Tuesday, 29 August 2023

Bills

Statute Law Amendment (References to the Sovereign) Bill 2023

Second reading

Debate resumed on motion of Ingrid Stitt:

That the bill be now read a second time.

Matthew BACH (North-Eastern Metropolitan) (13:44): It is with much relish that I rise to make a contribution on behalf of the coalition parties regarding the Statute Law Amendment (References to the Sovereign) Bill 2023. It is a bill that should have been an unremarkable bill, a bill focused on simple housekeeping. But in actual fact, President, it may not surprise you to learn this is actually quite a sneaky bill. It is a bill that should do something very straightforward. Following the tragic death of our late Queen there has been a need, of course, to make some updates to our statute book. That is all well and good. However, the government has gone further – and I will talk about this anon – in a way that I know has been described even as an effort to start a process of republicanism by stealth.

Now, I have friends who are republicans, and if they want to wilfully embrace historical illiteracy, that is a matter for them. Some of my colleagues are republicans. I know some members opposite are republicans. There are some good people who are republicans. But I would hope and presume that all colleagues in this chamber would recognise the extraordinary inheritance we have as members of the Commonwealth due to our links – our historical links and our ongoing links – to the British monarchy.

I just heard a contribution from Mr Davis about the upcoming referendum. Well, in the latter period of last century we had a referendum about whether we wished to become a republic. Strong arguments were put on both sides, and ultimately the people made a decision. I know that many within the government pine for a different system of government to our constitutional monarchy, and that is fine. They can do so. They can advocate to their federal colleagues to bring on another referendum. However, a process whereby we seek to alter our statute book to seek in some cases to sever the linkages – the very important linkages, actually – that we have to our sovereign I think is one that is disingenuous. Like I said, my hope when I first saw this bill was that it would be a very straightforward matter of housekeeping – not so in fact.

Now, we know that the main purpose of the bill is to make changes to the Interpretation of Legislation Act 1984 in relation to references to the sovereign and also then to amend the statute law of Victoria to revise language referring to ‘the Queen’ to language referring to ‘the King’ and language, for example, referring to ‘Her Majesty’ with language referring to ‘His Majesty’. It would be remiss of me to go further without acknowledging what was acknowledged by people from right around this chamber at the time – and also people with different views about Australia’s current system of government and what that system of government should look like into the future – and that was, I think, a really deeply felt sense of grief in this place at the loss of our late Queen. That was the trigger, of course, for the need for this legislative change.

The Interpretation of Legislation Act 1984 does provide that references in legislation to the Queen, now the King, are to – I will quote that piece of legislation – ‘the sovereign for the time being’. Nonetheless, the actual wording of each statute, on its face, is now incorrect; hence the need for a change. These amendments, nonetheless, are meant to be minor and to ensure that the state’s laws remain, simply, relevant and accurate. This bill, however, goes further than that.

I seek to give you, President, and the house just a few examples – there are many, I am afraid – of this bill going further than that in a way that we on this side of the house will seek to remedy, Mr McIntosh, through some amendments that, again, I will speak to anon. Here is an example: in the Attorney-General and Solicitor-General Act – that is from back in 1972 – the bill does not replace the proper title ‘Her Majesty’s Attorney-General’ and ‘Her Majesty’s solicitor-general’ with ‘His Majesty’s Attorney-General’ and ‘His Majesty’s solicitor-general’. Now, what it actually does is to remove the references to the sovereign altogether, which means that these roles are only referred to as ‘the Attorney-General’ and ‘the solicitor-general’. In other areas there is a replacement of ‘Her Majesty’ with ‘the Crown in right of Victoria’ in reference to the functions, in this case, of the solicitor-general. That is just one example where we are not seeing a like-for-like comparison, and that is what we should have: a simple, like-for-like comparison.

I will go on to give you some further examples. By way of example, in the Crown Proceedings Act 1958 the full title of the sovereign is removed and not replaced with a reference to King Charles III. A whole host of similar examples were referenced and canvassed by not only the member for Kew, who led the debate for the opposition in the other place, but also other members, so I need not go on. I know members of the house are apprised not only of our concerns with this issue but of this issue itself and the extent of this issue across relevant pieces of legislation. It is for that reason that I am going to move a reasoned amendment. I move:

That all the words after ‘That’ be omitted and replaced with the words ‘this house refuses to read this bill a second time until the government has provided clarity on the rationale of the amending provisions.’.

The PRESIDENT: We will distribute that.

Michael Galea interjected.

Matthew BACH: Thank you very much, President. Mr Galea shouts out that the rationale is to move into the 21st century. However, to do that we do not have to ditch references to the King. Australia in the 21st century is a constitutional monarchy. My personal view is that that is a very good thing.

Michael Galea interjected.

Matthew BACH: Mr Galea shouts across the chamber that we are not ditching references to the King. Well, I just read into Hansard many examples where references to the sovereign – references to the Queen previously and to Her Majesty – are not being replaced appropriately with references to His Majesty or to the King, King Charles III as he is. I dare say this may be presented by those opposite as a minor matter. I confess we think not. We think that, given the historical strength and the ongoing strength of our constitutional system of government and of our involvement in the Commonwealth and of all the wonderful things that that has brought us as a country – the rule of law, the separation of powers –

Michael Galea interjected.

Matthew BACH: Again, Mr Galea shouts out that this does not change that. No, it does not, but nonetheless I think if we seek to be historically literate we come to an understanding that we only enjoy the benefits of living in a thriving liberal democracy because of our connections, through our constitution, to our monarchical system. To seek to reduce, to minimise, the strength of those connections through legislation is something that we will not support. That is why I have moved my reasoned amendment. That is why a little later on I will move a series of other amendments that I might just broadly speak to now.

The purpose of the amendments that I will have circulated and then we can discuss at the conclusion of our debate is to bring the bill back to its original intent. The government said that the intent of this bill is straightforward. It is a necessary piece of legislation upon the sad death of our late Queen. The amendments seek to update the bill to reflect what should have been brought before this Parliament, and that is a simple substitution of terms, given the death of the Queen and the accession to the throne of King Charles III, long may he reign. With these amendments, the bill will be a straightforward matter of legislative housekeeping to ensure that all our laws here in Victoria make correct references to the sovereign. That will be the purpose of our amendments. I know the government has them. They were discussed in the other chamber as well.

I know many members of this place are keen to speak on this bill; I am not surprised. At the outset of our broader debate, I want to acknowledge what the member for Kew said in her contribution: that we will seek support for our amendments, and I am very hopeful of gaining support for our amendments. I urge members of the government, not just members of the crossbench, to ponder those amendments and the need for those amendments. Should, however, those amendments not be successful, then we cannot support this bill.

Samantha RATNAM (Northern Metropolitan) (13:55): I rise speak on behalf of the Greens on the Statute Law Amendment (References to the Sovereign) Bill 2023. The effect of this bill is to replace ‘Her’ with ‘His’ when referencing the sovereign throughout our statute books. Just like the monarchy itself, it is the Greens view that this bill is a distraction when we should be addressing the many serious issues facing Victorians at the moment. Climate change, the housing crisis and First Nations justice are ignored while this bill makes up 50 per cent of the government’s legislative agenda this week. The only reason the Greens are speaking in support of this bill is because we are informed by the Liberal Party and the monarchist league that it apparently contains a hidden plot to usurp the monarchy and establish an Australian republic by stealth – in which case, we commend the bill to the house.

John BERGER (Southern Metropolitan) (13:56): Thank you for the opportunity to contribute to the discussion of this bill. The bill before us today is the Statute Law Amendment (References to the Sovereign) Bill 2023. It is specifically an amendment to an extensive selection of legislation containing references to the sovereign, which for everyone’s clarification is the British monarch, who is the head of state for both the state of Victoria and the Commonwealth of Australia. As of this year, that monarch is no longer Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II but is now her son King Charles III. Whilst the Andrews Labor government has congratulated King Charles in his ascension to the throne, it has presented an issue within the state laws, which must be addressed. The late Queen Elizabeth II reigned for a long and illustrious seven decades over Britain and the Commonwealth, a reign that saw great upheaval and change throughout the world. The world of 2023 would be virtually unrecognisable to the world the late Queen was coronated in. However, one thing has remained the same through all of those years: the wording of our legislation. That is right; several acts in force within Victoria specifically reference the monarch, with each reference, by the way, referring to the monarch as either ‘Her Majesty’ or ‘the Queen’. This is not reflective of reality, so we must go in and change it.

Before getting to the substance of this bill, I would just like to briefly touch on a few points. This is a very straightforward and plain bill. It has been put forward so that our legislation may reflect the reality of our state. I am sure that this chamber holds a diverse array of feelings and views on the monarchy and the monarchy’s relationship with the state of Victoria. The bill does not seek to divide those views. As of August 2023, the Victorian constitution states that the monarch of the Commonwealth is the head of state. That is a written fact, and it is important that our legislation is consistent with this. To ensure that our legislation is accurate, we must amend the references to ‘Her Majesty’ and ‘the Queen’. You would be forgiven for thinking the bill is a bit different to others, but that highlights one of the integral parts of good governance. One of our duties as a government is being responsible for ensuring that our legislation is up to date. Mostly this is manifested in reforms that reflect a change in society or societal values or when laws prove not to be effective, but that does not mean that clerical corrections do not count as an area that must be updated, and it is a responsible government that recognises this and takes the time to amend the laws.

Now, to turn to the actual contents of the bill, the bill seeks to amend 36 pieces of statute law within Victoria. The bill primarily focuses on the Interpretation of Legislation Act 1984, sometimes referred to as the ILA. The Interpretation of Legislation Act is an incredibly important part of Victoria’s legal system. It gives us the guidance needed to properly exercise the laws in this state. That is an important aspect of the functioning of our community here and can mean the difference between a fair society where everyone gets a go and one that does nothing to help the people that live in it. For this reason it is essential that the Interpretation of Legislation Act be accurate and up to date. It is a good government that does this. The interpretation of legislation can define so many aspects of Victorian life. It is an integral part of Victorian law, and it deals directly and in some depth with the linguistics and wording of our legislation. It stands to reason that a bill dealing with the meaning derived from the words of legislation should turn first to the Interpretation of Legislation Act to ensure that all relevant legislation may be interpreted in a manner in line with Victorian parliamentary standards.

The other acts that this bill seeks to amend are as follows. The Accident Compensation Act 1985, which pertains to the payment of compensation to accident victims, will be amended in section 129F(8), changing ‘Her Majesty’ to ‘His Majesty’. The Administration and Probate Act 1958, which consolidates laws relating to the administration of the estates of deceased persons, will be amended in section 84(4), with ‘Her Majesty’ being substituted with ‘His Majesty’.

The Attorney-General and Solicitor-General Act 1972, outlining the roles and responsibilities of the Attorney-General and other relevant legislative measures, is amended in three places. In section 3 ‘Her Majesty’s’ is substituted with ‘the’; in section 4, after ‘Her Majesty’s counsel’ the bill inserts ‘or His Majesty’s counsel’; and finally, in section 5 ‘Her Majesty’ becomes ‘the Crown in the right of Victoria’. Next is the Bail Act 1977, which outlines laws surrounding bail in Victoria. In sections 18A and 32 ‘His Majesty’ will be substituted for ‘Her Majesty’. The County Court Act 1958, the act that outlines the laws, responsibilities and regulations of our county courts, is amended twice in section 28A, changing ‘Her Majesty’ to ‘His Majesty’.

The Crimes Act 1958, the act consolidating our criminal law, will have several amendments, with sections 191(3), 206, 316, 404 and 405 all being updated to reflect the change in the head of state. In the Criminal Procedures Act 2009 section 327(1) will be amended to substitute ‘His Majesty’s’ for ‘Her Majesty’s’. The Crown Land (Reserves) Act 1978 will have ‘Her Majesty’ substituted with ‘His Majesty’ where it occurs in sections 5, 8, 15 and 19. Then we have the Crown Proceedings Act 1958. Being proceedings relating directly to the Crown, this act will be subject to 15 amendments throughout its many sections, all to ensure that they accurately describe the current monarch.

The Drugs, Poisons and Controlled Substances Act 1981 act covers some criminal law, so there is reference to ‘the Crown’. In sections 6, 30 and 83 every instance of ‘Her Majesty’ is substituted by ‘His Majesty’. Additionally, within the act, schedule 10 will include the words ‘His Majesty’. The Evidence Act 1958 will have its section 59 amended to feature the words ‘His Majesty’s’. In the Fire Rescue Victoria Act 1958, section 80(1)(a), the definition of ‘service’ will now include ‘Her Majesty or His Majesty’. The bill also touches on important acts that affect the very food we eat. The Fisheries Act 1995 and the Food Act 1984 both feature references to the monarch and therefore will be updated by this bill.

Other acts subject to more brief and minor alterations, in some instances just a single alteration, under the Statute Law Amendment (References to the Sovereign) Bill 2023 include, in no order, the Instruments Act 1958, the Racing Act 1958, the Sport and Recreation Act 1972 and the Unauthorized Documents Act 1958, with some more extensive amendments to be made to the Veterans Act 2005.

On the topic of laws and acts that are relevant to veterans, the Shrine of Remembrance Act 1978 also features in the amendment bill. The act pertains to one of the most iconic Melbourne landmarks, the Shrine of Remembrance, and I am glad to have the opportunity to talk about it. I am incredibly lucky to be close to the Shrine of Remembrance, and I am sure my constituents and colleagues in Southern Metropolitan share the same sense of pride in the shrine. The shrine is the most Southern Metro in all of Victoria, and it reminds us of the significance of the sacrifice that veterans have made for us. I look forward to being back there soon.

Many acts referenced within this bill relate directly to the functioning of our criminal and legal system, acts that affect prisoners such as the Prisoners (Interstate Transfer) Act 1983, the Summary Offences Act 1966 and the Sentencing Act 1991. Acts like the Public Safety Preservation Act 1958 will also be brought up to date, which is important as they directly address the safety of Victorians as we go about living our day-to-day lives in the community.

There are two acts included in this amendment bill that affect landlords within Victoria. Obviously due to the Crown’s ownership of Crown land, there are many references to the sovereign in the acts that address statute laws affecting land. The two land acts to be amended by this bill are the Transfer of Land Act 1958 and, far more notably, the Land Act 1958. Additionally, the Property Law Act 1958 will be amended by the bill. This is a very important law to every single Victorian as it addresses property protection within Victoria. As with other criminal and legal statutes, it is important that this remain up to date.

There are also instances in which this bill removes the reference to the monarchy altogether, but it is important to acknowledge and pay respect to Victoria’s head of state. The relationship that Victoria has with our sovereign has changed somewhat since the late Queen Elizabeth ascended to the throne 70 years ago in 1953. This is reflected in some of the legislation surrounding crime and policing. Unlike other amendments that have been referenced in which the feminine pronoun ‘Her’ is replaced with the masculine ‘His’ and references to the Queen are also altered to reference the King, these amendments will omit or remove references to the monarch. The last time our statute laws referencing the monarchy were subject to an amendment bill, Victorians were using pounds and shillings.

