In an interview with Professor David Flint, Australia's 25th Prime Minister John Howard explains his use of the term "Crowned Republic."
Mr. Howard was speaking after delivering the Neville Bonner Oration on 5 November, 2009 to mark the tenth anniversary of the day when Australians rejected the model for what opponents described as a “politicians republic".
This model had been overwhelmingly approved by republican delegates at the 1998 Constitutional Convention. The very well endowed republican referendum campaign was led by Mr. Malcolm Turnbull and the Leader of the Opposition Kim Beazley, and supported by two thirds of the politicians and most of the main stream media.
But on the first Affirmation Day, 6 November 1999, Australians voted No nationally, in every state (a referendum must be approved nationally and in a majority of states) as well as in 72% of electorates. The vote could not have been clearer.
...keep on voting...
Since then the republican movement has adopted the policy famously enunciated by a EU politician: " The people must keep on voting until they get it right."
Both before and since 1999, republican politicians have successfully diverted millions of dollars taxpayers funds from water, education, hospitals and other needs into this folly, including the removal of the symbols of the Australian Crown. At the same time they are either unable or unwilling to indicate what precisely they are proposing both as to the constitution and for a new flag.
The term " Crowned Republic" is used by Australia's leading constitutional monarchists, including Justice Michael Kirby, John Howard, the Leader of the Opposition Tony Abbott, and Justice Ken Handley, as an appropriate synonym for the Australian Federal Commonwealth under the Crown.
Malcolm Turnbull’s speech opposing his party’s policy on greenhouse emissions was “a dream Labor speech from the vanquished,” according to David Marr in The Sydney Morning Herald, (9/2). Mr Turnbull had already attempted to revive the debate about a republic, even accepting the once loathed directly elected presidency and endorsing a horrendous three part plebiscite.
“Perhaps Turnbull will never be listened to so attentively by so many ever again,” wrote Mr. Marr. When he sat down after about 30 minutes, "the life drained from his face. He was at one with his exhausted supporters. Slowly he slumped in his seat, a picture of misery.”
[ The people said No ]
“It's yet another Australian's story: so much intelligence, so much promise, so much elan twice bested by the same conservative wrecker,” declared Mr. Marr.
“What a double for Abbott to boast" he added" Securing the future of the monarchy and brown coal.”
Malcolm Turnbull had of course been leader of the republican movement in the 1999 referendum and before. Tony Abbott, his successor as Leader of the Opposition, was ACM’s first executive director, and a fighter for our crowned republic.
In question time, when Malcolm Turnbull took out his Kindle, David Marr wondered whether he was “investigating the options before him, lifetime goals for some but poor consolation prizes for the man who would be prime minister: banking, the bar or the Bahamas.”
Wentowrth can be a curiously unreal part of Australia. In her salons, mystical powers are often attributed, quite dogmatically, to Mr. Turnbull. Some said he had to be elected in 2004 to "block Mark Latham" or to "save the Howard government". And some are now saying he must stay in Parliament to "save the seat". There are those who believe he will surely rise again. To which Alan Jones said on 2GB, " once bitten twice shy."
The republicans’ leading strategist, Peter FitzSimons, has returned to his column in the Sun Herald. “Given the outrageous bashings of Indian students in this country, particularly in Melbourne,” he writes (7/2) “our rough plan before departure was to present ourselves as a holidaying Kiwi (New Zealand) family.”
We find this curious. The usual complaint by republicans is that the Australian and New Zealand flags are so similar foreigners cannot distinguish them. If you don’t want your flag mistaken for New Zealand’s, why would you disguise yourself as a New Zealander to escape being recognized as an Australian?
Does this mean this leading republican strategist is only a fair weather Australian?
Incidentally, does Mr. FitzSimons think we should substitute for our beautiful flag the one notably unveiled in that notorious exhibition supported by the republican movement? This republican flag is white and carries the peremptory instructions, “F*** off back to Fagland”. It appeared in the exhibition programme printed under the republican movement logo.
And if we must change our flag because of the New Zealand’s beautiful flag, there is more reason, Mr. FitzSimons, for a very large number of foreign countries to change theirs. They all fly some sort of tricolour, and it very difficult for a foreigner to distinguish one from the other.
