A new opinion poll, in anticipation of Australia Day, has been undertaken by Galaxy Research for News Ltd,according to a report by Jessica Marzelek on 23 January 2013 in the Herald Sun.
This reveals that even fewer people would vote for a republic if the 1999 referendumwere put to them now, with only 33 per cent answering yes.
The report says this compares with 45 per cent who answered yes 13 years ago.
Most of the polls at the time indicated higher support for a republic than the actual vote. This is not a criticism of the polls; it is most likely because people considered that voting in a referendum about changing the basic law of their country was a matter of the utmost seriousness.
The other factor, specific to the republican referendum, was the major propaganda campaign conducted in and by the media and by most of the politicians which belittled anyone supporting the existing Constitution.
The theme of this campaign was that it was up-to-date and modern to be voting Yes, and only old-fashioned, irrelevant dinosaurs would be voting No. Clearly both the media and the politicians were completely out of touch with the Australian people who registered a landslide vote against what was clearly described in the Vote No campaign as a politicians’ republic.
His view is refreshingly different from that of a former Foreign Secretary David Miliband referred to in the ACM column of 22 July 2009,“British politicians question relevance of Commonwealth” . It was not surprising that this former Foreign Secretary who could not see the value of the Commonwealth also closed the Foreign Office library
containing the records of 500 years of Britain’s overseas entanglements, including the original copies of all the relevant treaties, which are part of our shared heritage . This institution was described by Gladstone’s foreign secretary, Lord Granville, as’“the pivot on which the whole machinery of the Office turned’.( See this column, 22 September 2011, “Barbaric near criminal vandalism at the Foreign Office.”
...trade advantages...
“Research conducted by the Royal Commonwealth Society found that when two trading partners were members, their trade was likely to be a third to a half more than when one or both trade partners was non-Commonwealth. There is clearly the potential to build on this in 2013 and beyond.
“Nearly a third of the world, over two billion people, is made up of Commonwealth citizens. From India, one of the most populous countries, to Nauru, one of the smallest, the Commonwealth family spans every continent and hosts more than 200,000 listed companies. Collectively they have real clout.
“The UK is connected to all of these nations through historical ties but also through our Queen, a strong advocate of the Commonwealth, who in 2012 marked her 60th year as its head. The Royal family unifies the institution, a fact that was most recently shown in the unanimous agreement of Commonwealth realms to amend the Act of Succession. Now the first child of the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge will succeed to the throne regardless of gender. This is, I think, a symbol of a modernising institution that can move with the times.
Prince Harry says he was thrilled to hear Prince William and the Duchess of Cambridge are expecting a baby. . Report by Katie Lambornfrom ITN News London, 21 January 2013.
One of the most popular features of The Spectator is High Life by Taki (Taki Theodoracopulos). His views on the situation in Greece are usually blunt, but probably more informative and authoritative -and certainly more entertaining- than the usual bland reports from the European Union media.
..Prince Nicholas Romanoff...
Writing from his home in the fashionable Swiss resort, Gstaad, he begins his column of 19 January, 2013,with this provocation:
“The sub-primate level of conversation, as prevalent as the snow up here in the Alps, took a turn for the better last week while a select few celebrated Prince Nicolas Romanoff’s 90th birthday.
"Yes, most people who live up here are illiterate, but they sure know how to count, some even up to ten billion. None of the counters was present at the birthday, however, given at the yacht club by Dino Goulandris for the head of the tragic Romanoff house, just many old friends who included some of Europe’s oldest and most royal families.”
“No camel drivers, thank you very much, no Russian oligarchs, just Former People, as Douglas Smith named his heartbreaking book on the final days of the Russian aristocracy.”
What's wrong with the youth these days, asked Alecia Simmonds in an opinion piece in The Sydney Morning Herald, 19 January 2013. “Why are they so nauseatingly conservative?”
If opposing the shredding of our flag or the gutting of our Constitution is being conservative, the young people of Australia have long demonstrated that they are more likely to oppose change than, say, the middle-aged, especially those in the inner city electorates in the Melbourne/ Sydney/ Canberra triangle.
It is a pity some prominent republicans - including politicians - assume that they have the youth vote in the bag, They don't - and if they did some research before speaking they would save being embarassed.
[ Note: For Essential and Galaxy,there are no lines - see post 12 December 2012 ]
The Duchess is believed to be around 13 to 14 weeks pregnant and confirmation of the birth month means it's likely she has now had her 12-week scan and the pregnancy is progressing well. This is a video from the Press Association
HM Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother's ceremonial procession from St. James's Palace to Westminster Hall on 5 April 2002 for the 3 day Lying-in-State before the funeral.
The commentators are the Anlgo- Canadian Royal Historian Rafal Heydel-Mankoo, a commentator well known to visitors to this site, and John Geiger of the leading Canadian newspaper, The National Post.