I never thought that I would have the opportunity to speak about the Canadian territory of Yukon in the Parliament of Victoria, but this bill gives me that opportunity. Yukon is the smallest and westernmost of Canada’s three territories. It is also the second-least-populated province or territory in Canada, with a population of 44,412 people – a small population – and yet the forward-thinking people of the Yukon, with the population of a single seat in the Parliament of Victoria, passed the References to the Sovereign Statute Law Amendment Act 2023 to update the legislative references to reflect the change from Queen to King and to streamline the process of similar updates in the future. Our bill takes a similar approach to this. The statement published by the governor of the Yukon explained the purpose of the bill:

In light of the passing of Her late Majesty Queen Elizabeth II in September 2022, His Majesty King Charles III became Canada’s new Sovereign and Head of State.

As a result of this transition, the Yukon’s legislation must be updated to reflect the identity of the current Sovereign of Canada. This bill will accomplish this while streamlining the process for similar updates in the future.

As with other statute law bills we have passed this year and in previous years, this bill is straightforward. It does not try and change the effect of the laws or how they operate. The overarching intent of this bill is to make minimal changes to Victoria’s statute book to ensure the terms remain legally accurate and the meanings and legal interpretations are preserved. If we are to look at the planned amendments to some statute laws relating to crime and policing, the Victoria Police Act 2013 will be amended to omit or remove references to the monarchy. ‘Her Majesty’s peace’ will now simply be ‘the peace’ – the peace that collectively belongs to all Victorians.

We have the responsibility to ensure that every statute law in this state is accurate and up to date, and sometimes that does mean sitting down and altering nearly 40 acts. Governance is a big job with a million little jobs that need to happen under it, and in the Andrews Labor government we understand that attention to legislative detail is just as important to delivering for Victorians as big and ambitious, life-changing project goals. Additionally, it should be noted that this bill does not amend every single legislative reference to the monarch. There are many, many more references to the monarch in our state laws that read ‘Her Majesty’ rather than the appropriate ‘His Majesty’.

I would also like to take the time to talk about and acknowledge why we need to go in to change our state law in the first place – the tragic passing of Queen Elizabeth II nearly a year ago and her heir and son King Charles III’s coronation earlier this year in May. I am sure everything that could have been said about the Queen has been said, but it would be wrong not to acknowledge just how significant her 70-year reign was. It would also be odd not to acknowledge and congratulate the King on his official coronation some months ago. I would like to echo the sentiments of the Premier when addressing the passing of the late Queen Elizabeth and wish the new King Charles a long and prosperous reign.

President, if I could leave you and my colleagues in this chamber with one takeaway from my contribution, it would be that this does not affect the functioning of the statute laws that are amended. It is an amendment in principle really – the principle that the Victorian people have a right to have up-to-date, accurate laws, which is a duty that decent governments recognise. So to this effect I commend the bill to the house.

Melina BATH (Eastern Victoria) (14:09): I am pleased to rise today to make a brief contribution to the Statute Law Amendment (References to the Sovereign) Bill 2023. In doing so I find myself partially agreeing with the Greens, with Dr Ratnam, on the fact that this government has got a very thin, a very weak legislative platform, with two bills wandering through this place in the whole of this week. I remember back in the 58th Parliament where it would be nothing to have four to five bills in the house each week. They are going to filibuster. I am going to speak on this one; I want to put some brief points down. Then they are going to waffle on and filibuster on various motions. Their legislative agenda is a bit of a dry desert, and it is paltry. I agree with Dr Ratnam in that context, but I disagree with Dr Ratnam insofar as finding this bill appealing is concerned.

This bill should be about housekeeping; it should be about changing references and acknowledging the fact that our beloved Queen of some 70 years has passed and that the King – now King Charles – has ascended the throne and is in her place. We need to have changes to references in legislation to reflect that. That is what this bill should be about. Indeed the purpose of the bill is in relation to the Interpretation of Legislation Act 1984 to amend the statute law of Victoria in terms of language referring to the sovereign.

My colleague Dr Bach has referenced a number of sections of this bill. I will not reprosecute them all, but where I have concerns is where the government decides to overreach, as it is often wont to do. Rather than keeping within its brief to update and housekeep the legislation, it overreaches. We do have a stable democracy. I am very thankful and blessed that Australia is one of the most stable democracies in the world. It is that not by chance but owing to the fact that we have a constitutional monarchy and that for decades and decades we have been able to self-determine and rule and positively guide our citizens through that constitutional monarchy. If this were to change – and in no way am I suggesting it should – the people of Australia, not the Premier of Victoria and his Department of Premier and Cabinet, his close inner circle, should be the decision-makers in that via a referendum. This bill is an overreach. What it seeks to do is remove certain capacities or areas where it should keep ‘His Majesty’. I will give you an example: in the Attorney-General and Solicitor-General Act 1972 this bill does not replace the formal title of ‘Her Majesty’s Attorney-General’ with ‘His Majesty’s Attorney-General’, it just trims it right back. It takes the monarchy out of these normal statute requirements, using ‘Attorney-General’. That is an example.

We on this side do not agree that that is useful. We do not want to see it watered down, even in signalling. This government is very good at virtue-signalling in a whole raft of public policies and domains. We do not want to see that happening in this bill, and we will not be supporting it unless Dr Bach’s very sensible amendments – textual amendments and amendments to various parts and sections of the bill – are supported. I ask the house to support those.

Finally in my brief contribution, I want to make reference to the fact that Queen Elizabeth was very much a guiding force. She was very stable. I am sure she could keep her own counsel and keep calm. On her passing last year, I spoke to members of my community, and they referenced her coming to Gippsland – flying into the Sale RAAF base and hopping on a train, which was on time. Indeed it was probably a special train for her. She passed through Sale and Traralgon to the Yallourn power station, as it was then, and moved on to Warragul. I remember one particular Traralgon lady – Suzanne Pinchen, who is a lovely lady – saying she was an only an infant when the Queen passed by but there was great pageantry and great celebration and an acknowledgement of this very happy event back in 1954.

We now have, I believe, a modern king: King Charles. I was at a citizenship ceremony only the other day. Once upon a time you saw a banner there with the Queen in her stately robes. Now if you go to a citizenship ceremony, there is just a modest photo of a modern king, and I think that reflects his acknowledgement of what needs to happen across the world and in terms of the Commonwealth. And yes, he has I believe quite modern views and important views to acknowledge. What this bill seeks to do is water down our constitutional monarchy, albeit subtly, but we do not need a subtle creep. We do not need a sneaky creep. I acknowledge and welcome Dr Bach’s amendments and note that if those amendments are lost, the Nationals will not be supporting this bill.

David LIMBRICK (South-Eastern Metropolitan) (14:16): I rise to speak on the Statute Law Amendment (References to the Sovereign) Bill 2023. With the passing of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II, a review of legislation containing references to the late monarch has been undertaken. These kinds of bills are generally uncontroversial and could be considered a legislative tidy-up, but somehow the opposition have managed to turn the debate into a strange proxy argument over republicans and monarchists and whether updating legislation to remove unnecessary references to the Crown is somehow an attack on the monarchy. While it is all very quaint to reflect on previous visits of the royal family to Victoria, I am not sure that other members actually had a good look at the legislation that is being amended by this bill.

There is one amendment proposed by this bill to an act which needs to be brought to the attention of the house, not just for its sovereign references but for the purpose of the section being amended. Clause 30 of the bill proposes to amend the Unlawful Assemblies and Processions Act 1958 to remove gendered references to the late monarch. Some might not be familiar with this act or the purpose of the statement containing the sovereign reference, so for their benefit I will provide some context to this. I will now literally read you the riot act:

Our Sovereign Lady the Queen doth command and charge all persons being here assembled immediately to disperse themselves and peaceably to depart to their own homes. God save the Queen.

These magical words, when spoken by a justice of the peace or magistrate at a riotous meeting, afford the powers under section 5, which I will paraphrase:

… if persons so unlawfully riotously and tumultuously assembled … happen to be killed maimed or hurt in the dispersing … the offenders shall be free discharged and indemnified of for and concerning the killing maiming or hurting of any such person … unlawfully assembled as aforesaid.

I am unsure what is more concerning to me: the licence to kill without consequence provided by this act or the fact that upon review the only amendment the government felt necessary to this archaic power was omitting ‘Lady the Queen’ and ‘God save the Queen’ from the proclamation that allows murder. The opposition – or as they would seemingly prefer it, Her Majesty’s opposition – have spent their review of this legislation splitting hairs over the titles of monarchs in various references and paying no attention to what this abhorrent legislation does.

In 1999 the Scrutiny of Acts and Regulations Committee completed a review of legislation at the request of the then Minister for Police and Emergency Services Mr Pat McNamara, including a review of the Unlawful Assemblies and Processions Act. Their report found the act to be redundant and called for its repeal for the following reasons:

1. The right of peaceful assembly is an important right in a modern, democratic society. The Act represents an unreasonable restriction on this right.

Indeed it does.

2. The Act reflects conditions that no longer exist in, and policy decisions that are no longer relevant to, contemporary Victorian society.

3. The Act is not part of the current practice of regulating assemblies and processions in Victoria.

4. The submissions received by the Committee, including that from Victoria Police, almost unanimously agree that the Act is redundant and should be repealed.

Hear, hear! The powers under this act have not been used for over 40 years, though they were most notably used in an attempt to disperse the Frankston riots, in my area, in 1979. I say ‘attempt’ as it was noted by police at the time that the noise from the crowd was so deafening it was doubtful the crowd even heard the justice of the peace read it. After the reading of the riot act to a group outside Frankston police station, police moved on the crowd, who turned and ran. Inspector Carl Mengler, who headed the police response, was quoted as saying at the time:

If they had stood their ground, it would have been very serious.

Indeed it would have been. Given what the riot act empowered those dispersing the rioters to do, the level of seriousness could have been far worse. Interestingly, John Finlayson, who was then director of the Pines Forest Community Centre, was adamant the riot erupted after a crippled man was mistakenly arrested in the belief he was merely drunk and was placed in a police van.

This act is old and outdated. It is so old in fact that a person would be mistaken in reading the amendments in clause 30 of the bill referring to the Queen as references to Queen Elizabeth II. This act’s origin in Victoria dates to 1860, meaning the monarch it refers to is not Queen Elizabeth but in fact Queen Victoria. The reason we have this version of the legislation comes from events which happened only days before its royal assent on 28 August 1860. Frustrated by the lack of action by Parliament concerning land rights and land unlocking – not much has changed there – a group of unhappy protesters marched on Parliament House and demanded changes to the land allocation scheme, which this upper house was denying. This resulted in police being called to intervene, injuries to both police and protesters and bricks being thrown into Parliament, which happened to be sitting at the time. It is worth noting that Parliament business was not interrupted at all amongst the sound of breaking glass over members’ statements. Today even a case of the sniffles is enough to prompt an evacuation of this building. How times have changed.

When parliamentary debate was ending over these new powers, those in opposition to the riot act cautioned the risk of misuse, stating that these powers:

… if not … closely watched, would result in serious inroads on the privileges, and even on the liberties, of subjects in this colony.

The history goes back a little further than that, though. The words I read out earlier when I read the riot act from English legislation are over 300 years old. The words from the original riot act of 1714 are almost identical. And because I enjoy it, again I shall read you the riot act, Deputy President:

Our Sovereign Lord the King chargeth and commandeth all persons, being assembled, immediately to disperse themselves, and peaceably to depart to their habitations, or to their lawful business, upon the pains contained in the Act made in the first year of King George, for preventing tumults and riotous assemblies.

God save the King.

This act was repealed in England and Wales in 1967 and all of the United Kingdom in 1973. Our Parliament has recommended that it be repealed. Rather than updating references to the sovereign, the government should have simply repealed this act. After watching how this government has involved itself in the lives of more and more Victorians in recent years, I can confidently say the powers within this act do not belong in the hands of this or any other government so eager to establish inroads into Victoria’s liberties. Any maintenance being performed on these powers calls for the question of why these powers are even being maintained in the first place. Does the government intend to use them? I hope not.

Michael GALEA (South-Eastern Metropolitan) (14:23): I also rise to speak on the Statute Law Amendment (References to the Sovereign) Bill 2023. I rise to speak on what I expected to be a rather mundane bill. There has been some discussion about the importance or otherwise of this bill. I think it is an important thing to reflect on our legislation and adapt it to the times, but I would agree that it probably is one of the less exciting things that we could be discussing. But apparently not, because members of His Majesty’s most loyal opposition today, which is an expression we do not often use in this place – I am surprised they do not refer to themselves that way, if that is how they are asking to be referred to – have raised a number of concerns, as Mr Limbrick said, some rather bizarre concerns, about this bill, as they did in the Assembly two weeks ago. We saw this bill go to a division in the Legislative Assembly over supposedly removing some references to the sovereign through this bill.

It is quite telling that this is the legislative priority that the opposition – sorry, His Majesty’s most loyal opposition – wishes to talk about in this place. There are many other things going on of course. This government is getting on with delivering, and that is both within the Parliament and outside the Parliament. A number of things are underway this week. The expansion of the casual sick pay guarantee is just one of the things happening this week. So there is certainly no shortage of things happening. But the opposition are saying, ‘This is the issue. We’ve found it. Gotcha. This is our path to success. This is the way we’re going to get the government. This is the bill. Archaic references to the sovereign are an important thing to keep – this is what we want to have a stand on.’ In the contributions from some of the opposition members today we have heard ‘slippery slope’, ‘water down’, ‘sneaky’ – apparently this is a sneaky bill – and ‘tricky’. It is not; it is actually quite straightforward. In fact the changes that are being brought into many acts under the statute law amendment –

Matthew Bach interjected.

Michael GALEA: No, I do not want to be president, Dr Bach. The changes that this legislation is bringing in are basically updating the wording to mirror what is in other legislation that we would ordinarily bring in anyway. It is actually just bringing it up to date, so it is quite bizarre again. As I said, the leader of His Majesty’s most loyal opposition has obviously decided that this is the issue to go forward with. They are emboldened by their success on the weekend, winning a seat that they have held for generations. They think this is a great victory that sends a great message to Labor, even though Labor did not run a candidate in that seat. I know it is maybe up there in importance with the display that we saw from an opposition frontbencher on Sunday with a very exciting press conference. I think the new season of CSI: Berwick is going to keep us all in stitches this year. But these are the priorities that the opposition brings to the house today, and these are the issues on which they say, ‘No. You’ve got it wrong.’ We have brought it to the house, and you are saying that, frankly, a straightforward piece of legislation is outrageous and you must bring in amendments and you must debate it.

Matthew Bach interjected.

Michael GALEA: I certainly look forward, Dr Bach, to committee of the whole on this, assuming that we do get to a committee of the whole, which with the way this is going it seems like we very well may. I look forward to you asking all your questions of the Attorney-General by addressing her by her formal title, which is ‘His Majesty’s Attorney-General’. I have not actually heard that phrase said at all this year in the Parliament – I know I have not served here as long as some others have – but I expect to hear it today. If you cannot say it on this bill, when can you? Look, all going well, this straightforward bill should go ahead, so apart from adding a bit of flair into sentences, it will no longer be necessary to address the AG as ‘His Majesty’s Attorney-General’. Again the priorities of the Liberal Party are slightly unbeknownst to me, but I wish them all the best with that.

