Constitution of the Commonwealth of Australia

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Article I - Founding Principles#

§ 1. Operative effect#

The principles stated in this Article, together with the Preamble, are not ornamental. They are the binding interpretive standard against which every provision of this Constitution, every law made under it, every regulation, and every act of public power shall be read and, where necessary, struck down. Where a provision admits of more than one meaning, the meaning more consistent with the Preamble and this Article shall prevail.

§ 2. Individual sovereignty and inherent rights#

The rights recognised in this Constitution are inherent in the person. The state recognises them; it does not grant them; it may not revoke them; and it may not condition their enjoyment on membership of any collective, creed, ideology, race, sex, class, or caste.

§ 3. Equality before the law#

There shall be one law for every person within the territory of Australia. No person, community, religion, ideology, tribe, order, profession, office, or association may claim exemption from the common civil law, nor may any person be subjected to any binding legal order other than the courts, tribunals, and legislatures established by or under this Constitution.

§ 4. Non-establishment of religion; freedom of conscience#

The Commonwealth, the states, and every instrumentality of government shall make no law respecting the establishment of religion, imposing any religious observance, enforcing any religious code as civil statute, or prohibiting the free exercise of religion or conscience. No religious test shall be required for any office, employment, citizenship, or civil right under the authority of Australia.

Nothing in this section diminishes the freedom of any person to hold, live by, speak from, or argue publicly from religious or philosophical conviction. This Constitution refuses only to establish; it does not silence.

§ 5. Public reasons in law#

Statutes, regulations, and the reasons given for official decisions shall be defensible in common civic language - in evidence, logic, and foreseeable effect on real persons - without enshrining the particular revelation of any faith as binding civil dogma.

§ 6. Free inquiry#

Every person may question, examine, criticise, satirise, or reject any idea, belief, or ideology, religious or secular, without legal penalty, save under the narrow exceptions expressly permitted by Article VIII, § 2.

§ 7. Ordered liberty, not licence#

The liberties guaranteed in this Constitution presuppose moral responsibility: truthful witness, proportionality, mercy toward the weak, and the duty not to use one's freedom as a cover to destroy the freedom of others. Nothing in this Constitution requires the state, the courts, or the people to treat all claims, cultures, or ideologies as equally sound; it requires only that the state answer to each with reason, evidence, and equal law.

§ 8. Interpretive rule#

Where a provision of this Constitution admits of more than one meaning, the meaning more consistent with the Preamble and §§ 1 to 7 of this Article shall prevail. Where a statute admits of more than one meaning, the meaning more consistent with this Constitution shall prevail; where no such meaning is available, the statute is void under Article V, § 5.

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Article II - The People, Citizenship, and Sovereignty#

§ 1. Sovereignty#

Sovereignty in Australia resides in the people. All lawful authority of every branch and level of government is delegated, conditional, and revocable through the processes set out in this Constitution.

§ 2. Citizenship#

Citizenship of Australia is held equally by every person to whom it is conferred. It may not be graded, tiered, or qualified on the basis of ancestry, race, religion, sex, political opinion, or length of citizenship.

§ 3. Acquisition and loss#

The Parliament shall by law provide for the acquisition of citizenship by birth, descent, and naturalisation, and for its loss on grounds that are narrow, specific, and subject to judicial review. No person may be rendered stateless by act of the Commonwealth.

§ 4. Oath to the Constitution#

Every person assuming federal, state, judicial, military, or senior administrative office shall affirm loyalty to this Constitution and to the equal dignity, ordered liberty, and one civil law it protects. Advocacy for the replacement of this constitutional order with a theocratic, totalitarian, supremacist, or parallel-legal regime is incompatible with office and is a ground for removal under Article X.

§ 5. No hereditary office#

No office of the Commonwealth or of any state carries any hereditary privilege or entitlement. No title of nobility shall be conferred by Australia.

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Article III - Legislative Power#

§ 1. Vesting#

All legislative power of the Commonwealth is vested in a Parliament consisting of a House of Representatives and a Senate. No legislative power may be exercised by any other body except as delegated under Article VII.

