Originally Posted by bob10
Pay attention this way. Time for an education.
The Balfour Declaration of 1926 declared the UK and the Dominions to be:
… autonomous Communities within the British Empire equal in status, in no way subordinate one to another in any aspect of their domestic or external affairs, though united by a common allegiance to the Crown and freely associated as members of the British Commonwealth of Nations.[8]
Further, the passing of the Statute of Westminster 1931 effectively established the legislative independence of the dominions from the UK – embodying principles of equality and common allegiance set out in the Balfour Declaration.[9] This gave Australia the independence to legislate on its own citizens when it ratified this statute.[10]
Under UK law, the British Nationality Act 1948 altered the meaning of ‘British Subject’ by introducing citizenship within the British Empire.[11] British Citizenship was restricted to the United Kingdom and its Crown Colonies (CUKC), omitting the dominions including Australia. While His Majesty remained the constitutional monarch in these Dominions, the Act reclassified them as ‘commonwealth countries’.[12] Although the term ‘British Subject’ was an overarching uniting class that applied to both citizens of commonwealth countries and CUKCs, these events reflected an increasingly fragmented British Empire, and the emergence of Australia as an increasingly independent sovereign nation.[13]
Australian Parliament enacted its own citizenship laws in 1948,[14] which further altered the meaning of ‘British Subject’. While an Australian Citizen was a ‘British Subject’, he/she was only so by virtue of possessing Australian citizenship, even though he/she may be a ‘natural-born’ British Subject under UK law. This reflected the evolving political and constitutional relationship between the United Kingdom and Australia, which furthered the notion of an indivisible Crown increasingly obsolete, and with it the concept that ‘no subject of the Crown was an “alien” within any part of His Majesty’s dominions’ outdated.
By 1959, Australia was held to be an independent Commonwealth country,separate from the British Empire.[15]
British Subject status was radically altered by theBritish Nationality Act 1981 –it practically eradicated ‘British Subject’ status in UK Law. l number of otherwise statelThis Act provided that no person is a British Subject except for a small number of stateless nationals..[16] On a similar note, Australian Parliament repealed British Subject status from Australians in 1987 to reflect Australia’s status as an independent nation.[17]
These developments reflect a marked departure from Blackstone’s view – in that a common allegiance no longer gave effect to a common substantive nationality. In Australia, the High Court in Nolan held:
[while] there is only one person who is the Sovereign, … in matters of law and government the Queen of the United Kingdom … is entirely independent and distinct from the Queen of (e.g.) Canada or Australia. … References to ‘subject of the queen’ in the Australian Constitution … are interpreted as references to a subject of the queen in right of Australia.[18]
The UK Courts reiterated the view in Nolan. Lightman LJ upheld the rule in the Australia Acts, that Her Majesty, when acting in respect of Australia, has a distinct and different constitutional role from that which she enjoys as Queen of the United Kingdom.
[W]hen HM the Queen is exercising her functions under the [Australian] Constitution; she is acting pursuant to Australian law. … It is not for the United Kingdom courts to enter the field proffering its view as to the proper interpretation of the Constitution.[19]
So, are ‘British Subjects’ subjects of the Queen in Australia today? Well, from the reasons above, persons who owe allegiance to the Queen’s person by reason of citizenship of some other nation apart from Australia are, contrary to the position taken prior to 1949, not ‘subjects of the queen’ in Australia for the purpose of constitutional law.
Here endeth the lesson ......Cobber.. You have been hard at work Bob. I am as Aussie as they come but recognise we are still part of the Commonwealth. By the way who ratifies legislation in the States, territories and Commonwealth?
Cheers
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