I also thank Mr Limbrick for his contribution on the bill, which was very interesting about that act. I am keen to have a look at that because it does sound like quite the archaic act. I am very happy to see that we are going one step towards a more modern and reflective legislation. In no way is this a slippery slope to republicanism. Look, no doubt there would be members on my side who would be very happy if it was, but it is not. It is certainly not. I note Dr Ratnam. I thank her for her contribution. She seemed to be excited by the prospect too, but I hate to say that, look, it is actually a very, very mundane bill. It does not change our constitutional status. We are still going to be a constitutional monarchy governed under King Charles III, as we have been for some months now, and it is appropriate that we amend our legislation and adapt it to the times, including adapting to the fact that we do have a male monarch now. Frankly, that is a bit of a weird thing to say. All my life I have grown up having Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II as my queen, and frankly so did my parents as well. They were both born during the Elizabethan era too. It actually seems very strange to be in a position to refer to ‘the King’ and not ‘the Queen’. I know it is going to take a lot of us quite some time.

I will not go into lengthy tributes, but I do note some of the contributions from other speakers. She was a fantastic monarch, and I know we all dearly miss her. To have a queen last through such a long period of time and through so many generational shifts was quite a remarkable thing, especially in these days. I am joining other colleagues on this side in wishing King Charles III all of our support as his perhaps most loyal Legislative Council – I am not sure if that is the expression. I know that ‘most loyal opposition’ is more commonly used, but the government too are equally loyal to him. At some point we may yet come to having another referendum in this country on that question, and I am sure there will be many arguments made on both sides at the time, and as others have said, the Victorian and the Australian people will then decide. It is not for the state government to unilaterally declare ourselves a republic, and that is exactly what we are not doing. We are not doing that. There is no slippery slope. It is not sneaky, it is not tricky, it is not watering down. It is none of those things. Quite frankly it is a bizarre approach for the opposition to take.

Now, Mr Berger gave us a most fulsome contribution on all the very many bills that this will actually affect in very good, fulsome and thorough detail, and I appreciate his contribution for that. I cannot say there was anything particularly in there that I found all that surprising, all that terribly exciting, that we are actually going to see some major change. There is no line, ‘Oh, by the way, Victoria is going to become a republic unilaterally.’ That line certainly is not in there. But we are now in the third Carolean age, coming from, as I say, a very long time of having Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth as our monarch, and it is appropriate that our legislation changes with the times and that rather than ‘Her Majesty’ we now refer to ‘His Majesty’. Again, it sounds very strange to me to say even still, and it probably will for some time to come – and how wonderful a thing that we have had such a wonderful female role model in all of our lives for such a long period of time.

Beyond updating the references to ‘His Majesty’, the bill also amends the Interpretation of Legislation Act 1984 to clarify the operation of specific provisions and further futureproof the legislation for future demises or successions of the Crown. I note that it is, I believe, only the third time since the Parliament of Victoria first met in 1851 that we have had to change the gender references to the monarch. Again, as members would know, in the 19th century it was Queen Victoria, and it has changed a couple of times backwards and forwards since then. In all likelihood for most of our lifetimes probably, but certainly for most of the time that all of us will be here, it will continue to be ‘His Majesty’. We have got two generations below, both male. It was great to see the UK change its laws a few years ago around male primogeniture and to see a more equal system brought in so that for future generations, whichever sex a child is born to a future king or queen, they will be the next king or queen. It will not just be the first male; it will be the first child, as it frankly it should be. We may well be a republic by then; we may not be. We may well have a future king or queen, and it would be very good to see a future queen again for the United Kingdom and Australia if we are still a part of the Commonwealth and monarchy by then.

Beyond those relatively simple changes, I know Mr Berger also referred to the Canadian territory of the Yukon. I note the Northern Territory in Australia has already changed its legislation too on this very issue, and it all seems to be rather straightforward. Again, it is only the Victorian Liberals who seem to have a major issue with these sorts of relatively mundane changes. Again, it is good to add some colour, it is good to add some excitement, and I certainly appreciate that we have had that today, as I believe our colleagues in the Assembly had in the last sitting week as well.

I note that in the Assembly last week the member for Kew – and I believe these might be the same amendments that the good Dr Bach is raising today – really objected to some of the changing of phrases. Some of the phrases that are apparently so outrageous to be changing are, firstly, changing ‘Our Lord the King’ to ‘the King’; ‘His Majesty’s most loyal opposition’ to simply ‘opposition’; also, ‘His Majesty’s Attorney-General’. We have already talked about that, and I look forward to Attorney-General Symes being referred to by her apparently proper title, which is ‘His Majesty’s Attorney-General’. There is ‘His Majesty’s solicitor-general’ as well.

The other thing they say is that this is some sort of great, radical shift, that it is virtue signalling, that it is changing things by deceit, that we are sneaking stuff in there. I actually point out to members of His Majesty’s most loyal opposition that in 2002 in the United Kingdom Parliament the then Blair government made, again, a relatively procedural change in laws. I believe that it was the Police Reform Act 2002 – yes, it was, and the member for Monbulk talked about this extensively in her contribution on this bill last week in the Assembly – that actually did a similar thing: it replaced mentions of ‘our Lady the Queen’ to simply ‘the Queen’ and also removed other references to ‘Her Majesty’s subjects’ ‍– again, not radical stuff.

The United Kingdom Parliament passed laws which had very similar effects as to what the opposition today are saying are so outrageous. They did that 21 years ago, and I do not really see a decline in the moral fervour for monarchy in the UK. We saw absolutely tens and thousands of people lining up in the streets of London for the coronation this year and even more so last year when Her Majesty did pass away, so I cannot say that the United Kingdom is a hotbed of republican activity at the moment. But according to the Liberals, 21 years after that law you would think that the United Kingdom was. You would think that they would be marching through the streets demanding a republic. Again, there are these references that they are getting so ventilated about, so excited about and having this great moral panic about, with Dr Bach’s amendments as well. Perhaps these are the most important issues in Dr Bach’s area. I suspect not. Perhaps they are the most important issues for the member for Kew, who raised similar amendments in the Assembly last week, but I can tell you that they are not the most important things for my constituents in the south-eastern suburbs.

This is a government that is getting on with the job and delivering real practical reform, real improvements and real new infrastructure and services across the fields of transport, education and health. We are addressing cost-of-living pressures. The power saving bonus is ending in two days as well, and that has been a massive boon this year. We have seen a huge take-up in the community of that $250 power saving bonus. Again, as I say, this is a government that is getting on and delivering, including through the legislature here with bills. We have busier weeks and we have quieter weeks, but every day we are out there in the community delivering, and we will continue to do that. Meanwhile, what do we have from the opposition? We have bizarre press conferences, we have celebrations over keeping one of their safest seats and we even have today ventilating and jumping up and down saying this is outrageous and talking about references to ‘Our Lady the Queen’, all these archaic references to ‘His Majesty’ and other things as well.

This is a very, very simple bill. This is changing the law in a very simple way from ‘Her Majesty’ to ‘His Majesty’ and removing some of the more archaic parts of our references as well. I will use the expression one last time. For His Majesty’s most loyal opposition to be up and about ventilating about this today – I use that phrase with pleasure because I know if this bill does pass it will no longer be accurate to say – if this is the issue that they want to jump up and down about, by all means they can go for it. But real Victorians know that they have a government that is getting on and delivering for each and every one of them.

Trung LUU (Western Metropolitan) (14:37): I rise today to contribute on the Statute Law Amendment (References to the Sovereign) Bill 2023. The purpose of this bill is a legitimate one. Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II has died. His Majesty King Charles III has acceded to the throne and now is the constitutional monarch of Australia. This means that several of our statutes that refer to ‘the Queen’ or ‘Her Majesty’ are now textually incorrect and need to be corrected to refer to ‘the King’ or ‘His Majesty’. This is proper and should be a simple task to accomplish, but it seems that the government has taken opportunity to implement some republicanism by stealth. Many of the amendments contained in this bill appear to remove references to the sovereign with no valid reason. Australia is a constitutional monarchy and will continue to be one until the Australian people decide otherwise. As long as we are a constitutional monarchy, as long as we are a government administered on behalf of the Crown, it is right that our statutes reflect this legal reality and that our statutes reflect the traditions of the language that evolved through our continual history.

Many in the other place as well as in this house have discussed several of these changes. I want to discuss one in particular which relates to the many Australians who have dedicated their entire serving lives in serving our community and our country. As a police officer of 28 years, the changes to the Victoria Police Act 2013 interest me particularly and very personally. Clause 32 of this bill amends the Victoria Police Act, Schedule 2, which contains the oath that must be sworn by a police officer when they become one in Victoria. The current oath, the oath that I made when I joined the police force, is:

… well and truly serve Our Sovereign Lady the Queen as a police officer … that I will see and cause Her Majesty’s peace to be kept and preserved …

This bill will amend the police oath, but not in a good way. Yes, it will keep reference to the sovereign, but where it should replace ‘Lady the Queen’ with ‘Lord the King’ it will instead simply delete the reference to the Queen and no mention will be made of the King. Where it should replace ‘Her Majesty’s peace’ with ‘His Majesty’s peace’, it will delete the mention of the Queen and simply call it ‘the peace’. Why does this matter? Let me explain very simply why it is so. It is true that it is a small change, and many others may argue so and that it will not make any legal differences, but it will make a symbolic difference, and symbolism matters in how we think about our political duties, especially for servants of the Crown, like a government minister, judge and me, a former police officer. In the words of a former Lord Chief Justice of England and Wales, the concept of the Queen’s peace is unbreakably linked with the common law. It refers to public quietness and tranquillity and the entitlement of every citizen to go about his or her lawful business without interference from any malevolent forces. This peace is part of the common good of society, and it is the King’s peace because the king is a symbol of unity and a symbol of continuity, and that lasts beyond the change of any competing political parties. The King’s peace is a peace that belongs to the permanent interests of the community. It is important that when a police officer swears to keep the peace they understand their loyalty is to the people, not ultimately to the government of the day or a particular political party. Their promise is to serve the King and the people.

The reputation of the police was harmed in many ways and they lost the trust of people in many ways in Victoria owing to what happened during COVID. The Labor government asked police to enforce law that infringed on many basic civil liberties. They were told to close playgrounds. They were told to arrest women for being at the beach. They were told to arrest people for posting things on Facebook. Just think about that. They were told to fire bullets on protesters. I escaped a regime of communism and suppression. This behaviour of an authoritarian regime is not liberal democracy. Most of my former police colleagues disagreed with these rules, and many have told me they could not in good conscience enforce them, but as many do, professional officers have sworn an oath to the King and to the people to continue to carry out their duties. Perhaps some of them remember their oath – they remember that their ultimate loyalty is to the King’s peace, the peace of society at large. They saw some government policy was undermining instead of serving the peace, and I know many resigned because of this. The public have lost trust in the police because of what has been done, and some of the police have resigned because of it.

It is important that when we make necessary change to our statute law to reflect the change in monarch we do not throw away important ideas without a reason. Clause 32 would remove an important idea of the police officer’s oath, an oath they have sworn, to serve and protect. The idea of their promise is that we keep the King’s peace. This concerns me deeply. I support the amendments and moves to improve this bill.

Jacinta ERMACORA (Western Victoria) (14:44): The passing of Queen Elizabeth II on 8 September 2022 was a significant moment around the world. She served as monarch for more than seven decades and was an integral figure of our times, a constant presence in the lives of multiple generations. This bill will update the language of the state of Victoria and its laws, changing references from ‘Her Majesty’ to ‘His Majesty’ and similar terms due to the passing of the Queen and the accession of King Charles to the throne.

I was in London at the time that the Queen died last year. I was there for an extended holiday. In fact I was having dinner in a restaurant in central London with a British MP at the moment that her death was announced. The discussion was all about what would happen – what the procedural and ceremonial actions were that would have to take place for her as a result of the death of the monarch, not least of which was the recalling of the British Parliament. In London over the days that followed the death, there was quite a different tone in the city. There were a lot of people just continuing on their ordinary lives, but also a lot of people wearing more black than usual. It was summertime, so black was not a normal T-shirt colour across London, but it certainly was for the couple of weeks following. My hairdresser was very keen to know if the funeral would provide her with a public holiday. Then after some discussion she realised that there were two possible public holidays – another one for the coronation of King Charles.

Then on the Saturday after the Queen’s death my family, my husband and I took a train trip to Windsor. We thought we would go and have a look at Windsor. I must admit we accidentally met Harry and Megan at Windsor – it was when the four of them came out. We found ourselves behind a barrier, and the next minute we were in the crowd. That prompted several days of discussion and debate in my extended family about the future of the monarchy. There is a level of acceptance in London. There was no question – ‘The Queen has died. We’ve got a King now.’ In Australia the conversation was, ‘The Queen has died. Should we still have a monarchy?’ So there was a real difference across the community in that conversation.

In the end the mood in London was reflective, it was respectful and it was also disinterested all at the same time – a bit like this bill. The primary objective of this bill is to update the language of various state of Victoria statutes. The current legislation refers to ‘Her Majesty’ and includes similar terms which are no longer accurate following the death of the Queen, who was female, and the accession of her successor, who is male. It is pretty simple really.

There have only been four occasions in modern Victorian history when the gender of the sovereign has changed following the death of the monarch. Few would remember the last time this happened, when Queen Elizabeth II assumed the throne in 1952. Although the Interpretation of Legislation Act 1984 provides that references to ‘Her Majesty’ should be interpreted as referring to her successor and words importing a gender include the other gender, the passing of a female sovereign and the succession of a male one leaves the actual wording of each act incorrect. This bill aims to rectify that and ensure our laws are both relevant and accurate.

Let us be clear: there is no hidden agenda here, although those opposite would be delighted to be able to evidence one. It is intended to correct formal errors, ambiguities and omissions in the existing laws. These types of amendments are standard legislative practice and are not intended to introduce any substantive changes to the law. Further, the Scrutiny of Acts and Regulations Committee, SARC, play a role in evaluating all bills introduced to Parliament, including checks for compatibility with human rights and certain legislative norms. SARC found no issues with this bill in its August 2023 Alert Digest No. 8.

Other Australian jurisdictions have also made similar changes, all a little bit differently. Western Australia, the Northern Territory and of course – how could I not mention – the Canadian territory of the Yukon have passed similar legislation, aiming to keep their statutes updated in light of changes of the sovereign.

Importantly, this bill does not aim to make retrospective changes and does not amend the constitution, as such an endeavour would require additional legislative steps. The bill will update references to the sovereign in the list of specific acts, ranging from the Workers Compensation Act 1958 to the Accident Compensation Act 1985. I am sure a great deal of work and thought has gone into the overarching goal of this bill: to make minimal technical adjustments to the Victorian statute book. The aim is to absolutely preserve current meanings and legal interpretations.