§ 2. House of Representatives#

• (a) The House shall be composed of members elected from single-member electorates by preferential voting. The boundaries of those electorates shall be determined by the independent Electoral Commission under Article XI, § 10.
• (b) Members shall be elected for a term of three years.
• (c) The House shall originate all bills for the raising or appropriation of public revenue; the Senate may not originate, but may amend or reject, such bills.

§ 3. Senate#

• (a) The Senate shall be composed of twelve senators from each state, together with four senators from each self-governing territory. The number of senators allocated to a state or self-governing territory may not be altered except by amendment under Article XII.
• (b) Senators shall be elected for staggered terms of six years by proportional representation within each state and each self-governing territory, such that at each election one half of the senators from each state and territory retire.
• (c) The Senate shall confirm, by majority vote, the appointment of:
  • (i) Justices of the Supreme Court and of any inferior federal court created under Article V;
  • (ii) the head of each executive department;
  • (iii) the head of each statutory authority, commission, or independent agency;
  • (iv) ambassadors and the chiefs of the armed services;
  • (v) the Commissioner and senior officers of the anti-corruption body established under Article XI.
• (d) The Senate shall ratify treaties by a two-thirds vote; unratified treaties create no domestic legal obligation.

§ 4. Exclusion of the executive#

No person holding office in the executive branch may at the same time hold a seat in either House of the Parliament. A member of either House who accepts executive office thereby vacates the legislative seat.

§ 5. Sessions, privilege, and rules#

Each House shall determine its own rules, keep a public journal of its proceedings, and publish each recorded vote. Members shall enjoy parliamentary privilege for words spoken and votes given within the House.

§ 6. Passage of legislation#

• (a) No bill shall become law except by passage through both Houses in identical text.
• (b) Every bill shall be published in draft form for public comment for a period of not less than 30 days before formal introduction. Before its final passage, every bill shall be accompanied by an independent statement of compatibility with this Constitution (including the Preamble and Article I), prepared by parliamentary counsel structurally independent of the sponsoring minister or agency.
• (c) The compatibility statement and all public comments shall be tabled and considered; no bill may proceed to final passage in an emergency exception unless certified by two-thirds vote of each House as a genuine, immediate threat under Article IV, § 7.

§ 7. Presidential action on bills#

A bill passed by both Houses shall be presented to the President, who may within 14 days either sign it into law or return it with written objections. A returned bill becomes law if passed again by a two-thirds vote of the members of each House. If the President neither signs nor returns the bill within 14 days while Parliament is sitting, the bill becomes law.

§ 8. Non-delegation#

The Parliament may not delegate its core legislative authority. Delegated legislation is permitted only within the limits of Article VII.

§ 9. Impeachment#

The House shall have the sole power to impeach officers of the Commonwealth for breach of oath, corruption, or high crimes; the Senate shall have the sole power to try impeachments, with conviction requiring a two-thirds vote. Conviction removes the officer from office and disqualifies them from future federal office; criminal liability, if any, is a separate matter for the courts.

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Article IV - Executive Power#

§ 1. Vesting#

The executive power of the Commonwealth is vested in a President of the Commonwealth of Australia.

§ 2. Election and term#

• (a) The President shall be elected by the people of Australia through a preferential ballot conducted simultaneously in every state and territory. A candidate is elected President upon the first ballot if the candidate secures both:
  • (i) an absolute majority of preferences cast nationally after full distribution; and
  • (ii) a majority of preferences cast in at least four of the six states after full distribution.
• (b) If no candidate satisfies § 2(a), a second ballot shall be held on a date fixed by law, not later than 30 days after the first. The two candidates receiving the highest count of first preferences at the first ballot shall stand, and the candidate receiving an absolute majority of votes at the second ballot is elected President.
• (c) The President shall serve a term of four years and may be elected for no more than two terms in total.
• (d) The President must be a citizen of Australia of not less than ten years' standing and at least 35 years of age.

