Benjamin B Saunders

I am grateful to Professor James Stellios and Leslie Gonye for their interaction with my book – from two very different perspectives.

The book is an expansion and development of my PhD research, which was a historical examination of the views of the framers of the Constitution regarding responsible government, completed in 2017. At the time, Professor Stellios encouraged me to develop further some aspects of my work, including giving further examination to the concepts of ‘popular sovereignty’ and the ‘sovereignty’ of the people, and also reflecting further on the doctrinal implications of my thesis.

Leslie Gonye

I commend Ben Saunders on his book Responsible Government and the Australian Constitution. He has produced an accessible work that diligently examines and threads together a vast volume of material to argue the importance of historic context in understanding the Constitution regarding responsible government. This is key, as the provisions in the Constitution that concern the executive are relatively few and as responsible government is fundamentally political, there is plenty of scope for principles to evolve for governments to operate for the sovereign people of Australia to govern themselves in the manner they deem best (Saunders, p 207).

James Stellios

In this comment I offer observations on Associate Professor Saunders’ book, Responsible Government and the Australian Constitution (Hart, 2023) (Saunders), focusing primarily on the doctrinal implications of the book’s thesis. I will start by reflecting on the institutions of ‘representative and responsible’ government. While often presented as a composite expression, the institutions are distinct in principle, and that distinctiveness might have important implications for the role of judicial review. Further complicating the place of judicial review within the constitutional system is the tension created by the combination of political and legal constitutionalism, as each conception of constitutionalism contemplates a different means for controlling government power. Finally, I briefly reflect on the doctrinal implications of these constitutional features.

Ryan Goss

It is said that journalism is the first rough draft of history. In 2022, there have been many first drafts of the history of the Secret Ministries affair. Much has already been written about various aspects of the Secret Ministries. In a thought-provoking forthcoming article in the Australian Law Journal, for example, Fiona Roughley and Megan Caristo explore whether ‘the Constitution contains an implied requirement that any appointment of a person to administer a department of State be made public within a reasonable period’. The release of the Bell Report on 25 November 2022 — and of many of the submissions made to the Bell Inquiry — have added to our knowledge of the events surrounding the Secret Ministries.