Natural republicans all

When Professor Peter Doherty, National Australia Day Council's 1997 Australian of the Year, and the 1996 Nobel Prize winner commented that we are all "natural republicans" he was probably close to the truth. The Federal Treasurer Peter Costello reiterated Peter Doherty's sentiment on the republican referendum night in November 1999 when he stated: "In their hearts and minds the Australian people are republican."

In June 2006, Peter Costello restated on Southern Cross Radio that "Australia already thinks like a republic." Costello was reflecting and acknowledging the presence of republican thinking in Australia and making the assumption that Australian's do not need to be converted to republicanism as they already accept it.