Whitlams Dismissal

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'Mr. Whitlam, In accordance with section 64 of the Constitution I hereby determine

your appointment as my Chief Adviser and Head of the Government. It follows that I

also determine the appointments of all the Ministers in your Government.

With these very words, On Tuesday November 11th, 1975, the Governor-General of Australia, John Kerr, dismissed Mr. Gough Whitlam as Prime Minister and replaced him with Malcolm Fraser as caretaker PM - hence marking the most dramatic political crisis in the history of Australia then and since. In justifying his reasons John Kerr went on to state the main reason for Whitlam's dismissal was that 'If a Prime Minister refuses to resign or have election, and this is the case with Mr. Whitlam, my constitutional authority and duty require me to do what I have now done' -

The dismissal was a direct result of a series of events that took place within Whitlam's Government that ultimately led to the senate's first time ever decision in blocking government budget supply - a decision that in turn sparked widespread debate on the powers of the Senate, changing conventions in Australian politics and the powers of the Governor-General