Sydney
Almost 10 years after Australians overwhelmingly rejected cutting links with the British crown, the question of a republic is back on the agenda. Or so the republican diehards would like to believe.
A national survey of voters has found that 52 per cent now believe that Australia should become a republic, while 40 per cent remain fiercely opposed to change. Republican activists have seized on the poll as evidence of a sea change in the way Australians see their constitutional future. The referendum in 1999 imploded when republicans started fighting among themselves.
Anti-monarchists have also taken heart from the elevation of Malcolm Turnbull, a former head of the republican movement, to opposition leader and the appointment of Quentin Bryce, a pioneering feminist lawyer, as governor general - the first woman in 107 years to hold that post.
Having avowed republicans at the head of both major political parties is a significant shift - former Liberal prime minister John Howard was a died-in-the-wool monarchist. But Mr Turnbull has been quick to say nothing should happen while the current monarch is on the throne. Under the constitution, Her Majesty is queen of Australia and can only be removed by a referendum passed by a majority of voters in a majority of states.
Since the conservative side of Australian politics has traditionally regarded the monarchy as sacrosanct - backed by rural voters, the over-50s and returned servicemen - the Labor Party couldn't resist baiting the new Liberal leader. Would Mr Turnbull join bipartisan discussions about achieving a republic, wondered Prime Minister Kevin Rudd.