I believe it is also critical to note that constitutions and legal arrangements are living documents that change to reflect the values and understandings of society at any given time. The state of Victoria is no exception and has made important changes to recognise that before kings and queens there was – and there is – in this state the oldest continuous culture on earth. I do not feel that we can talk about this issue without making that acknowledgement. We acknowledge we have a rich and ancient heritage that predates the monarch and the founding of this state in its current form. This is why in 2004 we changed our constitution by inserting new section 1A into the Victorian Constitution Act 1975 to provide that:

(1) The Parliament acknowledges that the events described in the preamble to this Act occurred without proper consultation, recognition or involvement of the Aboriginal people of Victoria.

(2) The Parliament recognises that Victoria’s Aboriginal people, as the original custodians of the land on which the Colony of Victoria was established –

(a) have a unique status as the descendants of Australia’s first people; and

(b) have a spiritual, social, cultural and economic relationship with their traditional lands and waters within Victoria; and

(c) have made a unique and irreplaceable contribution to the identity and well-being of Victoria.

It is worth reflecting that Victoria has been a pioneer among Australian states in seeking a treaty and pursuing truth with its First Nations people. The establishment of the First Peoples’ Assembly of Victoria is highly notable, with this body being both independent and democratically elected. It represents the traditional owners of the land as well as Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples in Victoria. The ongoing treaty negotiations between the First Peoples’ Assembly and the state government symbolise a sincere commitment to rectifying past injustices and building a more equitable future. Many of these past injustices initially occurred in the name of, in history’s case, His Majesty the King. The aim is to reach Australia’s first ever treaty with First Nations people, which will no doubt be a monumental achievement in this state’s legal and social history. This represents an important change, and it is worth noting that legal systems can and do adapt to be more profound understandings of justice and representation.

In looking back over the history of the monarchy while contemplating this bill, I was struck by some of the legal complexities that have arisen throughout history with the change of monarchs. We have had multiple changes of gender over the hundreds of years – male monarchs going on and on, and then we have had several times where there has been, unfortunately, no male monarch available and only a female one. There have certainly been strong and long-lasting female monarchs. They are Elizabeth I, Victoria and Elizabeth II.

Today we are debating a bill that makes changes to legislation due to the fact that we have a new King rather than another Queen, and that is definitely no great complication for this chamber to address. There is no conspiracy afoot here either, as those opposite are desperately trying to suggest. Nothing contained in this bill undermines our national system of government; it is simply just a case of modern drafting practice. This bill does not cancel the 21st century, as suggested by those opposite, and despite how Dr Ratnam referred to it, there are no hidden meanings. But of course it is not that surprising that we would have those opposite subscribing to a conspiracy theory, because that is what has been going on over the last few months and certainly this week. It truly is an incredible stretch to argue that this procedural statute law amendment bill is a secret move by the state of Victoria to make Australia a republic. That is just simply not possible to do. If there is so much connection to the use of the phrase ‘Her Majesty’, or in this case ‘His Majesty’, as has been discussed already, perhaps the names of the parties opposite might be changed to ‘His Majesty’s Liberal Party’ and ‘His Majesty’s National Party’, if that would make everything a bit more comfortable for you.

These changes really are meant to align the legislation with modern standards and language, although you could argue that it is not particularly modern to include reference to a monarch in a democracy such as ours. But it does happen without affecting the underlying policy or any policies or actions of the government. Like others in this chamber today, I am a bit astonished that it is necessary to point out that the power to change Australia’s status as a constitutional monarchy does rest with the federal government. Legal language does evolve to reflect societal changes, including shifts in governance, and it is standard practice for legal documents to be updated and remain clear and relevant. Clearly the passing of Queen Elizabeth II has increased debate about our ongoing connection to the monarchy, but that is not being addressed in this bill. Instead it is using clear and modern language to strengthen the effectiveness of the law and, by extension, the institutions it upholds, including in this case the constitutional monarchy. It can only be said, in conclusion, that the fears of the opposition surrounding these amendments are not substantiated by the actual content and intent of the bill.

Gaelle BROAD (Northern Victoria) (14:58): Today I rise to speak in relation to the Statute Law Amendment (References to the Sovereign) Bill 2023. It is strange that the title of the bill says ‘references to the sovereign’ and yet it actually removes them in the bill. It should be a relatively straightforward bill that seeks to update the statute law of Victoria to revise language that refers to the Queen, or Her Majesty the Queen, following her passing after a historic 70-year reign. With His Majesty King Charles III now being the head of state, updates need to be made to 38 different acts, and we certainly wish the King a very long and prosperous reign. I would particularly like to acknowledge the work of Jess Wilson, the member for Kew, who engaged with Liberals and Nationals colleagues and with the Victorian Bar association, the Law Institute of Victoria, the Australian Monarchist League, the Australian Republic Movement, the Police Association Victoria and many others when considering this bill.

The bill will update Victorian laws to replace ‘Her Majesty’ with ‘His Majesty’ and similar terms, such as ‘her’ to ‘his’, and ‘Queen’ to ‘King’, as relevant. However, there are several proposed changes in the bill that go too far by removing reference, for example, to the sovereign. While the state government has indicated that there is no intention to change the effect of these laws, the proposed amendments result in symbolic changes when we have had no change to our system of government and the ongoing connection to the sovereign as our head of state. The drafting appears to go beyond the scope of the bill, and the Liberals and Nationals have proposed several amendments that better reflect the true intention of the bill. I thank Dr Bach for putting these amendments forward in the chamber and my colleagues Melina Bath and Trung Luu, who have been contributing to the debate on this bill.

For young women across the world, the Queen demonstrated consistent leadership and respect for others regardless of their background, so she was a real role model. On her 21st birthday, 21 April 1947, Princess Elizabeth was on a tour of South Africa, and in a speech broadcast on radio from Cape Town, she dedicated her life to the service of the Commonwealth. She said:

On my twenty-first birthday I welcome the opportunity to speak to all the peoples of the British Commonwealth and Empire, wherever they live, whatever race they come from, and whatever language they speak.

She went on to say:

If we all go forward together with an unwavering faith, a high courage, and a quiet heart, we shall be able to make of this ancient commonwealth, which we all love so dearly, an even grander thing – more free, more prosperous, more happy and a more powerful influence for good in the world …

To accomplish that we must give nothing less than the whole of ourselves. There is a motto which has been borne by many of my ancestors – a noble motto, “I serve” …

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.

But I shall not have strength to carry out this resolution alone unless you join in it with me, as I now invite you to do: I know that your support will be unfailingly given. God help me to make good my vow, and God bless all of you who are willing to share in it.

Well, the Queen’s life and service honoured that pledge, and she became the longest serving monarch in British history, reigning for 70 years and living until the age of 96. The Queen was a role model for women in leadership, and I have always admired her unwavering faith, compassion and dedication to service.

The Queen visited Victoria 11 times and travelled to many places in Northern Victoria, including Tatura, Echuca, Rochester and Castlemaine. In 1954 Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II opened the Victorian Parliament, and she came to Melbourne again in 2006 to open our Commonwealth Games. They were exciting times, but not ones that we are likely to see again under this current government. During Australia’s bicentenary celebrations, the Queen visited Canberra to open Parliament House on 9 May 1988. I was just a teenager at the time, and I remember standing outside the front of Parliament House waiting patiently to see the Queen. In her opening speech, she said:

This new Parliament House will become the workplace for the men and women into whose hands Australians choose to place legislative and executive responsibility. The chambers will become the centres for debate on all the pressing issues of government, and future generations of Australians will look to those who work here for national security, wise legislation and fair administration.

You could say that for a time I lived parallel lives with the Queen. I remember on several occasions while our family was on that trip in Canberra that our Mitsubishi van had to stop as the parade of her lovely black Rolls-Royces would go past. So yes, we certainly were living parallel lives. Every one of us has memories of the Queen, and we are fortunate to have lived during this time to see this period in history.

There are many venues across the region that remind us of the royal family. Last weekend I was at the football at the Queen Elizabeth Oval in Bendigo. Another key venue in Bendigo is the Prince of Wales Showgrounds, and that hosts events all year round. But I trust as changes are made to revise and update these acts that the memory of the Queen and her unwavering desire to see Parliament as a place of wise legislation and fair administration will always be remembered.

David ETTERSHANK (Western Metropolitan) (15:04): I rise to make a contribution to the Statute Law Amendment (References to the Sovereign) Bill 2023. Given the pro-republican flavour of many of my previous contributions in this place, I suspect it is no surprise that I would jump at the chance to speak on a bill of this kind, even when it is something as mundane as basically a sort of control-F-and-replace statute amendment bill. But some here do not seem to consider this to be a mundane bill. They even appear to suggest that these amendments could be a vehicle for republicanism by stealth. Would you believe it? A statute amendment bill is going to make us a republic – if only. I wish. If it was only that easy, then we could ring up our beloved Prime Minister, Albo, and I bet he would be just thrilled to know that he need not spend millions of dollars on a republican referendum ‍– ‘Don’t worry, Albo, the Victorian Labor government has got it sorted.’

We have heard numerous complaints in the Legislative Assembly and in this place regarding this bill, particularly those parts that opted to remove explicit references to the sovereign. One was an objection to the Crown Proceedings Act 1958 removing references such as ‘our Lady Queen’ and replacing them with ‘King’ instead of ‘our Lord the King’. It is comical, and some, including me, would go so far as to say that it is inane that in this day and age this would be a point of contention. Who in modern Australia could really relate to such a turn of phrase? If you are under 70 and you can relate to this phrase of ‘our Lord the King’, I would just have to suggest you need to stop watching re-runs of Game of Thrones. We have moved beyond that. We need modern language that reflects a modern Australia. We have matured as a nation, and we should use this maturity to discuss the future of our nationhood. It is my hope that this takes the form of self-determination and, better yet, a republic.

Over the last few weeks our nation has been transfixed by the spectacular efforts of the Matildas at the FIFA Women’s World Cup. Cruelly, their journey was unfortunately cut short by England’s team, but what did our next potential head of state have to say during the lead-up to this match? ‘Good luck, England.’

Michael Galea: Shame!

David ETTERSHANK: Shame, shame. And what about us, his loyal subjects? Well, apparently nothing – nothing at all. Here we see the crux of the issue. For all our talk of everyone deserving a fair go, Australia can never have an Australian head of state. Instead we have a foreign monarch whose role is handed down within a single family generation after generation by divine providence. Empowered as they are, they purportedly represent our nation and our national identity. Pigs fly, too. Republicanism is not a political statement. It is a question of personal and national identity. It is about democracy, in terms of both participation and representation. Most importantly, republicanism is about reconciling our present and our future with 65,000 years of unceded and continuous occupancy. This, however – this bill before us today – is a simple statute law amendment bill to correct ambiguities, references and errors found in statutes by way of references to ‘Her Majesty’ and similar terms. The bill will also futureproof legislation for demises or successions of the sovereign – remember, today’s rooster is tomorrow’s feather duster.

Although Legalise Cannabis Victoria will support this bill, it is my hope that such futureproofing will become redundant. By this I mean to say that I hope that history records King Charles as the last king of Australia as it peacefully transitions to a republic and, further, that history records that this occurs but a few short years after this country constitutionally recognises 65,000 years of continuous Indigenous ownership with voice, truth-telling and treaty.

Ryan BATCHELOR (Southern Metropolitan) (15:10): I am delighted, absolutely delighted, to be joining this debate on the Statute Law Amendment (References to the Sovereign) Bill 2023. I think that many members in the course of this debate have made insightful contributions on firstly why it is unfortunately necessary to be attending to this in the Parliament and making updates to various pieces of state legislation to more appropriately reflect the current title of our sovereign but also our frustration and exasperation with the fact that this is still necessary in this state and in this country in this century; the fact that we are so beholden to the circumstances and twists of fate that surround a family on the other side of the world, with its curious, sometimes glorious, often ridiculous lineage; and the fact that it is still a matter that this Parliament needs to address both in today’s legislation in terms of amending the terms of the various aspects of statute that require an update from ‘Her Majesty’ to ‘His Majesty’. But then potentially, and hopefully at some point in the future, we can actually turn our minds to the more substantive question about why it is that we need in any way, shape or form to reflect that our head of state is there by dint of birth and not by dint of the will of the Australian people and why it is that they are on the other side of the world with very little engagement in the day-to-day affairs of our nation.

As Mr Ettershank so rightly pointed out recently, with respect to the achievements of our national women’s football team, they do not care about our successes either, and that family, for all that it has done for so many over so many years, does not reflect the realities, hopes or aspirations of modern Australia. It is a stain on our statute books that we need to be doing this today, because the bill does need to amend references in Victorian legislation following the death of Queen Elizabeth II and on the assumption of King Charles III to the throne. And obviously as one of the realms – one of the 14 or so, I think it is, realms – of the Commonwealth of which King Charles III is the reigning sovereign, we are required to go through the process, because of that hereditary passage, to update our statutes.

It is not the first time that Victoria has had to do this. Queen Victoria, after whom the state was named, was on the throne in 1837, and we had to manage the assumption of Edward VII in 1901, just after the federation of our nation. Obviously when Queen Elizabeth assumed the throne in 1952 and now that Charles III is on the throne in 2022, we have had to go through this process of shifting backwards and forwards between Her Majesty and His Majesty – a sort of linguistic hokey-pokey it seems – to keep up to date with what is going on in that now English, once German, family.

It is important to understand that various pieces of state legislation, including the Interpretation of Legislation Act 1984, do provide some degree of coverage in respect of the interpretation of legislation in which the relevant term of ‘Her Majesty and successor’ operates, but it is actually the fact that we have got incorrect laws on the statute book now that we need to adopt. This is a not infrequent part of parliamentary practice and custom to ensure that our statute books are kept up to date. From time to time we have passed statute law revision bills which do this important if unglamorous task of making sure that the legislation modernises words, phrases and styles – editorial changes. They do not in any way create policy changes or substantive changes to the law, and that is not what the bill before us does. It is not, as members opposite would like to suggest, some sort of vanguard for republicanism. As I have mentioned, sadly, it is not that. It is merely a tidying up of various acts.

That is what the practice of this legislation is obviously trying to do. It is a feature common of this Parliament but also of other parliaments, and other parliaments in Australia have undertaken the task of updating various parts of their statute book. It is also a task that has fallen to various jurisdictions in other realms – I should get the terminology right, because they are not sovereign nations; strictly speaking, they are realms of the sovereign.

A member: We could teleport there.

Ryan BATCHELOR: We could teleport there. Yes, that is right. I will get to the titles later, do not worry. There is a lot that has been going on around the world, including in various parts of other federal jurisdictions, including in Canada. What the bill does do is amend references for ‘His Majesty’ or ‘Her Majesty’ to ensure that that transition has taken place. I think it is important to note that in the terms of this legislation amendments are not being made to the Constitution Act 1975, because of the nature and the special place that that act has, and some of the special provisions in terms of manner and forms provisions that exist in the state Constitution Act would preclude that sort of simple technical amendment. So it is not making those bigger changes. It is amending a degree of acts, including the Accident Compensation Act 1985, the Administration and Probate Act 1958, the Attorney-General and Solicitor-General Act 1972, the Bail Act 1977, the County Court Act 1958, the Crimes Act 1958, and the list goes on and on.

