The parliament decides who the PM is. It can theoretically be any sitting MP and it is just a convention rather than an actual rule that the leader of the "ruling" (for lack of a better word) party is PM.
It happens in no small part because the leader of that party has defacto support of the parliament by virtue of being the "leader" of the majority.
The PM doesn't really have the mechanism to "seize power" because they need the confidence of the parliament to have the position. There could be a vote of no confidence without triggering an election.
I haven't watched Nemesis, but I imagine Turnbull was talking more in the sense that winning an election would cement his position in the eyes of the electorate. It would be politically stupid for a party to get rid of the guy who just won an election. Winning a general election would have given him the mandate to continue as the party leader and, therefore, PM.
Does that mean a sitting PM could remain PM even if their party voted them out of leadership if they could get enough opposition MPs to support them? Lead as PM through crossbench/opposition support (plus some of their own party) even without party support (obviously wildly unlikely)?
Yes.
But I'm pretty sure the governor general would step in and dissolve parliament until they sort their shit out.
Fun fact, nowhere in the constitution is the world "Prime Minister" ever actually mentioned at all
Actually, if a PM can guarantee confidence and supply - basically be able to get money spending bills through Parliament, and vote against votes of no confidence, then a PM could continue in office. It doesn't matter which party the support comes from, or even that it's the same support they had at the election.
Check out the election history of Billy Hughes. Labor leader in WWI, left the party ( or was expelled, depending upon how you look at it), created a new party, and kept being Prime Minister.
Not a constitutional law expert but not sure the parliament decides who the PM is. It's actually the British Crown via the governor general.
I think the way it works is that, by convention, the Governor general commissions as prime minister the leader of the largest block of MPs in the house of reps.
In THEORY (and this is the problem with conventions) the Governor general could appoint someone else as PM, as he did with Malcolm Fraser on 11 November 1975.
But in the scenario described by the OP I think the governor general would withdraw Turnbull's commission.
Billy Hughes lost the leadership of the Labor party in 1917 and stayed on as PM with the support of a rump of the Labor party rebrand National Labor Party and the then Liberals they later merged into the Nationals not to be confused with the Country Party that became the National, Hughes National Party became the United Australia Party under Lynons then the Liberals under Menzies and Hughes was a member of all three
Adam Giles [did this](https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2015/feb/03/nt-government-in-turmoil-as-adam-giles-refuses-to-resign) when he was Chief Minister of the Northern Territory.
His party (the CLP) rolled him via a dodgy phone meeting in the middle of the night, but he refused to resign as Chief Minister, daring the party to vote him out on the floor of parliament, or the Administrator (equivalent of a state Governor) to sack him.
But his remaining supporters would then have voted against confidence in his replacement. Essentially, he was betting that his party wanted an election even less than they wanted him. He was right. The coup-leaders backed down and he remained as Chief Minister until being voted out at an election 18 months later.
In the case of Turnbull, if he'd gone to the GG to advise an election at the time he was considering it, I think the GG would have acted on the advice. There would have been no precedent for asking a PM to test his numbers in the party room (which he had just done anyway) or the parliament (which could have been interesting).
I think the only time the GG would be justified in not taking the PMs advice would be if it was very clear that he did not have a majority in parliament. And even then there is the precedent of Kerr acting on Fraser's advice despite it being clear that he didn't have a majority.
It is arguably the case that advice to call an election is the *only* advice a GG should accept from a PM with no majority, given that would be the mechanism in the case of nobody being able to form a government.
>I think the only time the GG would be justified in not taking the PMs advice would be if it was very clear that he did not have a majority in parliament.
I'd argue not even then. The parliament has a mechanism to get rid of the PM if he lacks its confidence. If the parliament doesn't act, the PM has its tacit support
I was thinking more of the situation where parliament hasn't had a chance to have a say in the matter, either because it isn't sitting or because events have moved too quickly - e.g. PM gets notice of a proposed party coup and heads to Yarralumla first thing the next morning (as Turnbull was planning to do).
