What do Australian Republicans stand for?

Barry Everingham never disappoints you. In recent weeks I missed his republican propaganda articles, but there he was again, as I expected: On Australia Day. “Barry Everingham is a Melbourne commentator and a republican” as he was introduced with the common phrase by The Age for his usual republican opinion pieces. “That a monarch still rules us is embarrassing for a modern nation. … The time has come for Australians to look seriously at our constitutional arrangements and change them to bring us into the 21st century.” Never mind that the republican system also dates back more than 2,000 years to the Roman era, a well functioning monarchical system is as adequate for the 21st century, which began eight years ago, as it has been the centuries before.

He also repeats an opinion poll that was paid for by the Australian Labor Party (ALP) and had achieved the results that pleased the orderer: “Late last year a poll of 2000 people found 50 per cent supported making Australia a republic while 28 per cent were opposed. Eighty per cent of those polled were in favour of a head of state chosen by the people, the model that presents the most constitutional complications.” If this opinion poll were as decisive as Barry Everingham and the ALP make us believe, then why do they want to ask the same question in an unconstitutional plebiscite? Why waste the taxpayers' money, when everything is so clear as this opinion polls suggested? Why do they not want to go the right way and put a referendum to the people and have the people decide what they want as it is the proper way, the constitutional way?

However, Barry Everingham noticed: “The burning issue is not being helped by either ACM [Australians for Constitutional Monarchy] or the Australian Republican Movement (ARM); neither organisation seems geared to attracting publicity for their respective causes, which is confusing in the ARM's case given that our major news outlets are pro-republic.” Had Barry had a look at AR’s website recently, he could have noticed that there hasn’t been an update for the past three months. When I checked ARM’s website yesterday, the most recent update I could find was done in October 2008.

He was even less attentive to ACM’s website, which according to Barry Everingham “carries daily commentary by the group's ‘convenor’, Professor David Flint, which in the main revolves around British and European royalty”. To be fair, I must admit I did not make a statistics on ACM’s topics, but in my judgement “British and European royalty” take less than a third of all topics. The Australian agenda is evident for everyone who follows David Flint’s send outs regularly.

But someone like Barry Everingham, who does not seem to miss ARM’s send outs, cannot be expected to follow the regular Monarchist opinion pieces. Nobody has been more productive in handing out information on the Constitutional Monarchy in Australia than David Flint. Everybody knows, what he stands for and form an opinion of their own.

Does the same go for any republican?

After reading Barry Everingham, I have only a vague guess that he might like some republican model leaning towards the US presidential system. But he does not say it explicitly: “America's system is not perfect, but it's theirs. It is also high time to assume the dignity of being our own people with a modern constitution and an Australian head of state.”

Does this give you a clue what he wants?