But I doubt if the citizens of any of these would have to put up with the campaigning against their traditions and institutions which occurs here. An egregious example was when one of our major newspapers, The Sydney Morning Herald, celebrated Australia Day with a front page full of proposed new flags.
...master strategist...
But let us return to Mr FitzSimons’ role as the leading republican strategist. He revealed this in a major republican campaign in 2006. In his column in the Sun Herald, the Fitz Files, he had been hinting that a strategy which would secure a republic was to be revealed in a stunt timed for Australia Day, 2006. He wrote that a band of republicans had been furiously working on this for months at a secret location in Sydney's legal precinct, Phillip Street.
The result of their efforts was to declare the Sunday before Australia Day, Sunday 22 January 2006, to be..... “A Mate for Head of State Day!” Republicans were to wear yellow ribbons, which seemed a strange choice. It recalled the old song, “Tie a yellow ribbon round the old oak tree.”
The overwhelming reaction, even among republicans, was: “They aren’t serious, are they?” The campaign turned out to be an embarrassing failure.
Those who promoted it so vigorously would no doubt prefer it be forgotten.
...Indian bashings and the Attorney General ...
Mr. FitzSimons eventually abandoned his New Zealand disguise and, unsurprisingly, had an excellent time in India. But the outrageous and unacceptable assaults on Indians which encouraged him to hide behind New Zealander nationality cannot be dismissed by the (republican) authorities with say, the usual insensitive comment about the victim being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Nor can they be dismissed by their equally appalling response that there is no evidence that the assault or even murder was racist orientated.
The foreign editor of The Australian, Greg Sheridan, says that because of the assaults, Australia is enduring a catastrophe in its foreign policy and its standing in the world generally. He says that it is predominantly the fault of the Victorian Premier, John Brumby.
“Through the widely publicised assaults, murders and arson attacks on Indians and Indian houses of worship, Melbourne has become the racist-violence capital of Australia,” he writes (6/2).
...negative publicity...
He says the “indolent denial,” and the incompetent lack of response from his government and police force, have contributed hugely to a vast anti-Australian backlash in India, throughout Asia and more broadly internationally. He points out the BBC, CNN, Al-Jazeera - are covering the attacks in a way that would constitute hundreds of billions of dollars worth of negative publicity for Australia. (This will counter the superb publicity our sportsmen and women bring us, as did Prince William’s visit.)
...call the Attorney to account...
We believe the Premier should call his Attorney –General to account. Law and order is his ministerial responsibility. It is also a core duty of government. When the ministers of the Crown, Labor or Coalition, were not obsessed republicans, the people of this country were assured that they would be reasonably protected from criminals. It is not just coincidental that with the abandoning of the respect for the Crown, the system of law and order has broken down.
The Victorian Crown, and respect for the Crown, are central to the maintenance of law and order. Is it any surprise that the Victorian Attorney-General, the Hon. Rob Hulls, is presiding over the most disastrous decline in law and order just as he proclaims removing the Crown from criminal prosecutions is some sort of reform?
He is so lacking in an understanding of the role of the Crown he even declares criminal prosecution were hitherto instituted in the name of The Queen of England. There has been no such office since 1707, and prosecutions in Victoria have never been made in that name.
...a crime used to be a wrong against the nation, not just bad luck...
In dismissing prosecutions in the name of The Queen as a mere "colonial relic," Mr Hull ignores what he should have learned as a law student. This was that the birth of our modern criminal law came with the acceptance that a crime not just a matter between the criminal and his victims.
As the great legal historian FW Maitland says, a crime became “a wrong against the nation,” with “the King as the nation’s representative”. And a crime today remains a breach of The Queen’s peace, whether or not Mr. Hulls chooses to hide this.
It is his duty and the duty of the government of Victoria that those who live there be protected from criminals, Australians or foreign.
Call him to account, Mr. Brumby. Now , before it's too late.
Holding an office in the nation for a decade - or even two - and performing it with distinction would be thought momentous and would be the subject of much favourable comment in parliament and across the media.
To be in office for 58 years, to have performed faultlessly, with no intention of retiring and never to have been paid is extraordinary. And yet, the 6th of February, 2010 is likely to pass without much comment, or even any formal recognition of the service rendered.
