If, like me, you are over 42 years old, you would have voted in the 1999 republic referendum. This was a referendum to answer a simple question: Do we cease being a constitutional monarchy and become a republic? Despite most of us, at the time, desiring a republic, and despite the YES vote being far ahead in the polls, in the end it was the NO that won, defeating our hope for an Australian head of state. Many of us can still remember why and are still angry about it.

A decision was made back then to choose a model for the election of a president and then go to the referendum with that model. This made the NO campaign’s job easier as all they had to do to remain a monarchy (which was all they wanted) was to split the republican public and ensure that some of those who wanted a republic would vote against it. The way they did this was simple: they got the republicans arguing on the model, and encouraged people who wanted a republic but disagreed on how the president should be selected to vote NO.