrubbing up and refinement, and things like that can be taken into consideration. But it is a very important point.

Mr MOLLER - I ask one question: approximately what is the voting population of Australia? Is it between eight million and 10 million? I am trying to determine what figure would encompass one per cent of voters.

Mr HAYDEN - Mr Jones tells me 120,000. I figured 100,000 as a rough calculation.

Mr MOLLER - Speaking as someone from Tasmania, 120,000 would be over 25 per cent of the Tasmanian population, let alone the voting population. It is half the electorate so we would probably never see a Tasmanian president under this model.

CHAIRMAN - I hope the person might be known outside Tasmania.

Mr HAYDEN - Some of these special provisions and concessions are made for Tasmania. Someone might like to move an amendment: `except in the case of Tasmania, where only 0.005 per cent of the enrolled voters are required'.

CHAIRMAN - I call on Mr McGarvie to move his model. I remind each of the speakers that motions have to be moved as well as seconded at the appropriate time so that the model gets on deck.

MODEL C

Mr McGARVIE - I move:

MODEL C

President chosen by the Prime Minister and appointed or dismissed by a Constitutional Council bound to act as the Prime Minister advises

(A)Nomination

Any Australian citizen may at any time nominate any other Australian citizen to be listed for consideration by the Prime Minister when choosing a President.

(B)Appointment

The citizen chosen by the Prime Minister is to be appointed President by a Constitutional Council in accordance with the Prime Minister's advice (ie binding request) to do so. The Council can only appoint or dismiss a President on the Prime Minister's advice and on receiving that advice is bound by a convention backed by the penalty of public dismissal for breach, to do so.

The three members of the Constitutional Council, who can act by majority, are determined automatically by constitutional formula with places going first to former Governors-General or Presidents, with priority to the most recently retired, and unfilled places going, on the same basis in turn to former State Governors, Lieutenant-Governors (or equivalent), judges of the High Court or judges of the Federal Court. The membership, if it ever reaches the Lieutenant-Governors, would be most unlikely to extend beyond them, but the whole line of categories is necessary to ensure that there will always be people from permanent constitutional positions available to constitute the Council. A temporary provision is to operate for thirty years so that if there is no woman in the first two places filled, the third place will go to the woman with the highest priority among the eligible persons.

(C)Dismissal

The President will be dismissed within two weeks of the Prime Minister advising the Constitutional Council to do so.

(D)Powers

The President will have the same range of powers as the Governor-General, but, except for the reserve powers, they can only be exercised on the advice of the Federal Executive Council or a Minister. Otherwise there will be no codification of the constitutional conventions. The conventions which are now binding in practice because backed by an effective practical penalty for breach, remain equally binding because the system and its operation and practical penalties remain the same.

(E)Qualifications

The President must be an Australian citizen but otherwise no qualifications are specified.

(F)Term

As with the Governor-General now, the Constitutional Council will appoint the President at pleasure, without any defined term and legally liable to be dismissed at any time. The President, like a Governor-General, will have the political security of tenure which comes from public knowledge that the President has arranged informally with the Prime Minister to serve for a period, usually five years, and the adverse political reaction against the Prime Minister which would follow the dismissal during that period of a President the community regards as complying with the conventions and meeting expected standards. A President who did not comply with the constitutional conventions and those standards would lose public support and the political security of tenure.

In moving the adoption of model C, I make a comparison between that model and the model that I expect will be its main rival. What was called the Turnbull model but is now better described as the Turnbull camel model -

Mr TURNBULL - Never!

Mr McGARVIE - seeks to reinvent the basic unit of our system of democracy. Our ancestors a century ago were wise enough to retain the basic units developed in the states since the 1850s with their balance between governor, parliament, government and courts and joined them together in a federation with a similar unit for the Commonwealth. I repeat Bagehot's wise words:

Whatever is unnecessary in Government is pernicious. Human life makes so much complexity necessary that an artificial addition is sure to harm: you cannot tell where the needless bit of machinery will catch and clog the hundred needful wheels; but the chances are conclusive that it will impede them somewhere, so nice are they and so delicate.