I want to spend a little bit of time, perhaps more substantively, talking about the particular ludicrousness of our constitutional arrangements, whereby a foreign family is held up as a beacon and bastion and importantly retains so many important pieces of power over both the state of Victoria and the nation of Australia, and my discomfort with that. I think that it is time, more broadly, that Victoria and Australia took the mature step of ensuring that we have an Australian as our head of state. I do not think it should be beyond us as a nation to do that.

In the context of contemporary debates I think there are a couple of matters that are going to be before the Australian people shortly, if I can be frank, that are more important, and they are the recognition of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples in our national constitution and the establishment of the Voice to Parliament. I will be voting yes at that referendum when it is held in coming months. I think that is an exceptionally important next step that Australia needs to take, but it cannot be the last step that Australia takes in terms of modernising our foundational documents, because I do not think that paying tribute to, recognising or supporting funding on the tours of a sovereign from the other side of the world is part of where Australia’s contemporary identity is. I will quote the full title, because I think it is important to get the full extent of its ridiculousness onto the parliamentary record:

… the Most High, Most Mighty and Most Excellent Monarch, our Sovereign Lord –

King Charles III –

of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and of His other Realms –

not ‘the’ other realms, ‘His’ other realms –

and Territories King, Head of the Commonwealth, Defender of the Faith, and Sovereign of the Most Noble Order of the Garter.

That is who we, as Victorians and as members of Parliament, are swearing allegiance to. It is who we are holding up as being at the pinnacle of our governmental system. I think that anyone who thinks that that is a reflection of modern Victoria is themselves somewhat delusional in their approach.

Moving to a republic has been a topic of discussion in Australia for many years. Obviously we had a push in the 1990s, led by a Labor Prime Minister and by a Labor government, that was cruelled by the efforts of the former coalition government. We had a Prime Minister who was determined to see progress towards an Australian republic stalled and so set up considerable roadblocks and processes to prevent that from occurring. It was a sad day in 1999 when that republic referendum was defeated. Sadly, it was defeated pretty comprehensively. I think in the context of that debate, we as a nation have stewed on the fact that we did not really feel the need, and there was not a burning desire whilst Elizabeth was our sovereign, to change those constitutional arrangements. I think it is widely acknowledged that with her passing and the assumption of Charles III – Head of the Commonwealth, Defender of the Faith and Sovereign of the most Noble Order of the Garter – as our new sovereign, the mood for that is changing.

I think the mood for change in Australia will be gathering pace in coming years as a reflection of our maturity as a nation, as a reflection of where we want to be as a people, as a reflection of our aspirations, as a better reflection of the great diversity of this place and this land and its people but also as a reflection of the absolute irrelevance that this family has to our lives in any way, shape or form. They are not part of our contemporary culture. It does not really matter that he came here as a kid and spent some time at Timbertop; it does not give him a great connection to this place – although it is quite nice that we are able to look at a procession once or twice. We have got to be better, as a body politic, than that, and we should be grander in our ambitions to be more in control of our destiny as a society. There is no need for us to continue to swear our allegiance to someone who would not know us if he tripped over us in a line-up and who does not care about our national successes when they come around and does not share our national aspirations.

We do, and we will continue to have to – maybe not for another hundred years, given the current line of succession – make these sorts of changes to our statute books. Should this sovereign transition from a king to a queen at any future point, we will have to do this all again. I only hope that before we get to that point, before we are forced to pass another one of these statute law revision amendment bills, we as a community get together and fix the fundamental problem: remove this family from their position as our head of state and finally put an Australian there in their place.

Rachel PAYNE (South-Eastern Metropolitan) (15:25): I rise to make a brief contribution to the Statute Law Amendment (References to the Sovereign) Bill 2023. My colleague Mr Ettershank has already discussed Legalise Cannabis Victoria’s position on this bill, so there is no need for me to reiterate what he has already said, and I am very much in support of his position. Instead I would like to take this opportunity to touch on a specific aspect of this bill, namely the decision to continue to opt for gendered language. Amendments in this bill make gendered changes to the language used in various pieces of legislation, including for instance changing ‘Her Majesty’ to ‘His Majesty’. This means that for every future demise or succession of the sovereign we may well have to go through this whole process of amendments all over again – and I do take Mr Batchelor’s point that due to the succession that we are seeing we probably will not have to; however, we do not know their pronouns as yet. I too hope that we will become a republic before that time. But for now we have lost an opportunity for greater efficiency in our statute amendment processes. We have missed an opportunity for further discussions about the impracticalities and exclusionary nature of gendered language in legislation.

The push for gender-neutral language in law is not new, and the politics of it are well understood. Attorney-General Symes has highlighted the importance of inclusive language in all aspects of life, and this government requires that new legislation and amendments are written in gender-neutral terms. I thank the government for this. In our briefing with the government on this bill we did question whether they had considered a change to gender-neutral terminology for the purpose of these amendments. I understand that they did consider this issue but that gender-neutral language was not pursued further due to the additional complexity of the drafting process. I understand that reason, but I still think it is unfortunate that this government’s commitment to gender-neutral language did not extend so far as to impact this bill. Although for many it may seem inconsequential, as elected representatives we can reflect our community and values through the language we use in legislation. An inclusive gender-neutral language approach to crafting legislation and amendments has much merit. For my friends in the queer community: I know this issue is important, I understand its impact and I will not stop advocating for you.

Evan MULHOLLAND (Northern Metropolitan) (15:27): I rise to speak on the Statute Law Amendment (References to the Sovereign) Bill 2023. I want to start by acknowledging the work of my friend and colleague the member for Kew Jess Wilson, who has done great work consulting with stakeholders and consulting with colleagues in regard to this. As many in this chamber would know, I am actually a republican, and I agree with many of the sentiments put forward by previous speakers, my colleagues, in regard to the fact that our constitutional arrangements are somewhat out-of-date constitutional arrangements. That might just be the Irish in me, but I find it quite odd that we do not have an Australian as head of state.

I have also been on the record a number of times about the Australian Republic Movement. I do not think the Australian Republic Movement is actually the vehicle that will deliver this long-awaited change to change our constitutional arrangements to have an Australian head of state and for us to become a republic. Mr Batchelor was talking about the failed constitutional referendum to become a republic, largely because the left of politics, or the republican side, could not agreed on a preferred model. The Australian Republic Movement has aims to thread that bow by trying to be everything to all people. Last year they released their Australian Choice model. As a republican I have got to say this is an absolutely outrageous model that will lose anyone on the centre right of politics, who you kind of need to support these kinds of arrangements.

Under this model, state and territory governments will each get to pick one candidate to put up to be our head of state and the federal government will actually get to pick three candidates to put on the ballot paper. So it is basically already bypassing the usual arrangements we have in constitutional referendums – where territories do not actually contribute to the statewide portion of the vote – by including territories as equal to states, but it is also a bit of a Canberra power grab, because the federal government gets to decide three candidates.

What I have been looking at on the Electoral Matters Committee, and I am quite interested in our electoral system, is how this Australian Choice model would create an elites republic, because it completely disenfranchises a regular person, an ordinary battler, from becoming an Australian head of state. It would be an elites republic. The Australian Republic Movement is wanting an elites republic, because only people decided by a government will be able to run for president. Only people that hang out with the Premier at the Malvern Hotel will be able to actually stand to be the head of state from Victoria. That is not the kind of republic I want to see; I want to see an Australian republic where an Australian can become the head of state – an ordinary worker, maybe from my electorate.

Peter FitzSimons described this at the time, when this was announced and they pushed it out there, as being so we avoid someone like Shane Warne becoming our head of state. Now, since then he has passed on, and we are very sorry for his untimely passing, but my question is: why wouldn’t we? And who is Peter FitzSimons to decide we would not want someone like that being our head of state. I reckon that would be up to the Australian people to decide. So we go, ‘Oh, we don’t want another Donald Trump’ – again, put that to the Australian people. A character like Donald Trump is not going to get the support of the Australian people, but who are these elites like Peter FitzSimons to tell the Australian people that certain people cannot be on the ballot paper? This is our way of ensuring only those who mingle in the Sydney cocktail set, like Mr FitzSimons does, can appear on the ballot. You will never get a Chifley as an Australian head of state, You will never get someone like Anthony Albanese even. You will never get someone from a working-class background. No-one in my electorate will be able to run for president under this model, but this is the model the Australian Republic Movement – many on the other side are members – want to go forward to change our constitutional arrangements.

I was once actually a member of the Australian Republic Movement, and I did go to a couple of meetings but was very quickly put off. I tried to get involved, and I was told that the chair at the youth level – and this happens every year, apparently – only got there because there was a contest for the secretary of Young Labor and the runner-up usually gets to be the head of the young republican movement. I know Mr McIntosh knows the deal. It always happens. Certainly comrades I speak to at the Curtin Hotel and others all advise me that that is absolutely the case. So they fill the young ARM with Labor hacks to prise them out of running for things and to give basically a runner-up prize. Well, I think actually the Australian Republic Movement should not be used as a tool of the Labor Party, it should be used to reach out across the aisle and say, ‘How can we go forward? Where do we agree?’ I think the only way an Australian republic will ever happen is if we actually appeal to the Australian character, if we appeal to the Australian way of life and if we appeal to the characteristics of sovereignty and egalitarianism – sovereignty in that we are all Australian, we are all equal.

I know many Australians value egalitarianism. We cannot go forward with a campaign for a referendum to feel sorry and ashamed of actions of people that came way before us which we as people living in this very day are not responsible for. So I fear for a future republican referendum. I fear it will never actually be proposed, and that is because of the government insisting on pushing a Voice referendum. I believe this Voice referendum will put a future republican question at risk, because it is quite clear that Australians do not support the Voice. And while I do support constitutional change, as you know – I am a republican – I do not support the Voice to Parliament, because Australians naturally value egalitarianism, everyone being equal under the law and everyone having equal say.

I think it is a great thing that we have about 11 Indigenous MPs and senators in our federal Parliament, which is proportionally way over the percentage of Indigenous people in Australia. I think it is great that Indigenous people punch above their weight in representation in our federal Parliament, which shows Indigenous people do have a voice in our democratic institutions. I think that is a really good thing. What I do not agree with is putting into our constitution, which is basically a rule book, a body that is institutionalised that we will never be able to turn back the clock on. I mean, ATSIC was abolished for very good reasons; let us not forget that it was a bipartisan move to abolish ATSIC.

When you look at the reality of it, the proponents of the Voice say, ‘We can’t give you all the detail because that is up to the Parliament because the Parliament is sovereign. The Parliament will actually decide after the question is put.’ But basically what they are saying is that after the referendum we are putting in a permanent constitutional change, a risky one that we can never turn back the clock on, into the hands of the Greens and David Pocock in the Senate, because if you look at the balance of power in the Senate, that is what is needed to pass a bill, and that is what will be needed to pass a permanent constitutional change.

So again, I do not oppose constitutional change, but I very much fear the risk to a future republican question because the Voice referendum has been put forward. I think proponents of a republic were too quick to back down and say the Voice needs to be done first. The Voice has only been talked about since 2017; a republic has been spoken about for quite a long time. I remember in 1999, when many on the intellectual academic left said, ‘Oh, we don’t want this model, but we can do another referendum in two years and get the one we want, so we can vote no.’ They completely made a mess of it, and we are sitting here 20-plus years later without a republic. Then proponents of a republic have just said, ‘No, others can walk through the door before us and have their referendum question first’ – on a proposal that has not been properly scrutinised and has only been around since 2017 as a brand new idea, without a constitutional convention. I mean, come on. The republican movement and leadership have put the future of a republic at risk.

I did want to speak on some of the mentions in this bill. I will say this as a republican: I would love to be changing this bill completely. I would love to be bringing in a bill saying a lot of the things that are said here in the bill – once a republic referendum has been passed, once there have actually been changes to our constitutional arrangements and we have an Australian head of state. Then that is an appropriate time as Victorians, as a government and as a Parliament, to come in with a bill like this, changing the wording and removing references to the Crown – maybe even removing the crown from the top of the little statue there. That is an appropriate time to do it. You cannot just go in by stealth and change things around and rush it through the Parliament.

I want to particularly point out the police oath. I mean, this is pretty ridiculous. The bill changes the words in the oaths of affirmation given by police officers, protective services officers and special constables as they are contained in the Victoria Police Act 2013. The bill amends all three oaths to omit references to ‘Lady the Queen’ and substitute all references to ‘Her Majesty’s peace’ with just ‘the peace’. So it is not ‘His Majesty’s peace’, it is just ‘the peace’. They even removed ‘Her Majesty’s Leader of the Opposition’ and ‘Her Majesty’s Deputy Leader of the Opposition’. It just removes the opposition in the bill; it does not even replace it with ‘the opposition’. It just deletes – delete, delete, delete. It seems to be that someone has gone through it too quickly, or perhaps the government has run out of money to pay public servants so they have tried to use an AI tool to rewrite the bill or something. Seriously, some of the changes in this bill go quite a bit too far.

As I said, as a republican I would love to come into this chamber with a Statute Law Amendment (References to the Sovereign) Bill 2026, let us say, and have all these changes in here when Australia finally becomes a republic. And as I have said, that is not being helped by the republican movement in this country. You have got so many Labor members getting on their feet, talking about how they would love an Australian head of state and the long titles the King is referred to as, saying it is anathema to our system of government and anathema to the Australian character. What have they done about it? What did they do to actually advance the cause of republicanism, except for using the Australian Republican Movement as a sort of branch outfit of the Labor Party? What did they do to reach across the aisle to advance maybe a referendum in the last 20 years? Absolutely nothing, and as soon as another constitutional proposal comes up they just get out of the way and let it roll through the door in place of a republican referendum that has been talked about for a long time, making way for an idea that came up in 2017 that has not had a constitutional convention. I mean, this is the kind of thing we expect from those opposite.

Tom McINTOSH (Eastern Victoria) (15:43): I rise to support the Statute Law Amendment (References to the Sovereign) Bill 2023. The name is quite a mouthful, as is the majority of the content we are talking about today: words that to most people in our community do not have any meaning. I think to give things meaning we need to simplify the conversation. I think what we do see in this bill and in this debate and in the amendments that have been put forward by the opposition – or should I call them ‘His Majesty’s opposition’, as they like to be referred to? Are we here to think about and to debate the future of this state and the future of this country that we are within, or are we here to talk about the past? I for one am here to talk about the future.

We acknowledge the past. We respect the past, and I will start from the top by respecting the Queen, who has passed. I will respect the English systems that have been shared around the world, that have enabled and supported and protected democracies, that have established good institutions that have allowed a lot of nations to flourish and that I think have made this country a great nation and this state a great state. But we also have to look at a lot of the inequalities that exist within a monarchical system. There has been a lot of talk about whether people are monarchists or republicans. I am a republican because I cannot sit with the idea that massive amounts of wealth are being held by very few for what I can see as no good reason other than the family that they were born into.

