Australia’s republican sail

Joern Utzon, the Danish architect of the Sydney Opera House was asked in 1998 to comment on the idea of the world-heritage nomination of the Sydney Opera House.

“Please listen to me, Canberra. They should accept that an Australian building will be cared for, representing a time which is at the end of colony Australia and the beginning of republic Australia. The spirit of the building is independent of anything from anywhere. It could be the best example of what you’re going to do, because you’re to do that, to be a republic – with all respect for the royals! So I think these ideas fit beautifully together. Then you can hear beautiful music all the time in the future from a clean beautifully kept building.”

Utzon’s masterwork, one of the greatest buildings of the twentieth century, was opened by Queen Elizabeth II in 1973. However, in the eyes of its creator, it was the very essence of the spirit of republican Australia, resounding with the spirit of place, and of the very country in which we live.

In November 2008, Utzon died in Copenhagen at the age of 90. During the NSW State Memorial Service in March 2009, John Bell, of The Bell Shakespeare Company, read a tribute to Utzon called An Angel at Bennelong Point written for the occasion by David Malouf.

If, as humans, we had to name our supreme achievement in the realm of making, it would surely be that piecemeal work of hands and generations, the city.

Extraordinary, then, how often in such a collaborative enterprise, such a random collision of expediency and provisional hit-and-miss, of utilitarian dullness and commercialism and occasional caprice, a single building, the product of one man's vision, has made all the difference, providing a city almost overnight with what it lacked, a defining centre, or adding to an existing landmark a late-born twin and rival to create a new line of force.

Think of the Taj Mahal or the Golden Gate Bridge. Think of Notre Dame and the Eiffel Tower.

If such a building catches the world's eye and finds a place there it becomes an icon, or what Wallace Stevens, speaking of poetry, called a "necessary angel": a presence that speaks powerfully to the senses but whose real message is for the spirit.

Set such a building down in the muddle of a great city and the whole field composes itself anew. The city is drawn in around it, as if it had been waiting for just this miraculous object to appear and claim its place.

That, of course, is how it was when this building, Joern Utzon's Opera House, first arrived at Bennelong Point.

And those of us who lived through the 15 years of its construction - the piling up over weeks and months in all weather of so many tonnes of structural material, the assembling of so many hands, the precise calculations and engineering and technical know-how, the bringing in of excavators, derricks, cranes, lifts, girders to a site that swarmed like the pyramids, all mess and mud piles and unfinished arcs and unseemly arguments - will recall, when all the heavy work was done and those millions of tonnes had found their proper place and tension, and the finished object was cleaned down and unwrapped, what a work of playful lightness it turned out to be, a shining thing from another order of reality that had miraculously stepped clear of the mind that had conceived it, shouldered off its crust, and was actually there, spreading its wings on a new shore

But a city is a living organism, an enterprise not simply of towerblocks and thoroughfares and squares, but of daily comings and goings, of human needs to be catered for and interests served. Those too are transformed by whatever new thing is set in their midst.

When Utzon's necessary angel alighted at Bennelong Point, the whole inner city shifted its ground. Circular Quay, The Rocks, Woolloomooloo and Walsh Bay took on a new existence. Macquarie Street found a goal, became what it was always meant to be, a grand boulevard running from Hyde Park to the water. And the lightness, the exuberant fantasy the building embodies and so powerfully spoke up for, provided a new vision of what a water city - and specifically this city, all light and vertical space and air - might aspire to be: a playground of the spirit, a model of how the useful and necessary may also, within the rules, become pure play.

Like all true works of art, Utzon's great house and explosive sculptural ensemble was a gift. Our role as the receivers of it is to honour the gift with our affectionate gratitude, and be taking it into our lives and using it as it was designed to be used, and passing it on.

The sun had just slipped over the horizon to kiss the Opera House sails when the people of Sydney gave thanks to Joern Utzon, who had given them the sail. A sail created to catch the republican wind.

Republican of the Year

Located at the foreshores of Lake Burley Griffin in Canberra is the Australian of the Year Walk. The Australian of the Year honours those Australians who have been recognised for outstanding contribution to our community through the Australian of the Year Awards. It recognises all Australian of the Year, Senior Australian of the Year, Young Australian of the Year and Australia's Local Hero award recipients since the inception of the Awards in 1960.

The Australian of the Year Walk comprises a series of plinths, seating and lighting along the shores of the lake by Commonwealth Bridge. Incorporated into the Australian of the Year Walk design are five metal strips set flush into the ground, forming the five stave lines to a music score, along with bollards to represent the notes of Advance Australia Fair. Each bollard is topped with a plaque representing a year in history and that year's Australians of the Year. The walk was opened on the 25th of January 2006.

Historian and author Mark McKenna describes the walk in 'The Nation Reviewed' - The Monthly, March 2008, No 32.

