'I want a republic, but I'm in no hurry,' says Australian PM

Prime minister Kevin Rudd, who is meeting the Queen today, has renewed his commitment to making Australia a republic – but said he was in no hurry to make it happen.

Mr Rudd will have an audience with the Queen – Australia’s head of state – in London during an international trip that has also included talks with government leaders in the United States and Europe. He is to stop next in China.

It was unlikely that the issue of an Australian republic would come up during Mr Rudd’s meeting with the Queen – royal diplomacy is mostly limited to niceties, not politics – but the visit inevitably led to questions about the new Australian leader’s stance on the topic.

“I’ve always been a republican,” Mr Rudd said in an interview with the BBC, adding that ending Britain’s sovereignty of Australia was part of his Labour Party’s policy.

“We’re committed to it,” Mr Rudd said. But he added: “For us, this is not a top order priority. I’m sure we will get to it in due season, but it is not a top order priority.”

Australia’s first settlements were camps for British convicts, and the country has debated the role of the monarch ever since.

While the royals’ role has been whittled down to a largely ceremonial one, Australia is still a constitutional monarchy with the British sovereign as its head of state.

The prime minister is the head of Australia’s government, though on many matters of state he formally reports to the Queen’s representative, the governor general, who by convention carries out duties as advised by the elected government.

In effect, the government operates independently of Britain.

Australia’s most recent Labour prime minister, Paul Keating, launched a national debate in the 1990s that divided the country into monarchists and republicans.

A 1999 referendum held after Mr Keating was voted out of power asked Australians if they wanted to replace the monarchy with a president elected by parliament. It was voted down.

Then-prime minister John Howard, a staunch monarchist, refused to campaign for the referendum, and republican critics, who wanted the option to directly elect a president, accused Mr Howard of helping the “no” side by not presenting that as an option in the vote.

In a speech during a visit to the country in 2000, the Queen said it was up to Australians to decide on the future of the monarchy in the country and that she would remain their monarch for as long as they wished it.

In the BBC interview, Mr Rudd, who defeated Mr Howard in elections last November, declined to set a timetable for revisiting the republic issue, but suggested it would not occur while the 81-year-old Queen was alive.

Opinion polls show many Australians hold the Queen in high regard, but that they like Charles less.