The Turnbull camel model reinvents not only one of the needful wheels but a whole host of them. Invented during the long night before last, the model has had no exposure while mine has been open to scrutiny for nine months. Their model has obviously been designed in a rush to get the numbers on the floor of this Convention, not to maintain the strengths and safeguards of our democracy for future generations.

Its fundamental flaws would see it confined to the wastepaper basket in a referendum and give impetus to the weakening of the bonds of our Federation as in Canada. Nominations are to be published. Overseas tabloids will have a field day with the more ridiculous of them. It transfers to the opposition final say on the president instead of the political responsibility staying with Prime Ministers who have exercised it so well. For the Prime Minister and Leader of the Opposition to reach their deal, it will have to survive the vetoes of the party rooms and will produce relative mediocrity.

Mr Turnbull has said, `No former active politician could conceivably be our head of state under the methodology we have proposed.' That would forfeit the advantage to the nation of such experienced people as outstanding governors-general Hasluck and McKell. Parliamentary election is to occur without debate. In this media powerful community there is bound to be a public inquiry, and anyway the debate will start in the media, the Internet and elsewhere as soon as a name gets to the party rooms. Baseless allegations of disgraceful conduct will get saturation media coverage as in the case of Judge Clarence Thomas's nomination to the Supreme Court of the United States. There will be many who, like me, would never allow their name to be put forward.

Senator FAULKNER - One down, 18 million to go!

Mr McGARVIE - Different kinds of people will become president than those who have been Governor-General. The Prime Minister's right of instant dismissal demeans the president to a position less than that of any base grade clerk. The misconception of 1975 that the Governor-General would have been dismissed instantly on a phone call from the Prime Minister to Buckingham Palace becomes the reality of this model with all its sorry consequences. The lessons of history of the unique advantages of decisions by one being implemented by another, with the time for second thoughts and political sense to exert themselves, were obviously overlooked during the long Tuesday night. The Turnbull camel model is a sadly misconceived one.

Delegates, I put to you that the model I support should be put to the people in the first referendum because it alone has, in reality, the capacity to resolve the republic issue. It should not have to wait for the second referendum after the scrutiny of a failed first referendum has revealed the flaws of the Turnbull camel model. That is the road to the Canadian impasse.

Mr Turnbull himself has said that my model is a `blindingly obvious minimal development. It is a perfectly sensible model if you start from the premise of having absolutely minimal change'. That premise is the safe one for democracy. Professor Winterton has said my model is not a republic. The Republic Advisory Committee said that `all that is required to convert Australia into a republic is to remove the monarch'. Agendas other than becoming a republic have intruded. The monarchists brought in their big guns last week to criticise my model with singularly little effect. Their prime complaint is that it is only the monarchy which keeps our constitutional conventions binding. That myth comes from reading English textbooks.

Any observer of Australia knows that, with our harsh constitutional and political culture, conventions are in practice binding here only if a practical penalty for breach leaves no real option but to comply. As the system, its operation and penalties remain the same in my model, the conventions remain binding.

We must not destroy the institution of head of state, which Australia has developed in the office of Governor and Governor-General over 200 years. We should heed the words of my distinguished predecessor as Governor, Dr Davis McCaughey, in his 1987 Boyer Lectures:

`The characteristic danger of great nations, like the Romans or the English', wrote Walter Bagehot, `which have a long history of continuous creation, is that they may at last fail from not comprehending the great institutions they have created.' That applies to the languages, the literature, the art and the music of people, and of peoples, as it does of the institutions of government, of the law, of commerce and of science.

With our institutions of government we must resist the tendency we have developed towards historic buildings, which that great Governor-General, Sir Paul Hasluck, identified when he said:

We have a lust to destroy in Australia. It is not that Australians are cynical - they are just unaware of what they are doing. They really think they are engaged on work of national progress and are unconscious of being on work of national destruction. What we need to spread throughout this land is the idea that before you knock something down you take a second look at it. We need to decide whether you knock it down or whether it is valuable enough to keep.

Delegates, I put it to you that you have faith in Australians - when the position is identified and argued before them, as it has only started to be this month - seeing the dangers to democracy in the other models and the safety to democracy of the model whose adoption I now move. We must all remember that the eyes of history and posterity will be upon each one of us for the way we vote today. We must put in our forefront those of future generations, unable to vote or be represented here today, whose democracy is at issue.