We know that standards of courtesy and civility have declined, but that surely cannot excuse such a lamentable omission.
Fifty eight years ago, on 6 February, 1952, King George VI, aged only 56, passed away. He was much loved and respected across the Commonwealth and throughout the world, and above all, because he did his duty.
[ King George VI ]
This sense of duty was captured best when Queen Elizabeth, subsequently the Queen Mother, was asked whether their young daughters would be sent to Canada during the London blitz, she replied: “"The children won't go without me. I won't leave the King. And the King will never leave."
When her father died, the young Princess Elizabeth was at the Treetops Hotel near Nairobi in Kenya, on her way to Australia to represent her ailing father. It was Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, who had to break the sad news to her of her father’s death, and that as a consequence, she had ascended the Throne as Queen.
Australians, in the second most remote of the King’s “dominions beyond the seas”, received the news of the death of their beloved Sovereign with the restraint expected of the time, but with great sadness. Newspapers were published with black borders, and many people wore black or black armbands. ...”a most royal sense of duty”.
...the Prime Minister speaks to the nation...
The Prime Minister, Sir Robert Menzies, the greatest orator of his day, and probably the greatest the nation has ever had, addressed a hushed House of Representatives, and by radio, the nation, in these solemn words:
“His Gracious Majesty King George VI, whose sudden death we mourn today, reigned over us with singular distinction, unfailing courage, and the most constant devotion. He was a constitutional monarch in the grand tradition of his father, King George V, of happy memory. Possessed of great force of character, a most royal sense of duty, a keen perception of the movements and issues of his day, our late beloved King was in the vast and bitter crisis of the war, in which he served us all so well, ruler, and leader, and friend.
“His was no distant throne, for he sought no security and shared cheerfully every danger and every trial. All those who saw England under daily and nightly attack in the great battle of 1940 and 1941 were stirred by the spectacle of an embattled nation, normally not unacquainted with internal divisions and hostilities, in which there was unity, cheerfulness, courage, and a common resolution which ran through factory and farm, and which made the King and his humblest subject feel a deep and human brotherhood.
“It was that superb fusing of the common will which defeated the enemy, and did so much to save the world. King George VI and his Queen Elizabeth were among the great architects of that brotherhood”
....The Queen returns to London...
On 6 February, 1952, the Royal Party flew from Kenya to London. Through blurred radio photographs and black and white news reels screened weekly in cinemas across the land, Australians saw those gloomy scenes in London where Sir Winston Churchill and the whole cabinet waited in line, dressed in mourning, as their new young Queen came down the gangway.
Later Australians watched in sadness as the great gun carriage bearing their late King was drawn slowly by sailors through the silent streets of the imperial capital, followed by their new Queen, and other members of the Royal Family including the Queen Mother and the Dowager Queen Mary, all heavily veiled in black.
( A video showing these scenes follows.)
...The King is dead: Long live The Queen...
Before this they had seen the ritual assuring them that the Crown continues and there can be no interregnum, applying the ancient affirmation that “The King is dead: Long live The King.”
This was asserted formally in the Proclamation of the Accession of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II which was read from St James's Palace on the following day.
In the meantime, conscious that the Statute of Westminster had separated the Canadian Crown from the British, another proclamation was issued by The Queen's Privy Council for Canada, and read in Ottawa on the same day.
(A video on the Accession follows.)
...The Queen of Australia...
It was not thought necessary to do that in Australia, but soon afterwards, the title of Queen of Australia was confirmed by an Act of Parliament, a formal recognition of the emergence of a separate Australian Crown as Australia moved from self government to full independence.
[ HM Elizabeth II, The Queen of Australia and Her Other Realms & Territories ]
Because the states so mistrusted federal governments of all parties, the role of the British Crown lingered here in this independent country until as late as 1986, never as some act of latter-day imperialism, but because the states preferred it.
The Queen was to play a more significant role than most have realized in terminating that role and enhancing the full emergence of the Australian Crown. The solution is something which was thought, and Her Majesty was no doubt advised, to be undesirable, unmanageable and perhaps impossible.
Unknown to Canada, and unique to Australia – under this solution, The Queen may be advised in the exercise of her Australian constitutional functions not only by the Prime Minister, but also, in relation to state matters, by each of the six Premiers.