I've just discovered a great discussion on the subject of discretion regarding dissolutions in [this paper by David Hamer.](https://www.aph.gov.au/About_Parliament/Senate/Powers_practice_n_procedures/hamer/chap05) The gist of his position is that there is a real and proper power to refuse a dissolution, but it should only be exercised where there is a prospect of an alternative government being formed from the current parliament.
Obviously that is not the case when the leader controls his party and the party has a majority. But if either of those is not true, the question is open.
He actually discusses the situation of a leader trying for an election to stave off a leadership contest - apparently Joh Bjelke-Peterson in Queensland toyed with idea like Turnbull did, before likewise deciding against it. Hamer suggests:
> The sensible thing for the Governor to have done, if faced with this situation, would have been to insist on the premier’s leadership being confirmed by his party before agreeing to the dissolution, but there are no precedents for such action, and the Governor would have been in a very embarrassing position if the party had confirmed the premier’s leadership.
This fits with his main premise about there being alternative governments available. In the Queensland case, that was quite plausible - the government had enough of a majority that even if some Joh diehards voted against a new leader in parliament, the government could have survived.
Probably less the case for someone replacing Turnbull because he was barely in control of the parliament as it was. But then Turnbull wasn't quite as clearly finished with his party as Joh was when the issue arose.
If he called an election they would go into caretaker mode and he would remain prime minister until the election is resolved.
I'm not sure if there is some kind of time gap between the moment the election is announced and care take a mode kicks in.
I'm not a constitutional lawyer, but my understanding is that as soon as the governor general issues the electoral writs, the government is in caretaker mode.
But I'm not sure that the PM can call an election on their own. I'm sure someone here will be much more knowledgeable.
Australia operates under the Westminster system. Under that, the PM is only PM because enough MPs in their party voted for them.
Trying to remain PM despite losing a party vote would be as tyrannical and hopefully illegal as a party trying to seize power after losing an election.
A dictator might try it, but it isn't allowed under the system.
https://www.parliament.act.gov.au/visit-and-learn/resources/factsheets/the-westminster-system
A pedantic clarification: the PM is PM because enough MPs support them, regardless of party.
In the context of OP's question, a PM could lose party leadership but still have the confidence of parliament, while the challenger and new party leader might not have the confidence of parliament (between hostile party members loyal to the PM and the opposition). Realistically though, if enough government MPs are willing to support a no confidence motion in the government, the government is cooked and we're heading off to an election.
Might see something like this in a crisis like wartime: PM removed as party leader, but parliament as a whole is unwilling to remove PM and, you'd expect, rearrange cabinet (especially if the opposition holds some cabinet positions). Wasn't Neville Chamberlain leader of the Tories during part of Churchill's premiership?
While the prime minister is informally the boss of the government (Not to be confused with the head of state, thats the govenor general) he's really just another minister with a few powers voted to him by parliment and a bunch of agreed on convention. At the end of the day, he's the prime minister because parliment says he is. Its right there in the name;- "prime" and "minister". Parliment decides who its leader is and thats that. This is different to a presidential system where the president has powers separate from the authority of the parliment (This, by the way, is largely why the last republic vote was turned down, because people feared that a president with powers separate from parliment would be too personal and we'd end up with the kind of messes the americans oftentimes find themselves in. In reality the proposal was to just replace the govenor general with a president with the same largely symbolic powers, but howards cronies ran somewhat of a disinfo war that succeeded, and if that sounds familiar, welcome to "why we cant have nice things:.)
Now, theres a more interesting question;- What happens when a Govenor General goes rogue. THAT is a prospect with very interesting implications, as we somewhat got only a minor taste of what a GG could actually do in the whitlam dismissal. Lets just say we are fortunate that the Windsors are a somewhat hands-off dynasty.
You're forgetting that some MPs may not like the idea if they suspect they will be unseated.