Professor CRAVEN - I second the proposal. I sense the mood of the Convention is not in favour of a harangue, so I will be brief. I am proud that I am standing here putting before you the model of this Convention which is the only model that is not a model attached to a faction. It has emerged as an idea rather than as a series of numbers. I am proud that I have no idea how many votes it has in this Convention, although I understand that if I get the person who has been doing the counting for Councillor Tully we actually have 170 votes out of 152!

I do not want to come before you and pretend - and I think I may be one of the first people to do this - that our model is perfect. There are no perfect models in this Convention. Those looking for the 100 per cent model are doomed to failure. We have copped our bit of ridicule. We have had the `three wise men'. Somebody else has now got the wizards and whatever it was.

Mr WADDY - The warlocks!

Professor CRAVEN - Yes, the `wizards and warlocks'. We will no doubt get the `wimps and the wallies' - they are all coming out. We can laugh at it too, but we know that, at the end of the day, it is a misrepresentation. The Constitutional Council is not the head of state. The head of state is not going to be some sort of geriatric goanna limping from crisis to crisis. It is merely a postage box for the appointment of the head of state - and that has been a misrepresentation of that model. It is a fair thing to say that the McGarvie principle, as I called it the other day, of dismissal of the head of state by the Prime Minister moving through parliament has been pretty well adopted in most of the other models. That is an unconscious tribute.

I put it to you that all the models have problems. We are going to have to work on it. The time for compromise, regrettably, is not yet over. The direct election people have never moved from their original position. They still cannot explain how it is going to work. The bipartisan model still has problems of whether it will actually be bipartisan. No doubt they can be worked on, but the McGarvie model still has one fundamental, lucid advantage. It is a simple, achievable republic. If the people are so in favour of a republic as we are told - and as I am inclined to believe - then they will vote for that republic.

I put it to you that it is a republic, and there is a simple test of this. We are, in a sense, metaphorically cutting off the head of the Queen. Someone else did that before - Oliver Cromwell. Was not Oliver Cromwell's Commonwealth a republic? If so, this is. I think we should remember that.

Nobody here can say that their model is going to win. I think this model should win, but if it does not win, if perchance it does not commend itself to the Convention, then I will look very carefully at the model that does win. I will look very carefully to see if amendments may be moved and if compromises may be reached. If that model is the one that we cannot call the ARM model and we cannot call the Turnbull model, but we may well be able to call the model of the bench of bishops, then so be it - I will look at the model of the bench of bishops.

However, I would say one thing: we must remember the dreadful consequences of stalemate. We must remember the dreadful consequences of not coming up with a model. As I have repeated again and again to this Convention, no doubt to the point of irritation, those consequences are five more years of constitutional destabilisation and then, I believe, constitutional catastrophe. That is not something that I am likely going to be driven to agree to.

Finally, I pay a personal tribute to Mr McGarvie as a person who has made a great contribution to this Convention, who has informed its deliberations, and who has done a very great thing for this Commonwealth of ours. I second the motion.

Mr WADDY - I rise on a point of procedure. I would have hoped that in the goodwill of this Convention and the traditions which we have established in the last nine days it would be possible for a professor or anybody else to address his arguments to the intellect of ourselves and the Australian people, without making extravagant remarks about the Queen. I will not dignify it by repeating it. It is irrelevant to everything else that has been said and I ask that it not happen again.

Mr BEATTIE - I might add, Mr Chairman, that I think we could do with a little less individual attack as well. Let me raise the issue that I am seeking clarification on. Mr McGarvie, when you referred to the model, you referred to it being the Turnbull-Campbell model. It is on the Notice Paper as being the `bipartisan appointment of the president' model. I am just curious as to who Mr Campbell is.

Mr McGARVIE - Not `Campbell', `camel'.

Mr BEATTIE - I see, it is camel.

Mr McGARVIE - Campbell is innocent.

Mr BEATTIE - I see. I am obviously reading too much of that London press you talk about.

Mr WRAN - Mr McGarvie, at the working party consideration of your model, you conveyed to us the upper and lower age limit for the members of the Constitutional Council. Could you remind me of what those limits were?