...The Princess Elizabeth dedicates herself to our service...
In reflecting on the 58th year of the reign of Queen Elizabeth, the conclusion must be that Her Majesty is very much her father’s daughter. On her 21st birthday, The Queen indicated how she intended to fulfil her role in life: “I declare before you all that my whole life, whether it be long or short, shall be devoted to your service and the service of our great imperial family to which we all belong.” .
...Duty and Faith...
This is the essence of her character, a sense of duty. This is complemented by a strong faith. As she has more recently affirmed:
“For me the teachings of Christ and my own personal accountability before God provide a framework in which I try to lead my life. I, like so many of you, have drawn great comfort in difficult times from Christ's words and example. I believe that the Christian message, in the words of a familiar blessing, remains profoundly important to us all: 'Go forth into the world in peace, be of good courage, hold fast that which is good, render to no man evil for evil, strengthen the faint-hearted, support the weak, help the afflicted, honour all men…' It is a simple message of compassion… and yet as powerful as ever today, two thousand years after Christ's birth.”
...the love of her people...
The Queen, who has reigned over us for more than one half of the life of the Commonwealth of Australia, attracts, and rightly attracts, the admiration of the people of Australia.
The reaction in Melbourne at the Opening Ceremony of the Commonwealth Games , when the 80,000 or so present joined with Dame Kiri Te Kanawa in singing not only Happy Birthday, but in standing to sing the few bars of the Royal Anthem the censorious organizers permitted, is testimony to that. The role of those young constiutional monarchists in handing out scripts of the two anthems must not be forgotten.
The fact is that we have been blessed with a Sovereign who has never put a foot wrong, who has never embarrassed us, who does her duty, and for whom we do not pay and never will pay.
She will not retire from this position to which was anointed and Crowned and to which she has dedicated her life.
Her service to Australia and the Commonwealth has been impeccable. The Queen is today as revered as she was when she first came to Australia.
Although the script writer of the film “The Queen’ is on record as saying he intended it to be a ‘ hatchet job”, Dame Helen Mirren has managed to capture the essence of The Queen’s character - duty supported by strong faith. People who did not realize this are finding an unknown side to their Sovereign – and increasing their admiration for her.
...at the very centre of our constitutional system...
In the meantime the Australian Crown curiously remains the “elephant in the room.” It is at the very centre of the constitutional system, it is our oldest institution in the nation, and, the High Court perhaps excepted, it is the only one which transcends the federal-state divide .
And yet, its history, role and function are little taught or even understood in our schools and academies, while our republican politicians are intent on hiding all references to it notwithstanding the landslide decision of the people to keep it.
Australia’s republicans cannot, and the more sensible ones do not criticize the Queen for the failure of their campaign, which has lost ground at all levels particularly among the youth.
Neither Her Majesty nor any member of the Royal Family campaigned in the referendum, and soon afterwards The Queen made her position absolutely clear:
"My family and I would, of course, have retained our deep affection for Australia and Australians everywhere, whatever the outcome. For some while it has been clear that many Australians have wanted constitutional change. You can understand, therefore, that it was with the closest interest that I followed the debate leading up to the referendum held last year on the proposal to amend the Constitution.
“I have always made it clear that the future of the Monarchy in Australia is an issue for you, the Australian people, and you alone to decide by democratic and constitutional means. It should not be otherwise.
“As I said at the time, I respect and accept the outcome of the referendum. In the light of the result last November I shall continue faithfully to serve as Queen of Australia under the Constitution to the very best of my ability, as I have tried to do for the last 48 years."
Australians should count their blessings that we have had such a Sovereign to reign over us for more than half the life of our nation. Well may we say and affirm, “God Save The Queen.”
In the continuing discussions whether a double dissolution will be sought by the government, it is generally assumed that if this is granted and the government returned without a majority in the Senate, it will be at least able to put the ETS legislation to a joint sitting.
This may not be so, and the experience of the Whitlam government illustrates this. After the double dissolution of 1974, the High Court disallowed the passing of one bill which had been the subject of the double dissolution.
This situation can arise where the Governor-General, in good faith, has erroneously concluded that the conditions in section 57 had been fulfilled.