§ 3. Cabinet and departments#

• (a) The President shall nominate, and with the advice and consent of the Senate appoint, the heads of executive departments, who together constitute the Cabinet.
• (b) The President shall have authority to direct, reorganise, and if necessary dismiss the head of any executive department, statutory authority, commission, or independent agency, subject to Senate confirmation of replacements.
• (c) No Cabinet member or head of an agency may hold a seat in either House.

§ 4. Faithful execution; limits on executive orders#

• (a) The President shall take care that the laws are faithfully executed.
• (b) The President may issue executive orders only within authority expressly granted by this Constitution or by statute. An executive order may not create or repeal criminal offences, impose new duties or liabilities on private persons, raise or appropriate revenue, or abridge any right recognised in Article VIII.

§ 5. Command of the armed forces#

The President is Commander-in-Chief of the armed forces. The armed forces shall remain at all times under civilian control. Domestic deployment of the armed forces against Australian citizens is prohibited except in circumstances, and for the duration, expressly authorised by both Houses of Parliament.

§ 6. Foreign affairs#

The President conducts the foreign relations of the Commonwealth and negotiates treaties. No treaty creates domestic legal obligations except upon ratification by a two-thirds vote of the Senate under Article III, § 3(d).

§ 7. Emergency powers#

• (a) A state of emergency may be proclaimed by the President only upon a specified, identifiable, and serious threat.
• (b) A proclamation of emergency lapses automatically at the end of 30 days unless both Houses, by a two-thirds vote of each House, extend it; no extension shall exceed 60 days and no more than one extension may be granted, after which any further extension requires a three-quarters vote of each House. No renewal may suspend core provisions.
• (c) No exercise of emergency power shall suspend, abridge, or excuse breach of Article I (Founding Principles), Article V §§4–5, Article VII §§1, 2 and 6, Article VIII (Bill of Rights), Article IX (One Law for All), Article X §7, Article XII, or this Article's limits on executive order.
• (d) Every emergency measure shall be immediately subject to judicial review; personal liability of officers for overreach is not defeated by the declaration of emergency.

§ 8. Pardon#

The President may grant pardons and reprieves for offences against the laws of the Commonwealth, except in cases of impeachment. Every pardon shall be recorded publicly with written reasons.

§ 9. Succession#

Parliament shall by law provide for succession to the presidency in the event of death, resignation, incapacity, or removal.

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Article V - Judicial Power#

§ 1. Vesting#

The judicial power of the Commonwealth is vested in a Supreme Court of Australia, consisting of nine Justices, and in such inferior federal courts as the Parliament may from time to time establish. The number of Justices of the Supreme Court may not be altered except by amendment under Article XII.

§ 2. Appointment and tenure#

• (a) Justices of the Supreme Court and judges of the inferior federal courts shall be nominated by the President and appointed on the advice and consent of the Senate.
• (b) Justices of the Supreme Court and judges of the inferior federal courts shall be appointed for a single non-renewable term of fifteen years, or until attaining the age of seventy-five, whichever occurs first. Appointments to the Supreme Court shall be staggered such that, so far as practicable, no more than one vacancy arises in any calendar year through ordinary expiry of term. Where a vacancy arises before the ordinary expiry of a term, the replacement Justice shall serve only the unexpired remainder.
• (c) Judges may be removed from office during their term only on address of both Houses for proved misbehaviour, incapacity, or breach of the oath of office. A judge who completes a term under this section is entitled to a pension for life at a rate not less than the judicial salary at the date of retirement, indexed.
• (d) No former Justice of the Supreme Court may, during the ten years following the end of their term, appear as counsel before any federal court, hold office in the executive branch, or accept paid engagement from any entity that was a party before the Court during their tenure.
• (e) Judicial remuneration shall not be reduced during a judge's continuance in office.

§ 3. Jurisdiction#

The Supreme Court has jurisdiction in all cases arising under this Constitution, the laws of the Commonwealth, treaties ratified under Article III, matters between a state and the Commonwealth or between states, and such original or appellate jurisdiction as Parliament may confer consistent with this Constitution.

