Vice-Regal Saint: Bring back Dames and Knighthoods
Hat tip to Professor Flint. The New Zealand Herald gets it:
You mean to tell me that all you have succeeded in doing is replacing the English class system with a New Zealand class system? As in there's the political class and then there is everybody else? New Zealand needs to stop acting like a "Politician's Republic".
"Much as the honours system is valued, it has never quite recovered from the former Government's decision to abandon titles such as knights and dames. These titles were thought to be redolent of the English class system and not appropriate for an egalitarian country such as New Zealand.
The argument was never wholly convincing. But what seems certain now is that the egalitarian version has not caught on as well as was hoped. Moreover, it is not likely to while the public sense that some appointments are political or simply matters of form. What is needed is a system that is thoroughly independent and that recognises outstanding contributions rather than just time served."
The only way to free the honours system from political taint is to take it away from the politicians and to put it in the hands of Her Majesty or Her Majesty's representatives. Always and forever.
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5 comments:
A respected reward for services to the community beyond that required by your occupation as for a civil servant, sportsman (or sportswoman), solider (sailor, airman), businessman or artist is simply noble and sublime.
Restoration or a politically neutral honours system independent of the Government would restore the integrity lost due to previous political interference.
I personally favour citizens directly petitioning the Governor-General without interference of the Office of the Prime Minister. A system of sub-committees to advise the Vice-Regal office on specialist subjects should also be considered.
Even though I do not really agree with the way "The Monarchist" website expresses things I know they do allow open debate unlike ACM who now do not allow any real argument. ACM wrote an article on this very issue but I was not able to have the below views published on that website:
No Australian government will ever again promote Imperial “Honours”, you can bet your house on it!
Just as republicans must go to a referendum to get change and not silly plebiscites, constitutional monarchist must be able to show why they believe our current constitution works better and not simple attack those Australians who believe in a presidential system.
In one way ACM cannot attack republicans effectively because there is no republic model to attack coming from ARM. As any thinking person knows people do not exist to serve the Queen (that has no logic to it as a concept) but we do have a duty to each other to have the best working system of government we can.
I feel that one day ACM will be on the sidelines throwing pebbles as the mighty republic marchers into existence. That is very sad as we should be working with our fellow Australians on the best system we can have, not just attacking people who are trying to better what we have.
It is a clear as day, to anyone whose heart is open, that the Crown (for whatever reason) does not have the support it once did. I was very active in the 1999 referendum on the NO case and know full well that we worked with direct-election republicans to win the referendum. Therefore many of the 55% who voted “NO” are not really in favour of the Crown but did not like the version of republic put to them – so let’s stop pretending we won that one. The people won as they had their say.
ACM as a group has no hope in hell of influencing the Labor governments of this nation; I have come to accept this. Let’s stand with our fellow Australians and not against them and help to bring an end to division. Maybe a compromise is just around the corner.
I can not say I particularly agree that the support for the Crown is not here, polls show it is slowly increasing while support for a republic dwindles. And even on ABC radio, where once it was back to back republic supporters calling in, recently it was more than half Monarchists.
More importantly there is no grass roots support for the change. I remember in '99 everyone talking about it, even at school when we were all 14 the teachers were talking about the republic, the students were talking about it, it was everywhere. The only political party actually pushing for it is the Greens, which is as good as a kiss of death.
However, I do agree that there is very little chance of an Australian government making our honours system actually worth something, for much the same reason. No one thinks about it much, those that do, whether for or against, are an intellectual minority.
Don't worry David - the Flint-style royalists are indeed evaporating (no doubt to the chagrin of this blog) - but the Whitlamite boomers, Keatingesque sectarians and avant-garde Grassbyites are disappearing faster. And without them, there is no real critical mass in favour of a republic.
We are rapidly approaching the point where the monarchy, with zero establishment power, nonetheless becomes near-untouchable in Australia, almost as a symbol of "Bogan Pride". Rebel Wilson, with a tiara if you like (Google the term "Bogan Pride" if you aren't Australian).
This site won't like this reason for the Crown's survival, and the political class will resent it horribly, but that's how things look like panning out...
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