How to deal with a constitutional breach that cannot be undone and that has potentially far-reaching consequences is a difficult question.
The constitutional expert Dr. Twomey recently observed that it is not uncommon for litigants in Australia to argue that there has been some significant and fundamental breach or ‘breach in sovereignty’. This often relates to the signing of the Treaty of Versailles, the appointment of the Governor-General with the "wrong" seal or the passage of the Australia Acts.
It has been argued that this has led to the invalidity of all laws passed for a number of decades. This has included taxation legislation.
[ Even they cannot unscamble an omelette ]
While these arguments are usually dismissed by the courts as fanciful, in very rare cases the courts have found that a law, such as one concerning electoral redistributions or the holding of elections, is invalid.
What are the consequences of this? It is clear the consequences will be restricted.
...invalid electoral provisions...
Dr Twomey points to Attorney-General (Commonwealth); Ex rel McKinlay v Commonwealth (1975) 135 CLR 1, where a majority of the High Court held that sections 3 and 4 of the Representation Act, 1905 (Cth) were invalid. The consequence was that every election since 1938 had been conducted upon the basis of invalid provisions and potentially invalid electoral boundaries.
The Court dismissed any suggestion that this meant that elections were invalidated, as were the resulting Governments and laws enacted by Parliament.
It did not explain why this was the case.
...double dissolution granted in error....
Dr. Twomey also refers to the opinion of the Chief Justice Sir Garfield Barwick CJ in Victoria v Commonwealth and Connor (1975) 134 CLR 81. The question concerned the potential consequences if the Governor-General had dissolved Parliament under s 57 of the Australian Constitution without the requisite constitutional conditions having been met.
Sir Garfield observed:
“The dissolution itself is a fact which can neither be void nor be undone. If, without having power to do so, the Governor-General did dissolve both Houses, there would be no basis for setting aside the dissolution or for treating it as not having occurred. None the less, the double dissolution would not have been authorized, and therefore it would not satisfy the second paragraph of s 57 and provide a warrant for a joint sitting.
"The joint sitting, pursuant to the third paragraph of that section, which was dependent upon such a dissolution, which, though not void, was not lawful, would not have power to affirm any law. It is not necessary, in my opinion, to regard any part of s 57 as directory in order to conclude that, though the proclamation be unlawful, the sequential dissolution in fact occurred and was incapable of being disregarded, reversed or done."
"Hence an unlawful dissolution was still effective, but although the new Parliament elected pursuant to the dissolution would be valid, at least one consequence would still flow from the unlawful dissolution, being the absence of power to hold a joint sitting.”
...what does this mean?....
In other words, even if the Governor-General grants a double dissolution in error, this cannot be undone. However the bill the subject of the double dissolution cannot be submitted to a subsequent joint sitting.
This may well become a relevant consideration in relation to the government’s current ETS legislation.
The fact that the second in line to the throne, Prince William, is is a very likeable young man, and has dedicated his life to service ensured that his visit to Australia would be a great success.
All of this has curiously come as a surprise to the doyen of republican academicians, Professor Greg Craven, Vice Chancellor of the Australian Catholic University. Professor Craven, whom I once described as Australia's answer to the Marquis de Talleyrand, is clearly upset by Australians' welcome to the Prince. As are a number of republicans, a small and diminishing band in Australia.
In “Celebrity monarchs rule” in The Australian Financial Review on 1 February 2010, he registers his outrage with his fellow Australians.
Could there be, he asks, anything as “nauseating” as the interest of “ an entire continent lying on its back to have its tummy tickled” by Prince William?
[ Charles Maurice de Talleyrand-Perigord ]
...Australians condemned as " constitutional sl*ts"...
He concludes that Australians are a nation of “constitutional sl*ts." Really? If he is talking about "passionate" republicans being interested in royalty, surely Professor Craven is aware of the phenomenon we warn our supporters about. This is never to stand between republicans and visiting royalty, even minor European royalty - otherwise you'll risk being knocked over in the rush.
“In a laid back way we will bag the pommy monarchy in pubs and picnics,” Professor Craven claims, although I have never once heard such bagging in pubs “but at the first sign of a princely grin, lie back and think of England.”