To the actual bill, the bill is quite simple. We are making amendments to a variety of acts to acknowledge the passing of the Queen and King Charles coming in and ascending the throne. This bill identifies that and makes changes, but those opposite want to make amendments. Rather than just been called ‘the opposition’, they want to be called ‘His Majesty’s opposition’. The Attorney-General ‍– a fantastic Attorney-General who does great work, I must say – would be ‘His Majesty’s Attorney-General’. We would have ‘His Majesty’s solicitor-general’. It goes on and on. Victorians, if you go out the front and have a chat to people in the street, do not want to hear these sorts of titles – His Majesty King Charles III, by the grace of God, King of Australia and his other realms and territories, head of the Commonwealth, being Charles Philip Arthur George Mountbatten-Windsor. I think we have more important things to get on with than this sort of triteness.

Basically, we should respect people for what they bring, for what they contribute, for who they are, not a title that they are born into. The future titles that are coming are His Royal Highness the Prince of Wales, being William Arthur Philip Louis Mountbatten-Windsor, and Prince George of Wales, whose full name is George Alexander Louis Mountbatten-Windsor. There was a comment before that King Charles has done some good work, and I acknowledge that. On climate change he has been an absolute beacon, and we have seen the UK take a lot of action on that. Absolutely we should acknowledge him for his deeds, for what he has done, but we should not bow and curtsy to a title that he inherited.

I want to mention my nanna Pat – Pat O’Donnell, so you probably do not need to guess where her allegiances lay. She and my grandfather Tom were over in England back in the 1950s, and they had been over there for 12 months on a sabbatical. As they were going to leave, some pompous guy came up to her party and said, ‘Oh, it must be terrible going back to Australia. They don’t have much history, do they?’ And my nanna, always being a pretty quick wit, turned around and said, ‘Well, at least we’ve got a future, which is more than I can say for your lot.’ And that brings it back to what we are talking about: the future. The future is what we have to have our eye on, and there have been very nice simple illustrations of the fact that we need the head of this country to have the future interests of this country and our people at mind, and it is crazy that we cannot have an Australian as the head of Australia.

Just coming back to that fundamental issue I have, it is about the sharing of wealth. I should also note that my family were arrested at Eureka in 1854. Why did those people stand together? Why did they come together and say, ‘No, we will not accept the actions of this colonial government’? It was because their rights were not being listened to. They were not being respected. That act in Ballarat in 1854 helped set up this nation, and it is something we should be very mindful of. That spirit is still strong.

There has been a lot of talk about the referendum in the 1990s, and Dr Bach talked about it being last century, which just highlights where the Liberal mindset is at – it is always last century. It does not matter whether you are talking about action on energy, it does not matter whether you are talking about how we are going to invest in our infrastructure or the social debates, the social striving that we make for equality – ‘Well, let’s just keep it in last century because we could not possibly take ourselves out of that thinking to consider new ideas.’ But again coming back to our communities, when we go outside, our communities absolutely want us to be thinking to the future, and they want it in today’s language, language that they can understand.

I think most of all they want respectful debate but also a respectful community and a respectful society. Unfortunately so much of the sort of ‘grab for a headline’ politics that we see from those opposite is just trying to find a little toehold of prejudice or a little toehold to put some doubt in people’s minds. There has been a lot of talk about the Voice, and I will come to that soon. They are examples of ‘Let’s just sow fear, doubt and division’ as opposed to leading and providing plans for our people, options for our people and opportunities for our people. Because we know how easy it is to sow fear. We know how easy it is to be negative. We know how easy it is to pit people against each other. But it is absolutely crucial that we bring people together and we set common goals. You can have disagreements on the way – that is fine – but there should be a basic level of respect and acknowledgement of people in the community.

I will come to the Voice in a moment because I do have a fair bit I want to say about that. But back to this question of airs and graces and language that nobody understands – I mean, I have only been in the chamber for a year, but half the time when Mr Davis talks I do not even actually understand what he is saying; I have to look in a thesaurus. I am getting there, but most Victorians do not understand. I just did a quick Google of the monarchs – lords, dukes, duchesses, marquises, marchionesses, earls, countesses, barons, baronesses, viscounts, viscountesses. A trillion dollars worth of wealth is floating around in those families – massive, massive estates. How is that just or fair? And how is it that we want to see a continuation of that? I do not think anybody needs a gold-plated toilet seat, thank you very much. I mean, it is nice to have a warm toilet seat, but I do not think you need to have one plated in gold.

There are so many fundamental things based on who should be our head of state but more on not having a monarchy. It is great to see Mr Mulholland – Comrade Mulholland, as we like to call him, as on some issues he is so progressive – speaking out on certain issues even though he is incredibly, unfortunately, backward on others. Things like workers rights are fundamental to equality – equality of people – and to enabling people to have good quality of life, to have good access to services and to have good access to infrastructure so their families can grow and prosper and have better quality of life than those before them, which is to me in absolute contrast to what a monarchy is. A monarchy is, you know, ‘We shall have, we shall inherit and we shall rule.’

Now to the Voice: I need to pull you up, Mr Mulholland, on a number of things you said, because I think they are incorrect. When I am out doorknocking at the moment, talking to people about how they intend to vote in this referendum, this incredibly important referendum, one of the first things I hear is, ‘You want us all to be one people,’ and, yes, we should be one people and there should be that equality – that equality of opportunity and that shared equity. But we look at the life expectancy of our First Nations people and it is significantly lower. When we look at home ownership, whether that is a mortgage or outright ownership, new Australians have somewhere around about the 66 per cent mark of ownership and our First Nations people, who have been here for 60,000 years, are looking at around about 33 per cent. So we are dealing with two peoples facing very, very different opportunities and hurdles within their lives.

Mr Mulholland talked about a Voice to Parliament being basically at the whim of Pocock and the Greens. In Victoria we made a change to our constitution in 2004, which I will come to soon. This scaremongering is: ‘Oh, my God, we’re going to enable our First Nations people to come together and put forward their opinions on how we engage with decisions of government that affect them’ and it is somehow a scary thing. Now, the constitutional amendment will ensure that that is guaranteed, but how that body is made up can be determined or amended by governments as they go on. So to say that the Voice referendum is some sort of incredibly scary thing that people need to be fearful of – yes, again, coming back, it is an easy tactic that can be taken, but it is just low-road politics and, again, pitting people against each other.

We are doing so much here in Victoria which I think we actually need to talk more about, because I think it is easy to whip up fear for people about the unknown. We are doing so much good work here in Victoria with regard to the Uluru statement, and I think the more people see that this work that we do gets better outcomes for all of us – whether it is our First Nations Victorians or the rest of us – the more people will come to value and cherish the work that is being done. I really hope – and I am committed to doing all I can to ensure that – the Voice referendum gets a yes when it occurs later this year. I think if it does not, we are going to wake up the next morning and we are going to realise what an incredible opportunity and incredible gift have been given to us by our First Nations people. As I said before, my family came out at Eureka and my family were not so patient and so kind in their words, so I think we should appreciate the beautiful opportunity and sentiment that have been given to us in a peaceful nature as a gift that has been extended to us.

In 2004 the Victorian Constitution Act 1975 had the following inserted:

(1) The Parliament acknowledges that the events described in the preamble to this Act occurred without proper consultation, recognition or involvement of the Aboriginal people of Victoria.

(2) The Parliament recognises that Victoria’s Aboriginal people, as the original custodians of the land on which the Colony of Victoria was established –

(a) have a unique status as the descendants of Australia’s first people; and

(b) have a spiritual, social, cultural and economic relationship with their traditional lands and waters within Victoria; and

(c) have made a unique and irreplaceable contribution to the identity and well-being of Victoria.

This has gone in, the sky has not fallen in and I think with the amendments in this bill and with the Voice the sky will not fall in either.

Ann-Marie HERMANS (South-Eastern Metropolitan) (15:58): Look, I have been listening to everything that has been said just recently in this chamber, and I do really take issue. I want to speak on the Statute Law Amendment (References to the Sovereign) Bill 2023, and I want to remind the house that the purpose of this bill is to amend the Interpretation of Legislation Act 1984 and to amend the statute law of Victoria to revise language and references to the sovereign as a consequence of the death of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II.

I had the great privilege of actually meeting Queen Elizabeth a couple of times in my life, and they were tremendous privileges, things that I remember very fondly and with tremendous excitement. I do not take the point that these are things that need to be eroded or that for some reason because somebody is born royal they are of any less worth or should not be worthy of respect. I wonder whether some of my worthy opponents on the other side of the chamber would want to see their ministers lose the title of ‘Honourable’, because in effect what we are saying is that anyone that has a title is therefore no longer entitled to have that title, because for some reason that makes them not worthy of the respect with which they were born. I actually do not have a problem with the monarchy. I do not share some of the opinions of some of the people on my side of the chamber in terms of us being a republic. My concerns with a republic are very much around the fact that you want to be able to trust the people that are tampering with your constitution, and I am not sure that I would feel that way about everybody that comes into government.

I want to again go back to the bill. As some people have mentioned here, it should have been a straightforward piece of legislative housekeeping, but unfortunately Labor appears to have seen this bill as an opportunity to diminish the role of the monarch as our sovereign. It should have been just a straightforward thing that we do not have to spend time on in the chamber – quite right. It is not trivial, though, and it is not time wasting to actually want to show respect to the monarchy. This was a wonderful queen that we had, the longest reigning queen in the history of the monarchy, but that is not the point. The fact that that is part of the Australian story and Australian history is not the point. It is a fact that this government thinks it can just go ahead and do whatever it likes with an air of entitlement.

They have taken a bill, and instead of just inserting, as would have been respectful, ‘His Majesty’, they have decided to completely take it out and to completely change it. For example, in the Attorney-General and Solicitor-General Act 1972 the bill does not replace the former titles of ‘Her Majesty’s Attorney-General’ and ‘Her Majesty’s solicitor-general’ with ‘His Majesty’s Attorney-General’ and ‘His Majesty’s solicitor-general’ respectively. In fact it removes all references to the sovereign altogether, replacing of course ‘Her Majesty’ or ‘the Crown in right of Victoria’ with references to ‘the solicitor-general’. In fact this continues on so that it does not give the full title of the sovereign; that has been completely removed and is not being replaced with a reference to King Charles III. To me, this is completely disrespectful. It is not this government’s business to be able to take this sort of stuff out of legislation just because they feel like it or because they are trying to turn the country into a republic without even having a debate, without having a referendum and without having a conversation. To try to do it in this way is, to me, quite deceptive and inappropriate.

If we look at the area where it talks about the Parliamentary Salaries, Allowances and Superannuation Act 1968, this bill again removes ‘Her Majesty’ in reference to the Leader of the Opposition and the Deputy Leader of the Opposition, where previously they were referred to as ‘the Leader of Her Majesty’s Opposition’ and the ‘Deputy Leader of Her Majesty’s Opposition’. Now, this is again removing the sovereign completely from the bill. It is not just about legislative housekeeping; it is a matter of respect and a matter of historical and legal connection between the sovereign and the members of Parliament.

Who can forget that only in December we came in here and we took oaths. We took oaths in this place and we took affirmations, and we made them to the sovereign. Now we are just going to remove it. Well, I am sorry, how is that actually honouring that oath? It is not. Turning Australia into a republic might be part of the Labor Party platform, and it might be a conversation that a number of people wish to have, but doing this in this way is, to me, inappropriate, deceitful and untimely. It is not for one person to decide that they are going to redraft something on behalf of the whole of Victoria and take the sovereign out of it. Who is the person that wrote this and why do they think they have the right to make these changes without taking this to the Victorian public? I say there is no valid reason to alter or remove the references to the sovereign. Australia remains a constitutional monarchy. Any future changes to our system of government are a matter for the Australian people and not for somebody in a Labor Party department or office. It is not a matter for the Labor government to unilaterally alter all the statute books. We will remain a constitutional monarchy until the majority of Australians in the majority of states vote and express their will for a change to our system at a referendum.

The coalition will be moving a series of amendments to this bill to bring it back to its original intent and repair Labor’s legislative overreach. These amendments seek to update the bill to reflect what should have been brought before this Parliament: a simple substitution of terms to reflect the accession of King Charles III in our statute book. With these amendments the bill will be a straightforward matter of legislative housekeeping. It is just what our opponents on the other side of the house have been saying they want: a straightforward matter of legislative housekeeping to ensure that all laws in place in Victoria make correct references to the sovereign following the death of the wonderful Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II, for whom I have the utmost respect and who I think brought a lot of unity to a lot of nations, a lot of hope to a lot of children and a lot of majesty when there were times of despair and discouragement. The relevant acts will be amended only in so far as to switch references to ‘Her Majesty’ and ‘His Majesty’, ‘Queen’ and ‘King’ – like for like. If those opposite do not take the opportunity to support these amendments, they need to ask themselves why.

Australia’s constitutional monarchy is no less current or valid as a result of the passing of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II, which was the trigger event for the introduction of this bill. We should not shy away from the fact that Australia is a constitutional monarchy. We are in fact still part of the Commonwealth. We enjoy the entitlements of that. We enjoy the financial opportunities that that brings, along with the hope and the grandeur and the splendour that we identify with. Our system of constitutional monarchy has allowed us to maintain remarkably stable government in our country at a time when the world is full of uncertainties, full of challenges, and when we have had years of difficulties, despair and at times even a lack of hope. We should not seek to diminish this in any form.

I am very honoured to be able to have addressed this situation. I am also concerned to have to get up in the chamber and speak on something like this, because to me to do something like this is a little bit underhanded. It is inappropriate that some individual from the other side of the house, regardless of what your ideologies might be, thinks that they can take it upon themselves to completely rewrite the purpose of this, the oath that we all took in this chamber, and diminish it without so much as consulting the Victorian taxpayers, the people of Australia who should have the right to have that say.

Sonja TERPSTRA (North-Eastern Metropolitan) (16:08): I also rise to make a contribution on the Statute Law Amendment (References to the Sovereign) Bill 2023. I have had the benefit of listening to many of the contributions that have preceded mine today, and I am kind of perplexed about the level of angst that seems to be coming from those opposite on what we are trying to do in regard to this statute. All we are doing is modernising it to replace references to Her Majesty the Queen with the King, in a nutshell. The conspiracy theorists opposite are alive and well thinking that we are trying to mount a rearguard action to overthrow the monarchy and to go hard at a republic. Wow. It is quite bewildering really. Anyway, I hope to bring home the contribution I am about to make, as perhaps one of the last ones, with a little bit of common sense and a reality check about what is going on. It is a weird hill that you have picked to die on over there, I must say. But anyway –

A member interjected.

Sonja TERPSTRA: I do not know what is going on over there, but certainly it is not anything that is grounded in reality. This bill will amend references in the Victorian legislation from ‘Her Majesty’ to ‘His Majesty’ and other similar terms following the death of Queen Elizabeth II and subsequently King Charles III assuming the throne. That is it in a nutshell, despite what is being said by those opposite. It is not a groundbreaking bill, but it is important to ensure that our legislation is accurate and reflects contemporary, current circumstances.

Unfortunately, the reasoned amendment that has been moved by those opposite to this very straightforward bill in the other place – as they object to the way the bill modernises languages in some acts – is very on brand for those opposite. Again it is trying to generate some angst where there is none necessary. But nevertheless I am going to get into the weeds of some of the amendments that are being made and go through some of the legislation that is being proposed.

