The Dismissal. Australia's Most Sensational Power Struggle: the Dramatic fall of Gough Whitlam (Paperback)

~ Paul Kelly (Author)

Product Details

• Paperback
• Publisher: Angus & Robertson (January 1, 1983)
• ISBN-10: 0207148600
• ISBN-13: 978-0207148606
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #3,342,025 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars who flouted convention?, June 4, 2007

By	W Boudville (Terra, Sol 3) - See all my reviews (TOP 10 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

Sobering to realise that it is now 32 years since Whitlam was sacked by the Governor General. This book, written just a few years after the events, is an evocative recall of the tumultuous year of 1975. While the rest of the world was riveted on other matters, Australia endured its most divisive peacetime years.

The book explains how Whitlam constantly ran into his lack on numbers in the Senate. Especially frustrating to him and other Laborites, because they'd spent a generation out of federal power, and had an ambitious agenda to implement. It was certainly daring of him to try to govern after the Senate rejected his budget ("Supply"). We see arguments as to who flouted convention. Was the Liberal-Nat coalition in the Senate justified in rejected the budget, from a party that had decisively won the lower House in 73? One answer, by Labor, is that the coalition should have acceded to this electoral result. And that in not doing so, it was perverting the democratic process.

The coalition's rejoinder was that they had a constitutional right to review and, in this case, reject Whitlam's budget. That it was Whitlam who grossly ignored convention by not calling an election, and instead trying to govern when his money was running out.

All this is covered by the book. Brings back memories for some of us.