This reminds me of the words of celebrated communist playwright Bertolt Brecht, who wrote in the poemDie Lösung (The Solution) that when the East Germans could take no more from their communist masters and rose up in 1953, “the people had thrown away the confidence of the government.”
He asked “.... would it not be easier.. for the government to dissolve the people and elect another?
...Australia's Talleyrand?....
Professor Craven, an eminent constitutional lawyer and university vice chancellor, is a man who is not ashamed to change his mind or adopt new ideas. During the referendum I was involved in a debate with him in Perth where the republican team included the Federal Attorney General, Daryl Williams QC and Senator Stott Despoja.
I was with the former Governor-General Bill Hayden and former minister andformer Perth Lord Mayor, Reg Withers. By that time, Professor Craven had changed from being a strongly committed constitutional monarchist to becoming a supporter of the “least-worst “model proposed by Dick McGarvie and then, to a supporter of the Keating Turnbull model.
So in the debate I mischievously described him as the Australian answer to the Marquis de Talleyrand.
(Charles Maurice de Talleyrand-Périgord, an aristocrat in holy orders, served in succession the doomed King Louis XVI, various republican regimes during the Reign of Terror, the Emperor Napoleon I, the restored King Louis XVIII and after the revolution against that King, the “bourgeois” monarch Louis-Philippe.)
Rather than being indignant, Professor Craven took my criticism as praise. He continues to embrace ways and means of obtaining republic - provided always that it be conservative.
But from this visit he must know the Australian people are not going to reject the Crown.They are just not interested in a politicians' republic. So why does he expect Australians to treat our Royal Family with disdain?
Republicans Ray Martin and Malcolm Turnbull were roundly told they ought to grow up by that éminence grise among Australian editors, Ian Moore. (Spectator Australia, 30 January.) The magazine cover says both are snobs. Mr. Moore adds they both have a complete inability to understand the Australian people.
Mr. Moore’s “memo to the television celebrity and failed Liberal leader” is to the pont. “ We’re not a colonial relic.”
[ Is there an age limit, or does Australia hold the world record for the oldest enfants terribles? ]
This month Ray Martin came out as a most aggressive flag changer and Malcolm Turnbull spectacularly renewed and upgraded his push for a republic in a media blitz not only in Australia but inexplicably also in the United Kingdom. ( The link to the report on Ray Martin now has embedded the video of the Channel 7 report in which ACM argued for the retention of the flag)
When he entered Parliament Malcolm Turnbull renounced his previous flirtation with flag changing, and like any convert, became passionate about the Australian flag. He also said that a republic should not be on the agenda during the present reign, and not until there was a consensus on the model and opposition was minimal.
But not only has he now renewed his republican passion, he has renounced his once rock solid opposition to the president of an Australian republic being elected by the people.
That opposition had led the small “direct-elect” republicans at the 1998 Constitutional Convention to threaten a walkout, a potential embarrassment which was allayed by the timely mediation of the constitutional monarchist leader, Lloyd Waddy.
(Incidentally, if direct election is so popular with the people, why did they elect so few such delegates in 1998? On their voting figures they were awarded only two seats on the No committee to ACM’s eight. And why did the only poll on this in recent years, the Morgan Poll, show such low support for direct election, especially among young people?)
...threefold plebiscite...
Mr. Turnbull also endorsed a threefold plebiscite on the issue. (ACM has long denounced this as an irresponsible process. This is because it is devised to remove confidence in the constitution, thus leading to a period of constitutional instability without any guarantee of change.)
Although an inévitabliste*, Mr. Moore is outraged by Mr. Martin’s condescending dismissal of our past, particular his call for Australians to grow up.
As for Malcolm Turnbull, Mr. Moore points out that just as in 1999, he fails to articulate why change would be for the better. The only reason he gives is to get rid of the monarch because she also happens to be Britain’s.
If that were put to the people, we confidently predict it would attract significantly fewer votes than in 1999, where the republicans Mr. Turnbull led were, as Mr. Moore vividly recalls, “badly defeated”.
*[This word, we must admit, does not actually exist in French- yet. Based on the word 'inévitable', we have created it to describe supporters of the doctrine that Australia must become some sort of unknown politicians' republic. A search in Google française only brings up references to stories on this site.