"On the southern shore of Lake Burley Griffin, along the promenade directly in front of the National Library, a series of stone plaques, erected in 2006, commemorates every Australian of the Year since the award's inception in 1960. Manning Clark and Alan Bond are there, as are Patrick White, John Farnham and Paul Hogan. Taken together, this odd precession of sporting champions, writers, artists, scientists, entrepreneurs, military heroes and adventurers offers some kind of insight into the sort of people we have become and the forms of human achievement we admire.

The plaques stretch from the southern side of Commonwealth Avenue Bridge, almost to the front of the National Portrait Gallery. Standing in front of the first, dedicated to Sir Frank McFarlane Burnet, and looking east along the lakefront, the remaining plaques take on a stark funereal quality, appearing like the tombstones of fallen soldiers. They are also a stunning example of the art of memorialisation. While each plaque memoralises an individual, en masse these individual identities are subsumed by a much greater presence: national pride. In some ways they remind me of Italian cemeteries, where the names of the Catholic dead are accompanied by photographs of the deceased - passport style headshots blanched pale and almost indistinguishable by the sun - forming a sea of faded faces staring back from times past, somehow making our attempt to make the significance of each human life all the more futile and all the more poignant.

When I first saw the plaques, last December, I counted at least another 40 standing beyond the one that bears the name and photograph of the 2007 Australian of the Year, Professor Tim Flannery. These blank plaques - memorials to the future - stand as if waiting for the years to pass before they can be filled in and become whole. Yet strangely they seem more intriguing than the plaques that precede them. It is possible to imagine the line of blank plaques stretching one endlessly, and their emptiness begs the question: What sort of nation will Australia become over the next few decades?"

The question is which of these blank plaques will inscribe Australia's first ‘Republican of the Year’.

Book Review: G Barns & A Krawec-Wheaton (2006), An Australian Republic

Almost ten years ago, 55 per cent of Australians rejected the opportunity to rid Australia of the British monarchy and allow our national Parliament to select an Australian head of state. In Greg Barns and Anna Krawec-Wheatons book An Australian Republic they state they believe republican fortunes could change rapidly. They examine how the opportunity can be grasped, how the conditions necessary for achieving consensus can be constructed and how the political will to tackle the complex issues of constitutional change can be generated.

Both have excellent credentials in this field: Greg Barns was national chairman of the Australian Republican Movement (ARM) from 2000 to 2002 and national campaign director for the 1999 referendum campaign YES case, while Krawec-Wheaton is a recent PhD graduate with a thesis focusing on Australia's republican movement.

In March 2006, John Howard acknowledged there was no guarantees about the English monarchy's future in Australia after Queen Elizabeth II dies or abdicates. In An Australian Republic Barns and Krawec-Wheaton argue that in 2006 the Australian public was broadly republican in sentiment and that forces within both major political parties were sympathetic. For Australia to move to a republic they argue there needs to be widespread receptiveness and enthusiasm for the issue: in other words a preparedness and readiness for change by the public. Polls conducted continue to show that Australians are ready for a republic.

But for an Australian republic to be delivered, more is required. Those underlying sentiments need to be given voice. They need to be captured by a social-movement organisation, as was the case in the 1990s with the establishment of the ARM. However, the central factor needed for the republican cause is agreement between the decision makers. There needs to be agreement upon what form a republic will take. As Barns and Krawec-Wheaton point out, the real problem is disunity inside the republican camp. This book is a blueprint towards building a consensus among the major players and advancing the republican cause in twenty-first century Australia. Rather than focus on the variety of possible models that a future republic might take, this book examines how the opportunity might be grasped.

The challenge ahead is how do we get to an Australian republic? Barns and Krawec-Wheaton have made some ground in showing us the way. The first step is unity between republican protagonists and compromise on an agreed model.

Can’t afford a carriage …

The British Royal family is universally acknowledged as being amongst the world’s richest people. Yet the Australian Government paid $1.8 million for the 2006 Royal visit for the Commonwealth Games in Melbourne and $250,000 for a royal coach glorifying Britain, but not Australia.

The royal coach has been described as a stunningly wrought piece of propaganda. Stories of conquest and the divine right of kings are etched on its panels in the powerful language of heraldry. Apparently it contains more gold than any carriage built since 1762 and the doorhandles are made of New Zealand gold encrusted with sapphires and diamonds. The leopards that decorated the standard of Richard the Lionheart occupy one compartment, others house the flowers of Britain: England’s Tudor Rose, the Irish Shamrock, the Welsh Leek and the Scottish Thistle. There is no Wattle present, though, nor any reference to Australia in any part of the vehicle.

The following article from ARMLET, February 2007 exposes the true cost of subsidizing the British Royal family to the Australian taxpayer.

A blow-out in the cost of the Royal Visit led to a departmental budgetary shortfall of $1.4 million, Prime Minister and Cabinet Department Assistant Secretary, Frank Leverett, told the Senate Estimates Committee.