Mr McGARVIE - Certainly. I will give you the reason for them.

Mr WRAN - First of all, give me the limits.

Mr McGARVIE - The lower limit is 65; the other limit is 79. I know this draws derision from some of those in the younger generation who have nothing but derision for those of retirement age, but the reason is that they must be people who have retired from a permanent constitutional position so we will not run out of them. The lower age of 65 is to cover those who have not really served as judges, who have been judges for a year or so and then have retired. They would be cut out by the early retirement age. The other limit is for obvious reasons.

Mr WRAN - My second question is, in relation to dismissal, your paper reads:

The President will be dismissed within 2 weeks of the Prime Minister advising the Constitutional Council to do so.

What if the Constitutional Council refuses to do so?

Mr McGARVIE - Mr Wran, I expected some dorothy dixers, but not from you. There will be, as you will recall from reading my papers, an express provision in the Constitution, not legally enforceable but a clear statement, that the Constitutional Council is obliged to act on the advice of the Prime Minister. There will be a provision that, if the Prime Minister chooses to advise - we must remember that the word `advice' is used in a very special way in the constitutional context - if that binding request is made in writing to appoint or dismiss, and the members of the council will be obliged to do so within two weeks or will be publicly dismissed for a clear breach of the Constitution. I am sure Mr Wran, who is a partly retired man at least, will agree with me that, when one reaches the age of retirement, to be publicly dismissed for breach of a constitutional duty is something that such people would avoid at all costs.

Professor WINTERTON - I have three questions, Mr McGarvie, if I may. The first one is you do not expressly provide for continuation of the conventions, but I presume that is a part of your model.

Mr McGARVIE - Professor Winterton, I am very glad to answer the question. I am sure that as my friend you will not mind if I describe you as the most monarchist republican I have ever met, because your notion of the conventions has also come from English textbooks, not from observation of what actually happens in Australia. Conventions apply in practice because they are backed by a practical penalty so that the person has no real option but to comply. Because the system will remain exactly the same under the model that I support, those conventions which are binding now will remain so.

Professor WINTERTON - Perhaps I can ask since they are conventions -

Mr McGARVIE - Is this another question or a second part of that first question?

Professor WINTERTON - Perhaps I could just ask my three questions if you do not mind.

DEPUTY CHAIRMAN - You have had one, so you can ask two more.

Professor WINTERTON - I can add another one. There is no rule that you are limited to three. I said three to start with but -

DEPUTY CHAIRMAN - No, but we need to move on.

Professor WINTERTON - I will be quick. One is really a supplementary question. Firstly, where is the problem in stating expressly that they should continue since the present conventions are conventions of the monarchy? Let me just finish the other two. Secondly, why no term of office? I think it would look very strange to people if the president does not have a term of office. I cannot see that it is incompatible with your model. Why not? Thirdly, how do you respond to the fatal structural flaw of your model that a president about to be dismissed can always dismiss the Prime Minister and end the whole process? How do you overcome that totally fatal flaw?

Mr McGARVIE - There is no need to make a statement that the conventions apply. That would bring the courts into the political process, and the worst thing you can do is to bring the courts into the political process. It would stultify the political process and it would do great damage to the courts. What you say about being able to dismiss each other was the misconception to which I referred in my main address. In practice, the assumption that there be immediate dismissal upon a prime ministerial phone call to Buckingham Palace is just plain wrong. The Queen has a right to counsel. The Queen has a right to seek information and to inquire. There would be a time delay. There would be time for the political process to operate, for the colleagues of the Prime Minister to bring pressure on the Prime Minister. So the position will remain exactly as it is, and that is entirely satisfactory.

Professor PATRICK O'BRIEN - A very simple and direct question, Mr McGarvie. With great respect to you and your position, do you think that the Australian people will ever be fit and proper to elect directly their own head of state? If so, when do you think that the Australian people will become fit and proper to do so? If you do not believe that the Australian people will ever be fit and proper to directly elect their head of state, why not?

Mr McGARVIE - I said the other day that the Australian people are a wise people. Being a wise people, they will be far too wise, when the implications of the direct election models are put before them, to throw out the democracy that we have inherited. That is the short and complete answer.