We may in due course be responsible for adding a new word to both languages. We fear however that few of us will actually see its approval by the Académie française, even although it is French based. The eighth edition of its French dictionary was completed in 1935, and the first of about four volumes of the ninth only appeared in 1992. The second volume appeared in 2000, in which our word would have been located. We must therefore await the tenth edition]
These rare photographs begin with a shot of the Prince's table and other photographs of the barbecue given by Premier Kristina Keneally in the Royal Botannic Gardens on Prince William's second day in Sydney, 21 January 2010. it seems that none of these have been published until now . The photographer is Benjamin Townsend.
The video clip from Channel 9 shows scenes from the barbecue. You can see the Prince's table, and a shot at the harbour front which includes Thomas Flynn.
[The Prince's Table, left to right: Ian Thorpe, Prince William, Premier Kristina Keneally, Jai Martinkovits, Major.Lowther-Pinkerton]
[ Prince William]
[Prince William and Premier Keneally]
[ Prince William speaks]
[ Prince William with the Premier and young people ]
Prince William has told Australians that visiting their country is the realisation of a lifelong dream, reported Sarah Hughes, UK Sky TV’s Royal Correspondent (21/1). In a speech at the celebrations in Melbourne for Australia Day celebrations, Prince William said that he had heard from his family about "the wonders of Australia" as far back as he could remember.
"My father had such a great time here at school - and is still misty-eyed about an immortal moment on Bondi, when an Australian beauty planted a smacker on his cheek," he said
"It's good to see this tradition is continuing!"
"I also remember my mother coming back from her time here in 1996, telling me what a profound impression this country had made on her, and how much she loved Australia.
"Three days here and now I know why.
"And of course, there's that other guy with the ginger hair - who just never ever stops banging on about you, and how I haven't lived because I haven't been to Australia … blah, blah, blah."
Sky TV included an extract of the Prince's speech on its web site which is accessed by its vast worldwide audience.
Earlier, the Prince visited communities devastated by last year's bushfires and heard stories of tragedy and courage.
It is almost a year since Black Saturday - when the worst bushfires in Australian history raged across the state of Victoria. Some 173 people lost their lives and 2,000 homes were destroyed. It was clear thta his visit, and his evident concern was very much appreciated.
The Prince wrapped up his day, and his time down under, with an evening at the Australian Open where he was given a standing ovation as he watched Roger Federer beat Romanian Victor Hanescu.
Reported to her British and worldwide Sky TV audience, Ms Hughes assessed this visit to Australia:
“His first official overseas tour has been judged a big success. William has charmed Australia and Australia has enchanted him”.
According to a report by Damien Hearse for UK Sky News Online (30/1), Prince Harry has shown his caring side by cuddling a baby during a visit to a Barbados hospital. In a three-day visit to Barbados, the Prince will play in a charity polo match at the Apes Hill Polo Club on Sunday to raise money for his charity Sentebale which helps orphans and vulnerable children in Lesotho.
He will be joined by Prince Seeiso of Lesotho, who is the co-founder of Sentebale, at a garden party for orphaned youngsters and vulnerable children at Barbados' national museum.
In the evening, Harry will attend a music concert in aid of the relief effort in Haiti.
Damien Hearse reports that Prince Harry founded Sentebale in 2006 with Lesotho's Prince Seeiso after spending part of his gap year in the kingdom which is located within South Africa.
More than 3,000 of Lesotho's orphans and other vulnerable youngsters have already been helped by the organisation.
Prince Harry is following a great tradition among members of our Royal Family: raising funds for the disadvantaged of this world.
Prince Charles has leapt to the aid of Australian, New Zealand and British wool producers, launching a project to increase demand for fleece, reports News Limited (27/1). The Prince launched a new initiative to boost the struggling wool industry on 28 January, 2010 at the National Trust's Wimpole Estate in Cambridgeshire. The Prince's Wool Project is a collaboration of various interest groups including fashion designers, high street retailers, manufacturers and farming groups in this country and abroad.
The aim is to increase the desirability of wool and raise awareness of the benefits of wool as a natural, biodegradable and fire-retardant fabric, an objective which is very important to graziers and others in the Australian wool industry . Prince Charles spoke of the benefits of wool over artificial fibre and referred to the next stage will be Wool Week in September.