§ 4. Judicial review#

The courts have express power to determine the constitutionality of any law, regulation, executive order, or act of a public authority, federal, state, or local. In the exercise of that power, the courts shall apply the interpretive rule in Article I, § 8.

§ 5. Void ab initio#

Any law or act of a public authority that is incompatible with this Constitution is void from the beginning. Nothing done under such a law or act confers vested rights against the persons whose rights it violated.

§ 6. Standing#

Any citizen of Australia has standing to seek judicial review of a law or administrative action that contravenes this Constitution, whether or not the citizen can show particularised injury, provided the question presented is concrete and justiciable. The courts may adopt reasonable case-management rules to prevent abuse of this standing.

§ 7. Publication of reasons#

Every final judgment of a court exercising federal judicial power shall be accompanied by published written reasons.

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Article VI - Federalism and Subsidiarity#

§ 1. Enumerated federal power#

The Commonwealth has only those powers expressly granted by this Constitution, together with those powers reasonably incidental to their execution.

§ 2. Residual state power#

All powers not granted to the Commonwealth, and not prohibited by this Constitution to the states, are reserved to the states or to the people.

§ 3. Principle of subsidiarity#

Public functions belong primarily to the family and civil associations, and government shall intervene only when these primary spheres cannot cope. Where government action is necessary, it shall, so far as practicable, be exercised at the lowest level competent to perform it. Where a function can be performed effectively by local or state government, the Commonwealth may not supplant or absorb it without express constitutional authority.

§ 4. State constitutions#

Each state shall have its own constitution, which shall conform to this Constitution and in particular to Article VIII (Bill of Rights). State constitutional provisions inconsistent with this Constitution are void under Article V, § 5.

§ 5. Local government#

• (a) Local government is recognised as a distinct and necessary tier of government.
• (b) No local government authority may be abolished, amalgamated, suspended, or its powers transferred elsewhere except by a law that is specific to the affected community and ratified, in a poll held for the purpose, by a majority of that community's electors enrolled. A law having the substantial effect of any of the foregoing, however characterised, falls within this section.
• (c) Each local government authority has autonomy within its sphere - including planning, roads, waste, parks, and such other matters as state law may confer - subject to this Constitution.

§ 6. Horizontal equality of the states#

No law of the Commonwealth may prefer one state over another except where this Constitution expressly so permits.

§ 7. Fiscal fairness#

Inter-governmental fiscal arrangements shall be transparent, public, and rule-based; tied grants may not be used to coerce states into exercising powers reserved to them in ways they would not otherwise choose.

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Article VII - Rule of Law, Delegated Legislation, and the Administrative State#

§ 1. Constitutional supremacy#

This Constitution is the supreme law of Australia. Parliament, the executive, the judiciary, every state, every territory, every local government, and every statutory body are bound by it. Any law, regulation, by-law, decision, or instruction inconsistent with this Constitution is void under Article V, § 5.

§ 2. Non-delegation#

Parliament may authorise the making of delegated legislation only for the elaboration of technical detail within tight, specific, and readily intelligible statutory bounds. No delegated instrument may:

• (a) create an offence punishable by imprisonment, or any penalty exceeding a limit fixed by Parliament;
• (b) abridge any right recognised in Article VIII;
• (c) levy a tax, charge, or fee except within a rate and base fixed by primary legislation; or
• (d) authorise the exercise of coercive power against the person or property of any individual beyond that expressly contemplated by the enabling Act.

§ 3. Sunset of delegated legislation and regulatory budget#

Every delegated instrument shall lapse automatically five years after its commencement unless re-made under the ordinary statutory procedure. This requirement may not be waived.

Parliament shall maintain a regulatory budget under which any new delegated instrument imposing compliance costs must be offset by the repeal or simplification of existing instruments of equal or greater cost (one-in, two-out rule), ensuring the overall stock of delegated law trends downward and prevents unchecked growth of the administrative state.

Parliament shall by law prescribe the methodology for measuring compliance cost under this section, and shall cause the prevailing regulatory cost baseline to be published annually. Until such methodology is prescribed and a baseline published, no new delegated instrument imposing compliance costs may be made.