Mr VIZARD - Mr McGarvie, much of what you said was by way of contradistinction to what you termed the Turnbull camel model, which I think is an unfair naming. But, that being the case, I have a question on the McGarvie peacock model. The problem with peacocks is that they do not look at other things; they spend much of their time looking in the reflection of themselves.

DEPUTY CHAIRMAN - Less preamble to the question, please. We dealt with the preamble last night.

Mr VIZARD - The question is how, having regard to that, the lack of nexus with the Australian people and the fact that your model is built on the status quo, do you expect people of indigenous background, people of different gender, people from smaller states, to penetrate to the position of head of state?

Mr McGARVIE - I have had the advantage of talking to numerous citizens in three states and one territory about this. They understand the implications immediately. Unfortunately, the debate has been conducted in a way that did not introduce them to any. They have learnt more in the last month, and especially during this Convention, with the aid of the media, which deserves credit for it, than they did in the five years of the debate. They are very quick learners. They may not have written theses on political science, but history has shown they understand practical reality and they know Australians.

Dr SHEIL - Mr McGarvie, in your presentation you said you had taken high legal advice and been advised that all that was necessary to convert Australia to a republic was to remove the monarch. I put it to you that, if Mr Turnbull got on his camel, went to England and wiped out the entire royal family, it would have very little effect in Australia because the Crown is the operational instrument here, not the monarch.

Mr McGARVIE - Dr Sheil, you misheard what I said. What I said was: that is what the Republic Advisory Committee said was involved in becoming a republic. I agree with you, and I dealt with that in my response, you will remember, to Mr Tony Abbott. It does involve eliminating both the monarchy and the Crown and my model does that completely.

Professor TANNOCK - Mr McGarvie, I have two questions. The first one relates to the necessity for the Constitutional Council to accept the Prime Minister's advice - whatever that advice may be. What happens if the Prime Minister proposes, in this secret conclave, a Governor-General who is blatantly political in a partisan sense? Are they bound to accept it?

Mr McGARVIE - That is a very good question. It brings home something that is often overlooked in looking at the system that is usually referred to as the `articulated system', in which one with political power makes the decision, and others without political power implement it. In fact - and I speak with some experience, having been Governor; indeed, the experience of Amnesty International is an excellent example - when they are being looked at people tend to act more responsibly than if they are not. The council, like the Queen, would have the right to counsel the Prime Minister. If it was someone unsuitable, they could counsel.

A Prime Minister would be very reluctant to face the risk of being counselled by three people who have community respect that a particular person was inappropriate. Ultimately, if the Prime Minister insists, just as is the case with the Queen, the council would be bound to act on the advice, but the Prime Minister would have to accept political responsibility for that. Our history has shown that prime ministers have accepted and have acted with great discretion in exercising that responsibility as the elected head of the elected government.

Professor TANNOCK - I have one more question. The age range for members of this Constitutional Council is 65 to 79 and the ex-officio appointees according to their seniority, as I understand?

Mr McGARVIE - No, according to their date of retirement, most recent retirement - first priority.

Professor TANNOCK - Okay, but they remain as members of the Constitutional Council until they reach 79?

Mr McGARVIE - No. As you will remember from when you read that lot of papers I sent to you, what happens is that, except for the period during the time advice has been given and is still being acted on, it has a changing membership. No-one gets control of it because the most recently retired has priority. It is something that, in the ordinary course of events, it will only ever do anything about every five years. There are bound to be different people every five years.

Professor TANNOCK - What I am leading to is: what if they are physically unfit for office? Who determines that?

Mr McGARVIE - Again, you will remember from reading my papers that the High Court will have jurisdiction to declare beforehand that someone who would otherwise be eligible is unfit, in the ordinary way in which that can be done.

DEPUTY CHAIRMAN - At the end of the questioning, I propose that we bring on the fourth model.

Ms THOMPSON - Mr McGarvie, I have two short questions. Firstly, under `qualifications' you state that the president must be an Australian citizen, but otherwise no qualifications are specified. I assume you actually mean that the president must be an Australian citizen within the terms of section 44 of the Constitution or be entitled to vote or be aged 18 or something of that nature?

