Page 515 - Week 02 - Thursday, 22 February 1990
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The fact that no such action took place can never be justified to the Australian people. The seriousness of this matter is such that Watergate in comparison appears as a nursery story. The position can be summarised thus: if the Government and Opposition can succeed in ignoring or suppressing the application of a section of the Australian Constitution then upon that precedent the Constitution becomes the instrument of the Government to use how it likes. From such a result develops a dictatorship.
On 16 April, 1975 in the House of Representatives, Prime Minister Whitlam mentioned these matters in Hansard, pages 1661 to 1662. This just shows that the matter goes back 15 years and still nothing has been done. Gough Whitlam stated:
I do not think it is very seemly or effective for members of either House to determine whether they have transgressed the Constitution. Parliament has made provision for these matters to be determined by the High Court. It would seem to be a seemly way to have the High Court determine it. If we find that many of us have transgressed the Constitution and have placed our seats in jeopardy, then the cure is not to ignore the Constitution but to ask the people to amend the Constitution.
It was Senator Withers who stated, in Hansard on 21 April, 1975:
It is essential that members of this Parliament have the respect of the people ... If someone is accused of breaking the Constitution - the most important law in the land - that should be clarified. If it is not clarified, the whole Parliament will be demeaned ... It is not good enough to say that such a thing would only be a technical breach and should not be enforced. In the laws that govern this Parliament there can be no such thing as a technical breach. The law is the law. To breach it is to break it. We could not expect the people to obey the laws we pass to control their conduct, if the laws governing the conduct of Parliament were also not observed ... To do so would be dishonourable ... We have a duty to ourselves, to our successors and to the public, to immediately examine the meaning and application not only of section 44 but also of section 45 of the Constitution.
So we have a situation that has existed for 15 years where statements have been made in various Constitutional Commissions that the Constitution certainly appear to disqualify automatically any member from taking up a seat
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