§ 4. Agency reauthorisation#

Every statutory authority, commission, and independent agency shall be subject to express parliamentary reauthorisation on a rolling schedule set by Parliament and not longer than ten years. An agency whose authorisation lapses loses its legal powers and funding until Parliament acts.

§ 5. Narrow and defined mandates#

An agency may exercise only the powers expressly granted by its enabling Act. No expansion of mandate may be effected by internal reinterpretation, guidance, policy statement, or practice; any expansion requires primary legislation.

§ 6. No autonomous authority#

No institution of government, whether constituted by legislation, convention, or practice, may claim authority that is independent of, or co-equal with, the elected branches of government from which that authority derives. Administrative power is always delegated, always conditional, and always revocable by the people's representatives.

§ 7. Transparency of administration#

• (a) Every significant decision, policy guidance, and inter-agency directive shall be documented with reasons and made available to Parliament and the public, subject only to narrow, statutorily defined exceptions for genuine national security, personal privacy, or criminal investigation.
• (b) The classification of information to avoid public or parliamentary scrutiny on political, reputational, or institutional grounds is prohibited.

§ 8. Rights-compatibility statements#

Every bill and every delegated instrument shall be accompanied, at the time of its publication, by an independent statement of compatibility with Article VIII. The statement shall be prepared by a body structurally independent of the sponsoring minister or agency.

§ 9. Personal liability for overreach#

Officials who exercise public power knowingly or recklessly beyond their lawful authority are personally liable to persons harmed, and the defence of superior orders is not available. Parliament shall provide for this liability by legislation, subject to judicial review.

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Article VIII - Bill of Rights#

§ 1. Binding force#

This Article binds the Commonwealth, the states, every territory, every local government, and every statutory body. It binds them in the exercise of legislative, executive, and administrative power alike.

§ 2. Freedom of speech, press, assembly, and petition#

• (a) Every person has the right to speak, write, publish, broadcast, and otherwise express ideas, including ideas that are unpopular, offensive, or sharply critical of government, religion, or ideology.
• (b) The freedom of the press shall not be abridged. No licence shall be required to publish.
• (c) Every person has the right peaceably to assemble, to associate, and to petition government for redress of grievance.
• (d) The only permitted restrictions on speech are narrowly tailored rules against: direct incitement of imminent lawless violence; true threats of violence directed at an identifiable person; knowing fraud; perjury and contempt of court; defamation, subject to strong protection for opinion, satire, and good-faith reporting on matters of public interest.
• (e) No law shall penalise speech because it offends, insults, humiliates, or intimidates, nor shall such standards be used to impose administrative sanction.

§ 3. Freedom of religion, conscience, and association#

• (a) The Commonwealth and the states shall make no law respecting the establishment of religion or prohibiting its free exercise.
• (b) Every person may live according to the dictates of conscience.
• (c) No religious institution or voluntary association may be compelled to act contrary to its sincerely held beliefs in its worship, membership, or internal governance.
• (d) No person may be required to participate in any religious activity or observance.
• (e) This section does not extend to the establishment of parallel legal systems or the imposition of religious law on other persons; that boundary is the subject of Article IX.

§ 4. Due process and fair trial#

• (a) No person shall be deprived of life, liberty, or property except by due process of law.
• (b) Every accused is presumed innocent until proven guilty beyond reasonable doubt in a fair and public trial.
• (c) Every accused has the right to remain silent, with no adverse inference drawn from the exercise of that right.
• (d) Every accused has the right to competent legal counsel, funded publicly where the accused cannot afford counsel.
• (e) Every person charged with a serious offence has the right to trial by jury.
• (f) No person shall be tried twice for the same offence after acquittal or conviction, except on fresh and compelling evidence as Parliament may specify by primary legislation consistent with this section.
• (g) No reverse-onus provision may be enacted except upon a compelling justification sufficient to survive strict judicial scrutiny.
• (h) Every person has the right to a trial within a reasonable time.
• (i) Every person arrested or detained has the right to be informed without delay of the reasons for the arrest or detention and, where charged, of the offence with which they are charged. The right to legal counsel under (d) attaches from the moment of arrest or detention; no law, regulation, or order may withhold, condition, or delay access to counsel after arrest.
• (j) Every person arrested or detained shall be brought before a court within 48 hours of arrest, or as soon thereafter as the circumstances of place reasonably permit, to have the lawfulness of the detention determined. The writ of habeas corpus shall not be suspended.