Mr McGARVIE - Anything unnecessary in government is pernicious, as I have mentioned. There is absolutely no need to do that. I want to get people here away from thinking like lawyers to thinking about the way a constitution operates. There is not a ghost of a chance of a Prime Minister recommending for appointment someone who infringes section 44. It is quite unnecessary.

Ms THOMPSON - The second question that I have is in relation to the temporary provision to allow a woman to be on your constitutional committee. Can you explain why you regard it as appropriate to have a temporary position for 30 years?

Mr McGARVIE - Yes. I was the original Chairman of the National Discrimination Commission on Employment and Occupation. In 1973, when we started doing our work, there was enormous discrimination in this country against women. There is still a good deal of discrimination, but the change has been dramatic. The community has seen that there is no justification for it. While I was governor, I went to many secondary schools and the schools that were most keen to talk about these issues and who often had the best understanding of them were the girls schools. The discussion was very often led by women. I am confident that, within 30 years, women will have caught up.

Ms THOMPSON - Mr McGarvie, some of us would argue that we would be confident that men might have caught up.

Mr McGARVIE - It is not part of my approach to treat women as second-class citizens. That is why it is temporary.

Mr BRADLEY - Mr McGarvie, as you are aware, many of the delegates here lack a willingness or a capacity to understand the distinction between a Governor-General as a constitutional head of state and the role of the Queen in the appointment of a Governor-General. How will you enable them to understand the distinction between your president and the Constitutional Council that appoints the president?

Mr McGARVIE - Mr Bradley, you are speaking about the moments before I started speaking. It has changed; they understand now.

Mr BRADLEY - That is great. I hope they understand the current system better now, too.

Ms RODGERS - Mr McGarvie, you said we should not bring the courts into the political process, but does not your proposed automatic formula quite possibly provide a Constitutional Council comprising three judges? In WA, we have had a retired judge as Governor and our Lieutenant Governor is the Chief Justice. Could this not happen under your formula?

Mr McGARVIE - They will only be retired governors and judges because it is essential not to have a conflict of interest between an existing position. You must not overlook the fact that, although some judges become governors, there will be other components. My predecessor was the head of a university college and a minister of religion. Sir Paul Hasluck, the greatest Governor-General we have had, was a journalist, a historian, a member of parliament, a minister and a Governor-General. Practically never will it go beyond retired governors-general, governors and lieutenant governors, but you must have that full line because the system cannot operate without someone to fulfil the head of state role.

The Most Reverend PETER HOLLINGWORTH - Mr McGarvie, I have listened very closely to your argument from the beginning to the end. This Convention is greatly indebted to you for everything you have done. There has been consistent misinterpretation of what you have said and I think it comes down to the critical thing that I have not heard an answer to. I suppose it is this business of ageism. Would you consider an alternative option? For example, do they have to be retired governors? Would it not strengthen the federal system, for example, if serving governors were on the Constitutional Council?

Mr McGARVIE - Thank you for that question, Archbishop. The fatal error that was made in India in the 1940s when they set up their state system without having the state governors properly, practically bound by binding conventions was that everyone assumed that those in future would be liberal, relaxed gentlemen like themselves - as the textbook writers say - and that they would comply with conventions. It is enormously important to look at the practicality of conventions being applied.

In India they made the mistake that the one who has the right to dismiss is not the state premier, not the chief minister; it is the president. That has led to fatal error - I do not need to remind delegates of what has happened at the state level in India. For governors who are serving, they have their responsibility and the penalty that is imposed on them is dismissal, but at the instance of the Premier. If you had state governors exercising a function without being bound by a practical penalty, the system would be inclined to run amiss in a country where political passions run as deep as they do in Australia. For example, in relation to a president, it would be the Prime Minister who, under my model, would have the effective decision on dismissal, but the Prime Minister could not make an effective decision about the dismissal of a state governor. As we are catering for a century or centuries ahead when conditions might change again, that would be, I regret to say, an unfortunate deficiency which would come to be regretted as much as the deficiencies in India.

