I know Australian Senator Lidia Thorpe. I served in the 88 seat Victorian Parliament with her for two years, given its size, we all got to know each other quite well. Lidia is a political extremist and perpetual troublemaker. Her childish rant at His Majesty the King was counterproductive for her cause; it has only generated greater sympathy and support for a 75 year old monarch battling cancer. 

Following on from her stunt in the Great Hall of Parliament she has now declared that she didn’t swear allegiance to Her Majesty the Queen, her heirs and successors according to law, when she was elected to the federal Senate. Thorpe claims she “swore allegiance to the Queen’s ‘hairs’”.

Section 42 of the Australian Constitution makes clear: 

Every Senator and every member of the House of Representatives shall before taking his seat make and subscribe before the Governor-General, or some person authorised by him, an oath or affirmation of allegiance in the form set forth in the schedule to this Constitution.

This failure to make the oath as prescribed is very serious and calls into question Thorpe’s eligibility to take her seat in the Senate. Watch this space.

Thorpe has a litany of other controversies. She has previously suggested during a debate in the Senate that my friend, conservative Senator Hollie Hughes, mother to an autistic child, should have kept her legs closed. Thorpe has also had multiple altercations with police. For reasons best known to herself, she lay on the road blocking the Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras. She’s also managed to get herself banned from a strip club for life after verbally abusing a number of patrons.

Thorpe was forced to quit her role as deputy leader of the Greens after failing to disclose she was in a relationship with a former bikie gang boss whilst a member of a parliamentary committee investigating bikie gangs. 

She is so extreme, she subsequently left the Greens because of their support for the Aboriginal Voice referendum, which sought to establish a third chamber in the Australian parliament based on race. This referendum was spectacularly defeated last year by the overwhelming majority of the Australian people. 

Thorpe opposed the recent Aboriginal Voice referendum because it didn’t go far enough. Despite proposing to alter the operation of the Australian Parliament, the Voice still recognised the basic tenets of Australian sovereignty; Crown, constitution and parliament. All institutions she believes are illegitimate in Australia. Hence, yelling at the top of her voice, she declared “you’re not my King”, “give us a Treaty” and “f*** the colony”, whilst disrupting an otherwise warm and dignified ceremony in the Great Hall. 

The Crown can’t sign a treaty with Aboriginal people because they are citizens of Australia, hence I passionately believe a government cannot enter into a treaty with its own citizens. Thorpe basically hates Australia; therefore she demands a treaty and rebukes the presence of the King of Australia. 

Unlike the United Kingdom, the monarchy in Australia has, within recent memory, been legitimised by a democratic vote. When the constitution was established by votes in each of the six British colonies in 1899 and 1900 very few Aboriginal people, and women, were allowed to vote. In 1999 a proposal to abolish the monarchy and replace it with a republic was defeated by 55 per cent to 45 per cent of the Australian people, without exception. The monarchy has a democratic legitimacy that does not exist elsewhere, and recent polling has support for a republic floundering on 33 per cent. 

The monarchy in Australia is secure for many years to come, and this Royal visit will go down in history

Until July 2024 there was an Assistant Minister for the republic in the Australian government. This absurd post has been abolished because the Albanese Labor government understands that the republic issue in Australia is dead, there will be no second referendum. The republicans always said that when the late Queen died republican sentiment would surge, it hasn’t. The republic debate in Australia is similar to debates in the UK about the future of the House of Lords, the political class love to discuss this, but no one else cares.

The BBC is obsessed with the idea of Australia becoming a republic but changing the Australian Constitution is particularly difficult; it requires a simple national majority but also a majority in four of six states. Making life even more difficult for the republicans, they can’t agree on the model. Should a future president be directly elected or appointed by parliament? Should Australia maintain a parliamentary system or move to a presidential republic like the United States? No one in the republican camp can agree on what type of republic they want, which is why the republic in Australia will never succeed.  

The monarchy in Australia is secure for many years to come, and this Royal visit will go down in history as a great success, despite the odd interruption.