§ 5. Freedom from unreasonable search and seizure; privacy#

• (a) Every person has the right to be secure against unreasonable search and seizure of their person, home, papers, data, and effects.
• (b) A warrant shall issue only on sworn particularity as to the place to be searched, the person, thing, or data to be seized, and the offence suspected.
• (c) Mass, suspicionless, or bulk surveillance of the population is prohibited.
• (d) Personal data held by government or by private entities under compulsion of law may be collected and retained only for specified lawful purposes, for no longer than necessary, and subject to judicial oversight.
• (e) Schedule 2 supplements this section in respect of digital communications, personal data, automated decisions, and related matters, and is part of this Article.

§ 6. Right to property#

• (a) Every person has the right to acquire, own, and peacefully enjoy private property. This right is fundamental to human dignity, independence, and the flourishing of the family.
• (b) Private property may not be taken for public use without prompt just compensation at fair market value, determined by an independent tribunal.
• (c) This protection extends to regulatory takings: government action that substantially destroys the economic value or reasonable use of property, however characterised, is a taking and requires compensation.
• (d) This section binds the Commonwealth, every state, every territory, and every local government.

§ 7. Right to effective self-defence#

• (a) Every law-abiding citizen has the right to effective means of self-defence, including the right to keep and bear arms consistent with public safety.
• (b) The right shall not be infringed by blanket prohibitions, confiscations, or registration schemes whose purpose or effect is to facilitate future disarmament of the law-abiding.
• (c) Narrowly tailored regulation - including background checks, training requirements, storage standards, and prohibitions on possession by violent felons or persons adjudicated dangerous - remains permitted.

§ 8. Voluntary voting#

• (a) Every citizen has the right to vote in federal, state, and local elections on an equal basis.
• (b) Voting is a right, not a duty. No citizen may be penalised for abstaining from voting.

§ 9. Equality before the law#

• (a) Every person is equal before and under the law and is entitled, without discrimination, to the equal protection and equal benefit of the law.
• (b) No law of the Commonwealth, a state, or a local government shall confer on any person or group a benefit, preference, exemption, or burden on the ground of race, ancestry, religion, sex, or political opinion, except where such a measure is genuinely remedial, time-limited, based on current individual need, and subject to strict judicial scrutiny.

§ 10. Freedom from cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment#

No person in the custody of the state shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or punishment. This section is not subject to derogation, emergency, or exception.

§ 11. Liberty of movement#

Every citizen has the right to enter, remain in, and leave Australia, and to move and reside freely within Australian territory, subject only to laws of general application consistent with this Article.

§ 12. Family and children#

• (a) The family is the natural and fundamental group unit of society and is entitled to protection by society and the state.
• (b) Parents have a prior and inherent right to direct the upbringing, education, and moral formation of their children. The state may intervene only where necessary to protect a child from abuse, neglect, or serious harm.
• (c) The state shall act, in all its dealings with a child, with regard to the child's welfare and developing capacity for conscience and reason. Children have the protections of this Article on the same footing as other persons, as age-appropriate.

§ 13. Override#

No provision of this Article, and no provision within the unamendable core identified in Article XII, § 2, may be abridged, overridden, or suspended by ordinary legislation, by declaration of Parliament, or by executive order, however phrased. The rights recognised in this Article are inherent in the person under Article I, § 2 and may be altered only by the procedure in Article XII for such provisions as that Article permits to be altered.

§ 14. Enumeration not exhaustive#

The enumeration of rights in this Article shall not be construed to deny or disparage other rights retained by the people.