DEPUTY CHAIRMAN - Thank you very much, Mr McGarvie. Before I call Mr Malcolm Turnbull, Brigadier Garland earlier this morning questioned whether a response had been received to a point of clarification that he sought from the Attorney-General. The relevant paragraph appears at the top of the second column of the Hansard report, at page 793.

I am advised by the Chief Hansard Reporter that the Hansard log records the following response from Mr Gareth Evans to the question: Yes. I have noted the Hansard log and confirm that advice. That response will be included in the final version of the official transcript. I now call Mr Malcolm Turnbull to move model D.

MODEL D

Mr TURNBULL - I move:

MODEL D

Bi-Partisan Appointment of the President Model

A.Nomination Procedure

The objective of the nomination process is to ensure that the Australian people are consulted as thoroughly as possible. This process of consultation shall involve the whole community including:

.State and Territory parliaments

.local government

.community organisations, and

.individual members of the public

all of whom should be invited to provide nominations

All nominations should be published.

Parliament shall establish a Community Constitutional Committee which shall consider and propose a short-list of candidates for consideration by the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition. The Committee shall:

.in its composition, reflect the diversity of the Australian people having regard to gender, race, age and geographical considerations;

.include representatives of peak community organisations, Commonwealth, State and Territory Parliaments.

This process for community consultation and evaluation of nominations is likely to evolve with experience and is best dealt with by ordinary legislation or parliamentary resolution.

B. Appointment or Election Procedure

Having taken into account the report of the Community Constitutional Committee, the Prime Minister shall present a single nomination for the office of President, seconded by the Leader of the Opposition, for approval by a Joint Sitting of both Houses of the Federal Parliament. A two thirds majority will be required to approve the nomination which shall be done without debate.

C. Dismissal Procedure

The President may be removed at any time by a notice in writing signed by the Prime Minister. The President is removed immediately the Prime Minister's written notice is issued. The Prime Minister's action must be presented to a meeting of the House of Representatives for the purpose of its ratification within 30 days of the date of removal of the President. In the event the House of Representatives does not ratify the Prime Minister's action, the President would not be restored to office, but would be eligible for re-appointment. The vote of the House would constitute a vote of no confidence in the Prime Minister.

D. Definition of Powers

The powers of the President shall be the same as those currently exercised by the Governor General. The non-reserve powers of the President should be codified, and the reserve powers incorporated by reference.

E. Qualifications for Office

Australian citizen, qualified to be a member of the House of Representatives (see s. 44 Constitution).

F. Term of Office

Five years.

The bipartisan appointment model, unlike the one moved previously, has not flowed from a single mind uncorrupted by the opinions of other people, and if that is a fault, then so be it. The bipartisan appointment model is genuinely the result of many ideas, many people and an effort to accommodate many different aspirations. Mr McGarvie in, I assume, a generous remark, described it as the `Turnbull camel model'. It is certainly not the Turnbull model, but I take `camel' as a compliment. Camels have great endurance, are fleet of foot and survive in the desert long after other animals have died of thirst.

I will speak briefly about some of the other models. I have a quotation, which is very pertinent, from Mr Hayden's excellent autobiography. He writes:

More to the point, a presidential system based on a national election to the office of head of state will result in more not less friction than our system of political government. It is reasonable to anticipate that this would happen more frequently in a presidential system, especially where a strong national campaign was successfully mobilised behind a charismatic presidential candidate by one party while strong local campaigns gave control of the houses of parliament to an opposing party.

These words have always been of great guidance to me - as, indeed, have of all Mr Hayden's thoughts, and I felt it important to share them with you today.

I noticed that Mr McGarvie cited as a merit of his model that it involved the decisions of one being implemented by another - that is to say, the decision of the Prime Minister would be implemented by a constitutional council. He made it very clear in his remarks today that, of course, the decision is the Prime Minister's, but it is this council of genial retired governors - like Mr McGarvie, no doubt - who will implement it. This, Mr Chairman, is a recipe for immense confusion.

Most people will think that the council actually appoints the president. If you think that is drawing a long bow, if you think that ordinary Australians will not be confused, then I would refer you to page 200 of the Hansard of these proceedings where Dame Leonie Kramer, Chancellor of the University of Sydney no less, proceeds to criticise the McGarvie model on the basis that the Constitutional Council is not necessarily qualified to appoint the head of state. Dame Leonie was mistaken, but if the chancellor of the University of Sydney is going to be confused and misled by this, how will ordinary Australians who are not so well educated and astute and who have not been following the debate so carefully react?