I might just say before I do that, though, that I reflect on my earlier life in another place and space as a union official, and I remember once we were having to modernise agreements. Some of my colleagues in here might remember the days of award modernisation that many union officials had to go through. One of the things that we actually did was – not remarking about the federal system but in the state system – I can remember going down to the commission and having to represent a union, and we had over 101 agreements that needed to be modernised. Some of the things that we were modernising were in fact removing language references like ‘his’ or ‘her’ and making them gender-neutral and just removing outdated and old references. I remember those sorts of days. It was tedious, it was dry and it was boring, but there was nothing else behind it other than modernising documentation to make it more contemporary so that it reflected the situation at that time. Some of these documents that we were dealing with were like 50 years old. In this current circumstance, with this statute, obviously Her Majesty the Queen passed away. We have got a new king now, and we obviously need to modernise our statute books to make sure that they reflect that circumstance. It is not groundbreaking. It is just very pedestrian and dry, but it needs to happen. It is important to make sure that when people are looking at acts of Parliament they reflect the current circumstances.

Which acts are we amending? As noted, the bill is not amending the constitution. As we know, that requires specific measures to be effective, such as a referendum. You know, we are about to be looking at a federal referendum, but that is nothing to do with this bill, just so those opposite do not get spooked by any reference to a referendum. You never know, they are all a bit flighty over there at the moment for a whole bunch of reasons. But nevertheless –

A member interjected.

Sonja TERPSTRA: I know. Talking about Warrandyte as the great victory in a one-horse race is kind of flapping around looking for some sort of relevance.

But anyway, the bill is amending references to the sovereign in the following acts, and there are a range of acts. Like I said, it is time to get into the weeds a little bit, because it is that time of the afternoon where we need to maybe pay attention to some of these things. The Accident Compensation Act 1985 – it is interesting, when you listen to some of these acts, the length of time they have been around. As we know, Her Majesty was a monarch for a very long period of time, so there are a lot of pieces of state legislation the need to be amended: the Administration and Probate Act 1958; Attorney-General and Solicitor-General Act 1972; Bail Act 1977; County Court Act 1958; Crimes Act 1958; Criminal Procedure Act 2009; Crown Land (Reserves) Act 1978; Crown Proceedings Act 1958; Drugs, Poisons and Controlled Substances Act 1981; Evidence (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 1958; Fire Rescue Victoria Act 1958; and on and on it goes. I just have gone through almost half the list and there are loads more. As you can tell, some of these acts were made then but they have been subsequently amended through other amendment acts and iterations.

Obviously someone somewhere has taken a great deal of time to go through the list of acts and make sure that they are on the table to be amended. As I spoke about earlier, in my previous life as a trade union official I had to work through a number of awards to make sure they were gender-neutral, removing references to ‘he’ or ‘she’ and making them gender-neutral.

Similarly, in these sort of circumstances, ‘sovereign’ or a gender-neutral term like ‘the Crown’ has not been used in the Victorian bill as it would require potentially further and more detailed changes to legislation. While the terms ‘Crown’ or ‘state of Victoria’ can be used interchangeably, noting that under the Interpretation of Legislation Act 1984 ‘the Crown’ means ‘the Crown in right of Victoria’, not all references to ‘Her Majesty’ are necessarily interchangeable with gender-neutral terms. An example of this is where reference is made to ‘Her Majesty’ in a personal capacity as the head of state or the sovereign rather than as a reference to the body politic of Victoria. For instance, while the bill is not updating the constitution, as I remarked upon earlier, section 91 of the Constitution Act 1975 provides that Her Majesty is not entitled to revenues of the Crown accruing to the Crown in right of the state. Changing ‘Her Majesty’ to ‘sovereign’ or ‘Crown’ would make this section ambiguous and uncertain and may alter its legal interpretation. A great deal of thought has gone into these sorts of matters, and that is why it is necessary to get down into some of the detail of it.

The Interpretation of Legislation Act also includes references to the titles of historical offices, one being the ‘Queen’s printer’, for example, and another ‘Her Majesty’s Stationery Office’, some very important offices of –

Ryan Batchelor: Yes, very important.

Sonja TERPSTRA: A printer and a stationery office, very important in this modern age, especially in this electronic age. Nevertheless, these are things that exist or have existed, and we need to ensure that they are modernised and keep up with contemporary standards. These bodies are known by their references to the Queen or King, not the Crown, and it is therefore important to maintain consistency in these instances, so that is what we are doing. ‘The Crown’ is not always able to be used interchangeably with references to the Queen or King, as it may be, as they can include references to them in their personal capacity rather than their capacity as head of state or the state as an entity. Again, it is something that is very pedestrian, but as you can see in the instances that I have used as examples, it is important to make sure that those things are corrected and done to reflect and distinguish the different legal capacities that the Crown or the sovereign can be referred to.

I now turn to the opposition’s amendments. As I said, the bill amends some acts by changing ‘Her Majesty’ to ‘His Majesty’. The bill modernises some references to the sovereign in Victorian legislation. The opposition objects to modernising language and has circulated amendments to the bill which would ensure Victorian legislation still referenced the following examples. The reference to ‘our Lady, the Queen’ would not be changed to the equivalent wording ‘our Lord, the King’; it would be ‘His Majesty’s opposition’ rather than simply the ‘opposition’; ‘His Majesty’s Attorney-General’ rather than simply the ‘Attorney-General’; and ‘His Majesty’s solicitor-general’ rather than simply ‘the solicitor-general’. It is creating more work down the track. If there was another change to a sovereign, we would find ourselves in the same position, and we would have to go back and change all these things. As I remarked upon in my earlier example of being a union official, if you have gender-neutrality in written documents, you do not have to go back and change it every time there is a change to someone holding that position being a different gender.

In moving identical amendments, the member for Kew in the other place said that this bill ‘seeks to effect a significant shift in the way in which the sovereign is referenced in the state of Victoria’ and that, as I said, we are trying to move to some kind of republic by stealth, which again is a really, really long stretch. It is a really weird long stretch to try to suggest that somehow we want to start a campaign by stealth to overthrow the monarchy and have a republic just by modernising language. Dr Bach is laughing because he knows I am right. He knows I am right about what he is saying. Honestly, these claims are quite ridiculous. There is no basis for them in fact. I know they have got to come up with something to oppose. I know their mantra over there is ‘Oppose everything always’, but this is really quite fanciful. Nevertheless, here we are debating this very important bill.

Matthew Bach: Your bill.

Sonja TERPSTRA: Yes, it is our bill, and we are debating it because you have proposed some ridiculous amendments, and I know we are going to go into a committee stage very soon and we will get to debate it even further in committee stage, so I look forward to that process.

I think the other thing to note in the 3 minutes that I have left on the clock is that all the changes in this bill are entirely consistent with, as I have said, contemporary legislative drafting practice. There is no hidden agenda here, and there is a very healthy dose of paranoia I think on the other side of the chamber. But honestly, we have to debate these things, and I have listened to the contributions from those opposite, and there was a lot of talk about the Queen and the good old days and everything the Queen has done and where she toured and what she opened and all those sorts of things that are very nice and have nothing at all to do with the content of this bill. It is like visiting the glory days, and I get it, that is what they want to talk about, but nevertheless I have not heard anything in their contributions that actually addressed the content of this bill. For example, I have not heard one thing, one argument from those opposite, about contemporary legislative drafting practice. I have just explained to the chamber the reason for this. The rationale is that it is to do with embracing contemporary legislative drafting practice to use gender-neutral terms. This is not a new thing, but I have heard nothing from those opposite about that being a bad thing or anything at all from them about that, other than them saying that we are trying to mount a weird campaign for a republic – again, nothing at all to do with contemporary legislative drafting practice. Anyway, that is the hill you have chosen to die on today. All right, more power to you, but your –

David Limbrick interjected.

Sonja TERPSTRA: Your hill was better, Mr Limbrick. I must agree with you, and I actually agreed again. In strange circumstances, I agreed with a lot of what you had to say today, so your contribution was very valuable.

I think there is not much more I can say. There is a long list of legislation; I went through half of the list. There are many, many more pieces of legislation that we are modernising and updating in line with contemporary drafting practice to move to having gender-neutral terminology in the legislation. The conspiracy theories abound over there, but it is nothing earth shattering. But of course those opposite want to make it that because they want to have some kind of weird relevance.

But anyway, in conclusion with the 30 seconds I have left on the clock, summing up: the bill will not change any policies in Victoria. It will not even change how the law is applied. As I said, it is important to be consistent with current modern contemporary drafting practices. We are just changing the references to Her Majesty and similar terms following the death of Queen Elizabeth II. To leave it the way that it is would be technically incorrect. As other jurisdictions are doing, we should correct this as well. I will leave my contribution there, and I commend this bill to the house.

Bev McARTHUR (Western Victoria) (16:23): As I rise –

Sonja Terpstra interjected.

Bev McARTHUR: I am actually going to go into some detail, and then I might give you a bit of a serve about your chip-on-the-shoulder problem with the monarchy. Anyway, as I rise to speak on the Statute Law Amendment (References to the Sovereign) Bill 2023, I should perhaps start on a positive note and state my agreement with one aspect of Minister Pearson’s second-reading speech on this bill, namely that:

… this Bill, in a small way, acknowledges the Queen’s legacy.

Thank you, Minister Pearson. I would like to echo that thought and pay tribute again to the extraordinary life and service dedicated by the late Queen Elizabeth to the people of the Commonwealth. While of course our federal and state parliaments have governors-general and governors to perform this role, the late Queen, with her remarkable attention to detail, considered each and every one of the bills passed by the Westminster Parliament during her reign. As such, she was no stranger to political spin, and I suspect she would not have been deceived by some of the minister’s other commentary on this bill. He notes that the bill:

… will ensure that the State’s laws remain relevant and accurate.

…

There is no intention to change the effect of those laws.

And that the whole exercise is simply:

… good legislative housekeeping.

This should be completely straightforward and uncontroversial, and indeed if this was simply a straightforward matter of substituting ‘King’ for ‘Queen’, I would not even be speaking on it. But unfortunately it is more than that, as is typical of this government. I do not want to overdo this. There is no conspiracy to hide a dramatic lurch to republicanism here, but there is more than just ‘good legislative housekeeping’, and I think that should be noted.

My first observation on this is one I have not yet heard made in debate on this bill, and it is on the element of the degendering present in this legislation. A wider argument is currently going on over the impact that gender-neutral language can have. In theory, it is supposed to harm no-one, but the pernicious consequences of eliminating gender become clearer every day. Clause 23 of schedule 1 amends the Sentencing Act 1991, substituting the words ‘he or she is authorised on behalf of Her Majesty’ for ‘the Governor is authorised on behalf of His Majesty’. This removal of gender only occurs once in this bill, and I am inclined to think accidentally, but if the government genuinely believe this bill is purely about mechanical substitution – ‘legislative housekeeping’ – then this is an indication of their lack of attention to detail. And if it is a deliberate decision, then failing to reference the change is deceptive.

Earlier speakers mentioned the other inconsistencies. Clause 30 of schedule 1 of the bill, for example, in reference to the riot act, does not just swap ‘King’ for ‘Queen’, it removes reference to the Queen entirely from the act and the proclamation. Clause 32 of the schedule changes the oaths made by Victoria Police officers and special constables, again not simply substituting royal titles but entirely cutting references to the monarch and to His or Her Majesty’s peace. This is not just a cut-and-paste job; there is a difference there. It may just be symbolism, but symbolism can be incredibly powerful. The police’s duty to keep the peace without fear or favour, impartially and apolitically, is assisted, in my view, by the reference to the monarch – not the government, not the executive and not the day-to-day political operators.

I am of a similar view on the removal of references to Her Majesty’s Leader of the Opposition and Deputy Leader of the Opposition, but my concern is even stronger over the change to the title of the Attorney-General, because in this case we are talking about a government minister. The change is small, it is symbolic, but it could be powerful. Reference to Her or His Majesty’s Attorney-General emphasises that in this role he or she owes some duty not just to political masters but – impartially, apolitically – to the constitution as a whole. What we call ourselves can influence how we think of ourselves, and how we think of ourselves influences the decisions we make and take. I am sure our present esteemed Attorney-General has no anti-democratic tendencies, but who knows who a less constitutionally respectful Premier might appoint next. There is a symbolic point to the role having some distinction from simply the government of the day, the executive. It is a reminder that duty is owed not to politics or to the government but to Victoria itself and all Victorians.

One day, that might matter. Symbolism, tradition, whatever you call it, can and does have an important effect. We should meddle with it at our peril, and even less should we mess with it without mandate to do so and without need to do so. These last two are my other issues with this bill: that to go beyond mechanical substitution is taking a political decision and one which should rightly be the subject of national discussion and debate in the form of a referendum campaign, and that there is simply no need to do it. Our laws work well, as does our system, and I would warn all the republicans here that I and many others are ready to defend them very vigorously indeed. Full disclosure in this place: I am a very proud monarchist. In fact I am the patron of the Victorian Young Monarchists, and that is a huge, growing group of wonderful young people who have worked out that this democracy that we have, based on the Westminster system of government, is standing us in very good stead.

Mr Batchelor said he is voting yes to embedding division and racism in the constitution. Well done, Mr Batchelor. I am very happy to say I am voting no, because I do think we should all be equal and not be divided by the colour of our skin or any other variety. I am always struck by the chip-on-the-shoulder approach that the republicans have. Their attitude denies the fact that this nation is great. And why is it great? Because we have been a constitutional monarchy since day one. The best democracies in the world are actually constitutional monarchies. I basically have an inherent scepticism about government, as you might have noticed, and the idea that either the pollies elect some president or despotic leader –

Matthew Bach: President Kevin.

Bev McARTHUR: President Kevin.

Matthew Bach: President Malcolm. President Dan maybe.

Bev McARTHUR: Goodness me, the mind boggles, Dr Bach, at exactly who we might get. And, you know what, we are already the most overgoverned country in the world, so let us have a fourth level of government. The presidential campaign would run like this: ‘Well, I am here to promise you this, with your money, so I will tax you further.’ We are already overtaxed and over-regulated. You overly interfere in our lives on a non-stop basis. We have lost our freedom. Mr Limbrick will tell us we have got no liberties left; you took them all away.

David Limbrick: We’ve got a few.

Bev McARTHUR: We’ve got a few? Oh, good. Well, I hope they are coming back. But under a presidential operation, and that is what it would be, it would be either a president appointed by pollies ‍– no, thank you – or else one elected, which would then need a massive campaign. Who has got the funds to run a campaign, first of all? It will not be Joe Blow from down the corner or on your union worksite. Actually we learned in our inquiry they get a lot of money, those union workers. They want to keep duck shooting, those people – it is a wonderful thing. But we would end up with a fourth level of government with you republicans, because you have just got this perpetual chip on your shoulder.

Look, for me, the monarchy is cheap, actually; it does not really cost us anything. There is a bit of a house down the road there and there is one up in Canberra, but quite frankly they opened it up to the public; you can go and wander around the garden and some of the rooms – that is lovely. But other than that, they cut a few ribbons, say nice things and travel around the country. They actually do not interfere in our lives at all, and they do not tax us – hallelujah. An organisation that does not tax us – what a wonderful thing. So, you republicans, get the chip off your shoulder and work out how we can actually do the best thing for the people, and that is not by having some fourth level of government, because that is what it is going to turn out to be.