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Article IX - One Law for All#

§ 1. The principle#

There shall be one law for all persons within the territory of Australia. No person, group, community, religion, ideology, tribe, or organisation may establish, operate, fund, or submit to any court, tribunal, council, or governance body that claims binding legal authority outside the judicial and legislative system established by or under this Constitution.

§ 2. Void rulings#

Any decree, ruling, or sanction issued by such a parallel body is void, creates no legal obligation, and shall not be enforced by any Australian court or officer.

§ 3. Coercion#

It shall be an offence, provided for by federal law, to coerce or materially pressure any person into submitting to a parallel body, to penalise or impose civil disability upon refusal to abandon the protection of the civil law, or to dispossess or physically harm any person on that basis. This provision does not restrict good-faith speech, opinion, or voluntary association protected under Article VIII, § 2.

§ 4. Preservation of voluntary mediation#

Nothing in this Article restricts voluntary religious counselling, pastoral guidance, or mediation that:

• (a) does not claim legal authority;
• (b) does not produce outcomes that conflict with Australian law; and
• (c) leaves every participant free to walk away without civil, social, or economic penalty.

§ 5. Protection of the vulnerable#

This Article is to be interpreted and applied with particular regard to the protection of women, children, dissenters, and apostates, who are most often subjected to informal authority they did not choose and cannot safely refuse.

§ 6. No recognition of customary or religious law as binding#

No court of the Commonwealth or of a state shall give effect to customary law or religious law as a binding source of legal obligation. Such sources may inform sentencing, family mediation, or personal arrangement only where and to the extent that the general civil law so permits, and in all cases the general civil law prevails.

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Article X - Institutional Safeguards Against Subversion#

§ 1. Oath to the Constitution#

Every elected, appointed, judicial, military, and senior administrative office-holder shall take the oath prescribed in Article II, § 4 before assuming office. Refusal to take the oath is disqualifying; breach of the oath is a ground for removal.

§ 2. Foreign funding - disclosure#

All funding received from foreign sources by political parties, candidates, religious institutions, educational institutions, think tanks, media organisations, and advocacy organisations operating in Australia shall be publicly disclosed in a register maintained by an independent authority.

§ 3. Foreign funding - prohibition#

Direct or indirect funding from foreign governments, government-linked entities, or ideological networks whose stated or demonstrated purpose is to promote doctrines incompatible with this Constitution - and in particular with Article I §§ 3–6, Article VIII, or Article IX - is prohibited. Parliament shall by law specify prohibited categories and sanctions.

§ 4. Subversion offences#

Parliament may create offences for organised, systematic action, conducted in concert and with an identifiable institutional apparatus, whose purpose is:

• (a) the establishment of parallel governance contrary to Article IX;
• (b) the replacement of the Constitution's equal civil order with any system of theocratic, totalitarian, racial, or identitarian supremacy; or
• (c) recruitment to, or material support for, the above.

Such offences shall not extend to private belief, speech in pursuit of peaceful constitutional amendment, scholarly inquiry, journalism, satire, or individual dissent.

§ 5. Civic and constitutional education#

Every person in primary and secondary education in Australia shall receive instruction in this Constitution, in individual liberty and the rule of law, in the history of liberty and of its enemies, and in the historical sources of Western constitutional order, including how Jewish and Christian moral teaching and institutional practice helped shape concepts of conscience, dignity, and limited government alongside classical and Enlightenment sources. No school, public, private, or religious, may teach that any religious or ideological code supersedes this Constitution or that obedience is owed above the law.

§ 6. Party proscription#

A political party or organisation may be proscribed only by a two-thirds vote of each House of Parliament, on a finding that the party's stated or demonstrated aim is to abolish equal dignity under one law, to establish a confessional or ideological state, or to subordinate persons to group, racial, or religious supremacy. A proscription is subject to immediate and substantive judicial review by the Supreme Court.

§ 7. Directionality#

The safeguards in this Article protect this constitutional order against capture from outside and against capture from within. They do not authorise the state to punish private belief, lawful speech, peaceful association, or good-faith advocacy for amendment under Article XII.

