Wayne Swan and Malcolm Turnbull have formed an unholy alliance to turn Australia into some as yet undefined politicians’ republic.
For Wayne Swan this is distraction from the problems relating to the budget, surplus which disappeared, the massive debts which are accumulating and the polling which is indicating problems for the government in the coming election.
For Malcolm Turnbull this is a singular way to demonstrate that his brand is different from that if his leader, Tony Abbott. Mr Abbott it will be recalled was the first Executive Director of Australians for constitutional monarchy, and is a firm supporter of the existing constitutional system.
….brand differentiation…
It is remarkable that an election year Mr Turnbull, who is the shadow Minister of Communications, would seek to demonstrate brand differentiation from his leader by appearing with Wayne Swan to call for the removal of our oldest institution from the Constitution, and one which is clearly a non-political.
…Australian Flag…
And where is the flag in this unholy alliance? Since the referendum, many republicans keep as quiet about the Flag as they do about the form of a politician's republic they are trying to foist onto an uninterested nation
…no youth support…
The promotion of a politicians’ republic at this time will have little support among rank-and-file Australians . In fact it never did. As we demonstrate in ACM’s report on opinion polling, for an undefined republic – and for what is believed to be the most popular model – is somewhere between 35% and 48% . (The latter score comes from the ARM’s pollster which has consistently reported higher support than the others.)
Worse, there is a timebomb in the polling which the republicans try to keep quiet about. The young are just not interested in doing away with our very successful crowned republic. Polling indicates support for a politicians’ republic among the young is consistently lower than among the general public. It is very much lower than polling among the inner city and elites which form the core of republican support .
The last poll on this by Morgan revealed support among the young was at 31%. Wayne Swan and Malcolm Turnbull ought to study that before trying to revive the Keating Turnbull Republic . They should just face the facts.
…the Swan-Turnbull allies should face the facts…
In 1999, notwithstanding a very well endowed campaign broadly supported by the political class,. The Keating Turnbull Republic was defeated in a landslide, nationally, in every State and 72% of Federal electorates. No doubt the Swan Turnbull Republic would face a similar fate.
No doubt some stage this will be followed by a move to shred the Australian Flag, notwithstanding Malcolm Turnbull’s public conversion on this issue.