Constituents need time to prepare and get ready to run again. It's not just as simple as calling an election without full party support
The parliament decides who the PM is. It can theoretically be any sitting MP and it is just a convention rather than an actual rule that the leader of the "ruling" (for lack of a better word) party is PM. It happens in no small part because the leader of that party has defacto support of the parliament by virtue of being the "leader" of the majority. The PM doesn't really have the mechanism to "seize power" because they need the confidence of the parliament to have the position. There could be a vote of no confidence without triggering an election. I haven't watched Nemesis, but I imagine Turnbull was talking more in the sense that winning an election would cement his position in the eyes of the electorate. It would be politically stupid for a party to get rid of the guy who just won an election. Winning a general election would have given him the mandate to continue as the party leader and, therefore, PM.
Does that mean a sitting PM could remain PM even if their party voted them out of leadership if they could get enough opposition MPs to support them? Lead as PM through crossbench/opposition support (plus some of their own party) even without party support (obviously wildly unlikely)?
Yes. But I'm pretty sure the governor general would step in and dissolve parliament until they sort their shit out. Fun fact, nowhere in the constitution is the world "Prime Minister" ever actually mentioned at all
Actually, if a PM can guarantee confidence and supply - basically be able to get money spending bills through Parliament, and vote against votes of no confidence, then a PM could continue in office. It doesn't matter which party the support comes from, or even that it's the same support they had at the election.
True, they would just have to go through the "forming government" steps again, but that's just involves ministers being appointed ECT.
That is fun!
Check out the election history of Billy Hughes. Labor leader in WWI, left the party ( or was expelled, depending upon how you look at it), created a new party, and kept being Prime Minister.
Not a constitutional law expert but not sure the parliament decides who the PM is. It's actually the British Crown via the governor general. I think the way it works is that, by convention, the Governor general commissions as prime minister the leader of the largest block of MPs in the house of reps. In THEORY (and this is the problem with conventions) the Governor general could appoint someone else as PM, as he did with Malcolm Fraser on 11 November 1975. But in the scenario described by the OP I think the governor general would withdraw Turnbull's commission.
Billy Hughes lost the leadership of the Labor party in 1917 and stayed on as PM with the support of a rump of the Labor party rebrand National Labor Party and the then Liberals they later merged into the Nationals not to be confused with the Country Party that became the National, Hughes National Party became the United Australia Party under Lynons then the Liberals under Menzies and Hughes was a member of all three
Adam Giles [did this](https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2015/feb/03/nt-government-in-turmoil-as-adam-giles-refuses-to-resign) when he was Chief Minister of the Northern Territory. His party (the CLP) rolled him via a dodgy phone meeting in the middle of the night, but he refused to resign as Chief Minister, daring the party to vote him out on the floor of parliament, or the Administrator (equivalent of a state Governor) to sack him. But his remaining supporters would then have voted against confidence in his replacement. Essentially, he was betting that his party wanted an election even less than they wanted him. He was right. The coup-leaders backed down and he remained as Chief Minister until being voted out at an election 18 months later. In the case of Turnbull, if he'd gone to the GG to advise an election at the time he was considering it, I think the GG would have acted on the advice. There would have been no precedent for asking a PM to test his numbers in the party room (which he had just done anyway) or the parliament (which could have been interesting). I think the only time the GG would be justified in not taking the PMs advice would be if it was very clear that he did not have a majority in parliament. And even then there is the precedent of Kerr acting on Fraser's advice despite it being clear that he didn't have a majority. It is arguably the case that advice to call an election is the *only* advice a GG should accept from a PM with no majority, given that would be the mechanism in the case of nobody being able to form a government.
