Tony Abbott reveals the outgoing governor general, Quentin Bryce, and her successor, Peter Cosgrove, will be the first to receive the titles.
“Pre-eminent” Australians will become knights and dames at the Queen’s approval for the first time since 1989 after a shock announcement by the staunchly monarchist prime minister, creating a new tier of honour as an “important grace note” in our national life.
The Australian honours system was created by the Whitlam government in 1975 and the imperial honours system phased out by the federal government in 1982 and state governments in 1989.
But as he prepared for the governor general, Quentin Bryce, to hand over to her successor, Peter Cosgrove, Tony Abbott announced that, on his recommendation, the Queen had amended the letters patent for the Order of Australia to create a new honour: knights and dames of the Order of Australia.
He had not discussed the move with either his cabinet or his party room and said he had made the decision “in the past few weeks”.
The new awards would be recommended by the prime minister and approved by the Queen, with four made each year and the governor general occupying the position of “principal knight or dame in the Order of Australia”.
Both Bryce, who recently angered some monarchists by voicing her support for a republic, and Cosgrove, had accepted the award.
Abbott said the award would go to “those who have accepted public office rather than sought it” which means it is unlikely to go to former politicians, although they do not appear to have been entirely precluded.
More likely recipients, other than governors general and state governors, would be chiefs of the defence force and chief justices – people, the prime minister said, who “by virtue of the office they have held, could never entirely return to private life”.
It would be up to the recipient to decide whether the award would be bestowed at Buckingham Palace – something that can happen for existing Order of Australia awards – but if a future governor general did not want to be a dame or a knight, a future prime minister would have to again change the letters patent of the Order of Australia, as Abbott has just done.
The prime minister denied he was trying to “cement” the existing system for Australia’s head of state, but said that as a “staunch” supporter of the system it should be “no surprise I would want to enhance the dignity of the existing system”.
Final decisions for the Order of Australia are made by the Council for the Order of Australia, rather than a politician. But the new awards will be decided by the prime minister, who will “consult” the chairman of the Order of Australia.
The opposition leader, who is Bryce’s son-in-law, said the government would be better off concentrating on the economy.
Read the full story, Guardian Australia, here
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• Gemma, in Comments: National and personal sovereignty are the quintessential elements for our expansion into a more egalitarian and compassionate society. Quentin Bryce should have declined this offer and taken the opportunity to state her preference for an Australian honour. Disappointing and boring but not surprising as the future Sir Anthony gets brownie points with queenie and other assorted elites around the world. Not really a great leap backwards, more like a slimy slink downwards.
• Bob Hawkins, in Comments: Quentin Bryce, how could you? After making a decent fist of being GG (a vice-regal anachronism this country could well do without), you have allowed yourself to become the first victim of a megalomaniacal, divide-and-rule, miserably grovelling monarchist of a PM by accepting a “damehood” from him.
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