“Royal visits are always a high expenditure item”, said Mr Leverett.

“1.4 million was the shortfall in the program and that was the shortfall of the entire administrative funding for the Department”, he said.

The Government also paid $250,000 to a Sydney man to help him build a carriage said to be an 80th birthday gift for Queen Elizabeth II. The Queen was 80 on 3 June 2006, but the carriage was still in Sydney”.

The builder, avowed monarchist Jim Frecklington, constructed a similar coach for the Bicentennial, which the Government also funded. This time, funding was obtained after he sent a letter to the Prime Minister in March 2006. The Government refused to release this letter.

Questions were also raised about due diligence in relation to the disbursement of funds: no-one from the Government had met with Mr Frecklington, sighted the coach nor confirmed if the coach had other sponsors.

“So, if you had sent a letter saying that I was making a coach for Her Majesty the Queen, I could have scored $250,000 too. I jest, but surely there is some due diligence on this?” enquired Senator John Faulkner at the Estimates hearings.

Faulkner: “Well, what was it?”

Leverett: “There was a very detailed glossy brochure produced by Mr Frecklington”.

As at 29 May 2009 the Royal coach had been completed but is still waiting on the Queen's approval before it can leave Australia to go to London. Why on earth did the Australian taxpayer’s fund this?

Not even a passing reference.

Surely Australia can come up with better reasons for a winter long-weekend than the birthday of a foreigner on a day that is not even her real birthday. Nick Pippos's reflection on his experience this year on the Queen's Birthday public holiday said it best:

We took the clan yesterday to the Redcliffe Peninsula on what was a glorious day. Children were on scooters. A group sat on pink canvas chairs in pink T-shirts under a pink tarpaulin eating cakes. Adults, who shouldn’t have, were inline skating. We all ate ice creams. At Margate beach, the markets were humming along.

The strangest thing was what I didn’t notice. No Aussie flags were flying. There was no incidental chatter about Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth; not toasts; no images.
On a magnificent sunny historical Queensland sesquicentennial long weekend, a passing reference surely was in order. Nothing.

Can we all stop kidding ourselves? Let’s keep the holiday. Let’s change the occasion. Long live the long weekend.

Courier Mail, Tuesday, 9 June 2009

You're job is safe, ma'am. Your sons, however ...

In two days time it will be the Queen’s Birthday public holiday in Queensland. Most 84 years olds are long retired, but not that trouper the Queen. But the Queen displays similarly robust health to her mother and there's no sign of her standing down.

In 2006 rehearsals began for the first time after midnight in the heart of London for the Queen's funeral. As happened for her mother when she also reached about 80, a mock funeral march has been staged. They'll do it every year. In the case of the Queen Mother, they'd had lots of practice by the time she died at 101.

During the Queen’s last trip to Australia during the 2006 Melbourne Commonwealth Games, Australia's then Prime Minister John Howard stated "I don't believe Australia will become a republic while the Queen is on the throne. Beyond that, I don't know". This was code that this may be her last visit.

But please let's not have any more visits from Prince Charles. His 2005 visit was lacking in crowd-pulling power and plain dull.

The common view is when the Queen dies or steps down and Prince Charles ascends the throne there will be a trigger for another push within Australia for a republic. This will change things because there is a reservoir of goodwill for the Queen which there isn't for Prince Charles. However, it would be much better and more dignified to see the debate happen well before such an event.

A Fond Farewell to dear Liz

In his first 2008 Boyer Lecture, Rupert Murdoch urged Australians to declare their independence from Britain. "The establishment of a republic of Australia will not slight the Queen, nor will it deny the British traditions, values and structures that have served us so well" he said. As usual, Murdoch got straight to the heart of the matter. He is right when he says it would be a mistake to rush into a republic without acknowledging the role Britain played in defining our national character. Whether we like it or not, Britain made us what we are today. And I suspect there can be no harmonious transition to a republic without acknowledging the civilising effect of the monarchy on our history.

However, don't imagine Her Majesty will take offence at Australian's cutting the apron-string. She won't. In 1999 the rejection of the republic referendum was more an expression of popular mistrust of politicians than an indication of royalist sentiment. When told of the result the Queen said she would continue to serve as Queen of Australia under the Constitution. But she made it clear she would not stand in the way of a republic. "I have always made it clear that the future of the monarchy in Australia is an issue for the Australian people and them alone to decide, by democratic and constitutional means", she said.

The National Chair of the Australian Republican Movement, Michael Keating says it would be wrong to wait until the Queen dies before acting. "Philosophically it is wrong for us to link our national future to the health of a dear old lady living in England", Keating said. "People who say, 'I love Elizabeth but don't like Charles' are not putting their belief in any system".

It will no doubt take a couple of years to 'go through the process' of cutting ties with Britain. Perhaps Australia had better hurry up. A poll on Prince Charles's 60th birthday found 72% of Britons did not want Camilla to be Queen. Britain may be a republic before us.