We republicans believe that power should be exercised and seen to be exercised by those people who have the responsibility. It is an utter nonsense to cloud the issue and confuse people and pretend that a group of wise old men, and perhaps one woman, are making the decision when in fact it is nothing more than a partisan political decision. Those who advocate prime ministerial appointment, with great respect to Mr McGarvie, and he is the only person who has put a name to a model in these proceedings - the only person - would be better emulating the practice of most countries in the world that have non-executive presidents - that is to say, presidents with similar powers to our Governor-General - and have that person chosen by parliament. Why would it not be a motion of the Prime Minister supported by a majority of the House of Representatives?

The people understand that the parliament manages the country. They understand the Prime Minister is the head of government. Why not have a transparent mechanism? Why not respect parliament? Why not uphold parliament? Why confuse and muddy the waters with this Constitutional Council? I am fully expecting that, if the bipartisan appointment model survives the exhaustive ballot today, somebody will move that instead of a two-thirds majority it be a simple majority of parliament. We do not think that is a better model than ours obviously, but at least it is transparent. At least people will understand what is going on instead of being bamboozled by this council. Anyway, that is enough of Mr McGarvie's model. I will concentrate on the merits of the bipartisan appointment model.

I would like to take delegates firstly to the nomination procedure. I would remind delegates that this is essentially a draft: all of these models are drafts. If this bipartisan appointment model survives into this afternoon, there will be every avenue open to this convention to move amendments to finetune it, to refine it, into something that the majority of the convention support. I would ask delegates in looking at it not to be overly concerned with a detail here or a detail there. The thing to focus on is the principle.

What is the principle of the nomination procedure? The principle is that the Australian people should be involved, that the Australian people should be consulted. Is it really so outrageous that people, community organisations and state and territory parliaments should be asked what their opinion is on an appropriate president? State governments and territory governments are already consulted about judicial appointments. This is a perfectly appropriate course of action in a democracy.

There has been some concern about our suggestion that nominations should be published. Mr McGarvie suggests that this is an appalling suggestion. During the work of the Republic Advisory Committee, we spoke to Sir Zelman Cowan about this very matter. Sir Zelman said that there would be no more dishonour in being nominated to be head of state and not being chosen than there is dishonour for an actor to be nominated for an Academy Award and not win it. What possible dishonour could there be in that?

If a nomination was published, if I, for example, nominated Mr Wran or Mr McGarvie, no doubt when they were contacted by the press in the midst of the hundreds of names there would be they would say with great charm, `I am very flattered that Mr Turnbull has nominated me but I will reserve my views as to whether I would be interested in this appointment until I get a call from the Prime Minister,' which is exactly what judges and barristers do today when their names are floated as being potential judicial appointments. Let's face it: this goes on now.

When Bill Deane's term comes to an end there will be speculation about his successor just as there was speculation about Mr Hayden's successor. All we are doing is formalising a process and allowing ordinary people to get involved. So we do not see any harm in nominations being published. But let me say this: if that is a big issue, it is not a die in the ditch issue for us if delegates are concerned about it. Why? Because all the leading nominations will be published in the press anyway. The only thing that this ensures is that ordinary Australians who are not necessarily of great interest to the media will get their names published.

We have proposed a Community Constitutional Committee. Let me just outline the principle behind that. The principle is that in the sifting and assessment of these nominations which must be done - plainly that has to be done - it should be done by a group of people that are not a bunch of middle-aged men from Sydney and Melbourne. What we are talking about is having a group which has women, indigenous people, geographical diversity so there are people from the smaller states - a recognition of the nature of our society. This does not have to be a body of 100. It could be a body of 10 or 12 or 15. Plainly it cannot be too big. That is the core principle.

If you think about it, what else would parliament do? Do you really imagine that in appointing a group to assess these nominations parliament would sit down and say, `Let's get seven, white middle-aged Anglo-Celtic men from Sydney and Melbourne. Of course, they would not.

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