I am a bit concerned about Mr Mulholland, actually, who announced his republican sympathies. I rather take issue with him because he did actually infer that the people of Australia probably got it wrong at the last referendum. I am full of confidence in the people of Victoria. I do think the polity usually get it right, and they will probably get it right on 14 October – they will get it right again. They know what they are doing, the polity. They are wise. I am sorry Mr Mulholland thought that the people of Australia got it wrong and that it was all because of those useless people that ran the republican campaign. I am not sure they have improved at all. The bandana has gone off the head of that fellow who was the leader. Is he the husband of some television personality or something or other? I am sorry, team, but you will not get a republic come in. The people of Australia are a wake-up to this. We just do not want more of you interfering in our lives – taxing us, regulating us, telling us how to think, telling us what we can eat and telling us what our kids can do at schools. It is outrageous what is going on here – the interference in what is happening.

But, look, you have produced a bill, quite rightly, to fix up the bureaucratic stuff that we have here all the time. Can I just make a suggestion: every time you bring in a piece of legislation, can you get rid of two other bits? We are just overburdening this system with more legislation which just adds more complexity. Poor old Joe Blow out there cannot work out how to even fill out a form. Most of you will not talk to them. I constantly get contacted by the citizenry, who feel neglected. You do not reply. They need to be looked after much better. Just answer all their queries about everything and make sure we do not fiddle around with this so that we end up without properly replacing ‘Her Majesty’ with ‘His Majesty’. That will be fine. That is all we are looking for, isn’t it, Dr Bach?

Matthew Bach interjected.

Bev McARTHUR: Yes, simple changes. Look, sorry, but you will not get a republic.

Council divided on amendment:

Ayes (15): Matthew Bach, Melina Bath, Jeff Bourman, Gaelle Broad, Georgie Crozier, David Davis, Moira Deeming, Renee Heath, Ann-Marie Hermans, Wendy Lovell, Trung Luu, Bev McArthur, Joe McCracken, Nicholas McGowan, Rikkie-Lee Tyrrell

Noes (22): Ryan Batchelor, John Berger, Lizzie Blandthorn, Katherine Copsey, Enver Erdogan, Jacinta Ermacora, David Ettershank, Michael Galea, Shaun Leane, David Limbrick, Sarah Mansfield, Tom McIntosh, Rachel Payne, Aiv Puglielli, Georgie Purcell, Samantha Ratnam, Ingrid Stitt, Jaclyn Symes, Lee Tarlamis, Sonja Terpstra, Gayle Tierney, Sheena Watt

Amendment negatived.

Motion agreed to.

Read second time.

Committed.

Committee

Matthew BACH: I have a series of amendments. I have spoken to them already in my contribution. If they could be circulated to members, that would be great.

Clause 1 (16:46)

David DAVIS: This is in one sense a very small and narrow bill. It simply seeks to, on the surface, replace one description of the former monarch with one of the new monarch, and I wish him well. I am very happy to state openly and clearly that I am a very strong monarchist, and I think we have a very good system of government. But my concern and the reason I support Dr Bach’s amendments is that what has occurred here is the government have thrown a slightly sneaky – a sleight of hand is really what it is. The government has sought to dilute a number of the references to the sovereign. Now, some are simple transpositions, and I understand that. Others, where they relate to the peace and so forth, have been diluted. It is clearly an intentional thing. I mean, many in the government are known republicans – and I understand that; these are perfectly reasonable political positions that people can hold – but they should not in this bill seek to dilute the position of and the references to the sovereign and the unique position that the sovereign holds above the political fray. In that way I am just troubled that the government has used this opportunity to weaken the position in a slightly sneaky way.

I am sure that the Attorney-General will have a response to this, and I am sure some in the government have not intended it this way, but I should say I am troubled. I will support these amendments that Dr Bach has circulated, because I think they address most of the untoward changes that are proposed that do weaken the references to the sovereign. Let us have modern legislation and modern language ‍– I agree with all of that – but that is not what this is about. This is about diluting and weakening with a sort of soft, surreptitious republican position. They have not gone the full monty, as it were, but they could have – I accept that – but they have gone with just a little push here and there. I am sure some of the republicans inside the Labor Party are a bit happy to be pushing on this matter. But we have a good system of government. If people want to change it, there are ways forward, but the Australian people did have a chance in 1999 and they rejected the proposals that were put then. I have no doubt at some future point someone will put forward a different proposal, and that is fine, but I should say I am very prepared to stand up for our system of government, including the references that are described here.

David LIMBRICK: I will ask my questions – I only have a few questions – on clause 1, but they are actually all relating to clause 30, which amends the Unlawful Assemblies and Processions Act 1958. My first question I would like to ask the Attorney: was the government aware that the Scrutiny of Acts and Regulations Committee (SARC) recommended that this act be repealed in 1999?

Jaclyn SYMES: There is obvious merit in the question that you have raised, but I guess what I need to draw your attention to is that this bill has one intention, and it cannot be conflicted with a bill that would have a purpose of repealing other bills. Arguably you could have a separate statute law amendment bill that has a role of repealing outdated legislation, but this is just about changing references in response to the change of the sovereign and is in effect policy agnostic in relation to which bills it changes. It is basically just changing references and is not intended to have any policy implications at all, apart from updating language and ensuring that it is legally correct.

David LIMBRICK: I thank the Attorney for her answer. However, the government have the ability to bring in repeal bills, and it would appear that a decision was made that rather than repealing this act, the Unlawful Assemblies and Processions Act 1958, they would amend it here instead. It could have been repealed, as was recommended by SARC in 1999. Why has the government chosen to amend this act rather than repeal it? I would make the point that the reference to the sovereign is actually in the proclamation – the riot act – that could be read out during a riot, and it is my understanding it can be read out by a justice of the peace or a magistrate. It effectively immunises participants against killing and maiming – serious crimes – so this seems like something that really should be repealed, and I would be interested to know why the government has chosen to simply amend it rather than repeal it.

Jaclyn SYMES: Mr Limbrick, it is not that this act is amending acts per se. I take your –

David Limbrick interjected.

Jaclyn SYMES: It is not amending the impact or the effect of any act, so there was no consideration given to the impact of the changes of wording, because there is no impact. I take your point. There are a range of acts on the statute books that are no longer useful and no longer in effect, but this bill’s purpose is not to be a repealing bill, it is merely changing references to the sovereign, so there was no opportunity to consider the life span of the acts that it seeks to amend. It is merely changing language.

David LIMBRICK: I thank the Attorney for her answer, but I would make the point that this act is still in effect, and in fact my understanding is that it could be invoked by any justice of the peace. My team has looked at what is required to become a justice of the peace, and it is not a super, super high bar. It is concerning to me that the government has clearly been looking at this act in –

Jaclyn Symes interjected.

The DEPUTY PRESIDENT: Excuse me. Mr Limbrick has the floor, please.

David LIMBRICK: It is clear that the government has at least looked at this in the construction of this bill, because it needed to be updated. Now, it has clearly just updated the reference to the sovereign in the proclamation that is required to invoke that special power. My question, I suppose, is: as the government are amending this act, is it their intent to keep that power?

Jaclyn SYMES: I think I can really only reiterate what I have said to date. There are separate processes for the identification of bills that need to be repealed. This bill has a narrow purpose. It was intentional for it not to be effecting policy change in any way other than updating references. To start making a judgement on the existence of bills that it amends was not part of its remit and was not part of that work. There are other processes in relation to identification of bills that could be repealed, and I think you have identified one that is in contention for that consideration, but it was not part of the drafting of this bill. It was not something that people were asked to draw their mind to.

David LIMBRICK: Thank you, Attorney, for your answer. If I accept that at face value – that this is just a technical bill that is just changing references but is nonetheless updating this Unlawful Assemblies and Processions Act – the process of updating it has brought to light that this act actually exists and it is rather concerning that it exists. Could I obtain some sort of commitment from the Attorney that when you are going through the process of determining which bills to repeal in the future, this one might be on that list?

Jaclyn SYMES: I think you have made a good case for that, Mr Limbrick. So yes, I will certainly have conversations with people about that.

David LIMBRICK: I thank the Attorney for that commitment. I have no further questions.

Matthew BACH: I will just ask one or two questions. I do not wish to unduly detain the house. It has been an interesting feature of this debate that those opposite have consistently criticised members of His Majesty’s opposition on the basis that we are seeking to focus on this bill today, which is a strange thing to say considering that this is the first item on the government’s business program today and thus we must be here talking about it. It is also a doubly strange thing to say because my understanding is we are about to adjourn without any further business to enact, thus the government has decided that we should talk about this bill. The government wanted to filibuster this bill, putting up many speakers to say the same thing over and over again, yet in doing so they consistently criticised those of us on this side of the house for having to take a position on their bill.

Nonetheless, I moved a reasoned amendment earlier, which was unsuccessful, very sadly. The point of that reasoned amendment was to seek to gain greater clarity from the government on the rationale for some of the changes in various pieces of legislation where there is not simply a like-for-like change ‍– ‘Her Majesty’ to ‘His Majesty’, ‘the Queen’ to ‘the King’ – and I have read into Hansard a number of examples where that is the case. It was done in the other place as well. I do not need to bore the Attorney-General with any of those examples. So I might simply, Attorney, if it is all right, ask you broadly that question that we were seeking to gain more information regarding through the reasoned amendment. Where there is not a simple like-for-like change in language, what is the rationale for that?

Jaclyn SYMES: Dr Bach, I have been in back-to-back meetings today, so I have not had the opportunity to listen to a lot of the debate. However, I am pretty confident in your assessment that it was reasonably repetitive, because there is not a lot in this bill. I do acknowledge that the government business program this week is thin. We should enjoy that, because it is about to get a lot heavier. I have got some very important bills coming through in the justice space in the next couple of weeks. It is fair to say for those watching at home that the amount of speakers on this bill should not give any indication that there is more to it than what there is. It is purely updating references to the sovereign.

I have heard with great interest these conspiracy theories and suggestions that we are weakening references to the sovereign as some kind of march to a republic. I thought you guys were joking, and I still cannot work out whether you are or you are not. It is quite concerning to me that I am living a pantomime today. Nonetheless, in all seriousness, this bill is purely about creating legally sound language across a number of pieces of legislation. There are a lot of risks in doing nothing in fact, but given that we have identified a few, particularly in relation to verbal oaths, it is important to ensure that we are closing off some of those potential opportunities for questions to be raised about the status of such matters.

To bring in a bill to update incorrect legislative references is what we proposed to do, and we have taken the opportunity to ensure that any changes are modern, fit for purpose and, frankly, make sense to the average punter who would not ordinarily use the language that we are omitting. Therefore we are just catching up with 2023. It has been a while since we had an opportunity to look at a bill like this; the Queen was around for a while. We probably would have done the same thing 10 years ago. We did not do it in 1968, which was the last time these types of bills were able to be considered. Dr Bach, there is really not much to see here. There is no conspiracy. It is just being prudent and good housekeeping.

Clause agreed to; clauses 2 to 8 agreed to.

Schedule 1 (17:02)

The DEPUTY PRESIDENT: Dr Bach, you can either move just your amendment 1, which tests all of them, or you can move them all as a group if you wish to do so.

Matthew BACH: I will move them all in bulk. I move:

1. Schedule 1, line 11, omit “the” and insert “His Majesty’s”.

2. Schedule 1, line 15, omit “the” and insert “His Majesty’s”.

3. Schedule 1, line 17, omit “the Crown in right of Victoria” and insert “His Majesty”.

4. Schedule 1, page 9, line 28, omit “Schedule omit” and insert “Schedule, for”.

5. Schedule 1, page 9, line 30, after ‘Faith.”’ insert ‘substitute ‘“Charles the Third, by the Grace of God King of Australia and His other Realms and Territories, Head of the Commonwealth.”’.

6. Schedule 1, page 13, line 13, omit “the” and insert “His Majesty’s”.

7. Schedule 1, page 13, line 16, omit “the” and insert “His Majesty’s”.

8. Schedule 1, page 15, line 30, omit “omit” and insert “for”.

9. Schedule 1, page 15, line 30, after ‘Queen”’ insert ‘substitute “Lord the King”’.

10. Schedule 1, page 16, line 24, omit “omit” and insert “for”.

11. Schedule 1, page 16, line 25, after “occurring)” insert ‘substitute “Lord the King”’.

12. Schedule 1, page 16, line 27, omit “the” and insert “His Majesty’s”.

As I said a little bit earlier, I spoke to these amendments in my contribution, and thus I do not think it is necessary to talk any further about them at this stage.

Jaclyn SYMES: There has been great debate in relation to why the amendments put forward by the opposition are not only not supported by the government but, frankly, are ridiculous.

Council divided on amendments:

Ayes (15): Matthew Bach, Melina Bath, Jeff Bourman, Gaelle Broad, David Davis, Moira Deeming, Renee Heath, Ann-Marie Hermans, Wendy Lovell, Trung Luu, Bev McArthur, Joe McCracken, Nicholas McGowan, Evan Mulholland, Rikkie-Lee Tyrrell

Noes (22): Ryan Batchelor, John Berger, Lizzie Blandthorn, Katherine Copsey, Enver Erdogan, Jacinta Ermacora, David Ettershank, Michael Galea, Shaun Leane, David Limbrick, Sarah Mansfield, Tom McIntosh, Rachel Payne, Aiv Puglielli, Georgie Purcell, Samantha Ratnam, Ingrid Stitt, Jaclyn Symes, Lee Tarlamis, Sonja Terpstra, Gayle Tierney, Sheena Watt

Amendments negatived.

Schedule 1 agreed to.

Reported to house without amendment.

Jaclyn SYMES (Northern Victoria – Attorney-General, Minister for Emergency Services) (17:09): I move:

That the report be now adopted.

Motion agreed to.

Report adopted.

Third reading

Jaclyn SYMES (Northern Victoria – Attorney-General, Minister for Emergency Services) (17:10): I move:

That the bill be now read a third time.

The PRESIDENT: The question is:

That the bill be now read a third time and do pass.

Council divided on question:

Ayes (22): Ryan Batchelor, John Berger, Lizzie Blandthorn, Katherine Copsey, Enver Erdogan, Jacinta Ermacora, David Ettershank, Michael Galea, Shaun Leane, David Limbrick, Sarah Mansfield, Tom McIntosh, Rachel Payne, Aiv Puglielli, Georgie Purcell, Samantha Ratnam, Ingrid Stitt, Jaclyn Symes, Lee Tarlamis, Sonja Terpstra, Gayle Tierney, Sheena Watt

Noes (15): Matthew Bach, Melina Bath, Jeff Bourman, Gaelle Broad, David Davis, Moira Deeming, Renee Heath, Ann-Marie Hermans, Wendy Lovell, Trung Luu, Bev McArthur, Joe McCracken, Nicholas McGowan, Evan Mulholland, Rikkie-Lee Tyrrell

Question agreed to.

Read third time.

The PRESIDENT: Pursuant to standing order 14.28, the bill will be returned to the Assembly with a message informing them that the Council have agreed to the bill without amendment.