Federalism in Australia
Federalism was adopted, as a constitutional principle, in Australia on 1 January 1901 – the date upon which the six self-governing Australian Colonies of New South Wales, Queensland, South Australia, Tasmania, Victoria, and Western Australia federated, formally constituting the Commonwealth of Australia. It remains a federation of those six original States under the Constitution of Australia.
Australia is the sixth oldest surviving federation in the world after the United States (1789), Mexico (1824), Switzerland (1848), Canada (1867), and Brazil (1891).
Relatively few changes have been made in terms of the formal (written) constitution since Australian federation occurred; in practice, however, the way the federal system functions has changed enormously. The most significant respect in which it has changed is in the degree to which the Commonwealth government has assumed a position of dominance.
History[edit]
Federation[edit]
Instigated by Henry Parkes' Tenterfield Oration of 24 October 1889, the Australian Colonies conducted a series of constitutional conventions through the 1890s. These culminated in a draft Constitution that was put to popular vote in the individual colonies, and eventually approved by the electors, after a final round of changes met the higher threshold of support required in New South Wales. It was then passed into law by the Imperial Parliament in Britain as the Commonwealth of Australia Constitution Act 1900, finalising the process of the Federation of Australia.[1]
The rather desultory way in which federation proceeded reflected the absence of compelling urgency. The colonies saw some advantage in removing tariff barriers to inter-colonial trade and commerce, having a greater strategic presence, and gaining access to investment capital at lower rates; individually, though, none of these represented a driving force.[2] Taken together with the emergence for the first time of a distinct sense of Australian national identity, however, they were collectively sufficient.[3] This lack of urgency was also reflected in their desire to create a minimally-centralised union.[4]
Federal features in the Australian Constitution[edit]
In its design, Australia's federal system was modelled closely on the American federal system. This included: enumeration of the powers of parliament (s. 51) and not those of the States, with the States being assigned a broad 'residual' power instead (s. 108); a 'supremacy' clause (s. 109); strong bicameralism, with a Senate in which the States are equally represented notwithstanding great disparities in population (s. 7); the division of senators into different cohorts on alternating electoral cycles (s. 13); the establishment of a supreme court empowered to declare actions of either level of government unconstitutional, the High Court of Australia (s. 71); and a complex two-step amending procedure (s. 128).
The Territories[edit]
In addition to the States, Australia has a number of Territories. Two of those are self-governing: the Australian Capital Territory (ACT) and the Northern Territory (NT). The rest are administered by the Government of Australia. All are constitutionally under the authority of the Commonwealth parliament. The power to "make laws for the government" of the Territories, assigned to the Commonwealth Parliament by s 122 of the Constitution, is not confined by any words of limitation. It is generally assumed to be a plenary power, equivalent to the "peace, order and good government" powers of self-government assigned to the States by their own Constitution Acts.
However, the Constitution makes almost no provisions as to the role of the territories within the federation. For example, the Senate was to be composed of equal numbers of Senators from each state. A particularly troublesome matter was whether this excluded territories from participation in the Senate. Two seats each have been allocated to the Northern Territory and the Australian Capital Territory, while each of the states has twelve. Although officially a separate internal territory, Jervis Bay Territory is counted as part of the Division of Fenner for the purposes of representation in the House of Representatives and the Australian Capital Territory for the purpose of representation in the Senate. Two of the three inhabited external territories, namely Christmas Island and the Cocos (Keeling) Islands, are represented by the senators and representatives of the Northern Territory. Since 2019, Norfolk Island has been represented by the Senators for the Australian Capital Territory and by the House of Representatives member for Bean (since 2019) or Canberra (2016-19). It previously had no representation due to the higher degree of autonomy it possessed under self-government until 2015.
The Northern Territory referendum of 1998 narrowly rejected a statehood proposal for the Northern Territory. Admission of the Territory as a new State raises difficult questions about how much representation in parliament would be accorded a jurisdiction with such a small population.[15]
Intergovernmental relations and executive federalism[edit]
In response to the increasing overlap between the two levels of government, Australian federalism has developed extensive practices of intergovernmental relations.[16] At the peak of these are formal meetings between the Prime Minister, the premiers of the States, the Chief Ministers of the two self-governing Territories and the president of the Australian Local Government Association. In the early 1990s, those meetings were formalised as the Council of Australian Governments (COAG).[17] With the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, the formal processes of COAG were set aside in favour of more frequent, immediate and collegial meetings of the heads of government christened "National Cabinet".
In 2005, the State and Territory governments established their own peak body, the Council for the Australian Federation (CAF), modelled on the Council of the Federation in Canada.[18] However, CAF was active for only a few years and has fallen into disuse.