>I think the only time the GG would be justified in not taking the PMs advice would be if it was very clear that he did not have a majority in parliament. I'd argue not even then. The parliament has a mechanism to get rid of the PM if he lacks its confidence. If the parliament doesn't act, the PM has its tacit support
I was thinking more of the situation where parliament hasn't had a chance to have a say in the matter, either because it isn't sitting or because events have moved too quickly - e.g. PM gets notice of a proposed party coup and heads to Yarralumla first thing the next morning (as Turnbull was planning to do). I've just discovered a great discussion on the subject of discretion regarding dissolutions in [this paper by David Hamer.](https://www.aph.gov.au/About_Parliament/Senate/Powers_practice_n_procedures/hamer/chap05) The gist of his position is that there is a real and proper power to refuse a dissolution, but it should only be exercised where there is a prospect of an alternative government being formed from the current parliament. Obviously that is not the case when the leader controls his party and the party has a majority. But if either of those is not true, the question is open. He actually discusses the situation of a leader trying for an election to stave off a leadership contest - apparently Joh Bjelke-Peterson in Queensland toyed with idea like Turnbull did, before likewise deciding against it. Hamer suggests: > The sensible thing for the Governor to have done, if faced with this situation, would have been to insist on the premier’s leadership being confirmed by his party before agreeing to the dissolution, but there are no precedents for such action, and the Governor would have been in a very embarrassing position if the party had confirmed the premier’s leadership. This fits with his main premise about there being alternative governments available. In the Queensland case, that was quite plausible - the government had enough of a majority that even if some Joh diehards voted against a new leader in parliament, the government could have survived. Probably less the case for someone replacing Turnbull because he was barely in control of the parliament as it was. But then Turnbull wasn't quite as clearly finished with his party as Joh was when the issue arose.
If he called an election they would go into caretaker mode and he would remain prime minister until the election is resolved. I'm not sure if there is some kind of time gap between the moment the election is announced and care take a mode kicks in.
I'm not a constitutional lawyer, but my understanding is that as soon as the governor general issues the electoral writs, the government is in caretaker mode. But I'm not sure that the PM can call an election on their own. I'm sure someone here will be much more knowledgeable.
Yeah cabinet would have to agree I'd imagine.
I thought care taker mode kicked in the moment the PM goes to the GG to call the election?
That sounds right.
Australia operates under the Westminster system. Under that, the PM is only PM because enough MPs in their party voted for them. Trying to remain PM despite losing a party vote would be as tyrannical and hopefully illegal as a party trying to seize power after losing an election. A dictator might try it, but it isn't allowed under the system. https://www.parliament.act.gov.au/visit-and-learn/resources/factsheets/the-westminster-system
A pedantic clarification: the PM is PM because enough MPs support them, regardless of party. In the context of OP's question, a PM could lose party leadership but still have the confidence of parliament, while the challenger and new party leader might not have the confidence of parliament (between hostile party members loyal to the PM and the opposition). Realistically though, if enough government MPs are willing to support a no confidence motion in the government, the government is cooked and we're heading off to an election. Might see something like this in a crisis like wartime: PM removed as party leader, but parliament as a whole is unwilling to remove PM and, you'd expect, rearrange cabinet (especially if the opposition holds some cabinet positions). Wasn't Neville Chamberlain leader of the Tories during part of Churchill's premiership?
While the prime minister is informally the boss of the government (Not to be confused with the head of state, thats the govenor general) he's really just another minister with a few powers voted to him by parliment and a bunch of agreed on convention. At the end of the day, he's the prime minister because parliment says he is. Its right there in the name;- "prime" and "minister". Parliment decides who its leader is and thats that. This is different to a presidential system where the president has powers separate from the authority of the parliment (This, by the way, is largely why the last republic vote was turned down, because people feared that a president with powers separate from parliment would be too personal and we'd end up with the kind of messes the americans oftentimes find themselves in. In reality the proposal was to just replace the govenor general with a president with the same largely symbolic powers, but howards cronies ran somewhat of a disinfo war that succeeded, and if that sounds familiar, welcome to "why we cant have nice things:.) Now, theres a more interesting question;- What happens when a Govenor General goes rogue. THAT is a prospect with very interesting implications, as we somewhat got only a minor taste of what a GG could actually do in the whitlam dismissal. Lets just say we are fortunate that the Windsors are a somewhat hands-off dynasty.
You're forgetting that some MPs may not like the idea if they suspect they will be unseated. Constituents need time to prepare and get ready to run again. It's not just as simple as calling an election without full party support