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Article XI - Public Integrity#

§ 1. Purpose#

Public office is a trust. The holder of public office acts for the people and not for self-interest, faction, or future employer.

§ 2. Post-office cooling-off#

No person who has held elected federal or state office, or senior appointed office within the executive, may, for a period of not less than five years after leaving office, accept paid employment, consultancy, board membership, or lobbying engagement from any entity that had substantial business before that office during their tenure. Parliament shall provide the detail and sanctions, including disgorgement of benefits received in breach.

§ 3. Foreign career restrictions#

No former holder of elected or senior appointed office may accept employment, consultancy, or reward from a foreign government or its instrumentality for a period of not less than ten years, and never without disclosure, after leaving office.

§ 4. Financial disclosure#

Every elected office-holder and senior appointed official shall file, on entering office, annually, and on leaving office, a comprehensive declaration of assets, liabilities, income, and interests, including those of immediate family where relevant to conflict of interest. Declarations are public, subject only to narrow redactions for personal safety.

§ 5. Lobbying transparency#

All lobbying of elected and appointed officials shall be recorded in a publicly searchable register, including the identity of the lobbyist, the client, the subject matter, and the date of contact. Undisclosed lobbying is an offence.

§ 6. Political finance#

• (a) All donations to political parties, candidates, and associated campaign entities shall be publicly disclosed above a threshold fixed by Parliament.
• (b) Foreign donations are prohibited.
• (c) Parliament may cap donations and campaign expenditure by primary legislation consistent with Article VIII, § 2.

§ 7. Anti-corruption commission#

• (a) There shall be a federal anti-corruption commission, established by this Constitution and entrenched against abolition except under Article XII.
• (b) The Commissioner and senior officers are nominated by the President and confirmed by the Senate, shall serve fixed non-renewable terms, and shall be removable only by address of both Houses for proved cause.
• (c) The commission has power to investigate, hold public hearings where the public interest requires, refer matters for prosecution, and report directly to Parliament.
• (d) The commission's budget shall not fall below a floor fixed by law, indexed, and not subject to reduction by the executive alone.

§ 8. Term limits#

• (a) The President is limited to two terms under Article IV, § 2(c).
• (b) Members of the House of Representatives shall serve no more than six terms, and senators no more than three terms, consecutive or otherwise. Parliament may prescribe equivalent limits for senior appointed office.

§ 9. Recall#

Parliament shall by law provide a recall mechanism by which the electors of a federal electoral division may, on petition meeting a high threshold, trigger a vote on the removal of their member before the end of the member's term.

§ 10. Electoral administration#

• (a) There shall be a federal Electoral Commission, established by this Constitution and entrenched against abolition except under Article XII.
• (b) The Commissioner and members are nominated by the President and confirmed by the Senate under Article III, § 3(c)(iii), shall serve fixed non-renewable terms, and shall be removable only by address of both Houses for proved cause.
• (c) Federal electorate boundaries under Article III, § 2(a) shall be determined, on a fixed cycle not exceeding seven years, by independent Redistribution Committees operating under the Commission. Committees shall apply numerical and geographic criteria published in advance, shall invite and consider public objections, and shall publish reasons for their determinations.
• (d) No minister, member of Parliament, political party, or other person may direct, reverse, or modify a redistribution determination. Parliament may legislate the criteria and the procedure prospectively and generally, but may not intervene in any particular redistribution.
• (e) The Commission's budget shall not fall below a floor fixed by law, indexed, and not subject to reduction by the executive alone.
• (f) This section establishes the federal floor for electoral administration; state constitutions shall provide for equivalent independent administration of state elections, including independent redistribution of state lower-house boundaries.

§ 11. Pay and pensions#

Elected office-holders may not set their own remuneration. The remuneration of elected office is fixed by an independent tribunal, takes effect only from the Parliament following the one that receives the determination, and is published with reasons.

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Article XII - Amendment and the Unamendable Core#

§ 1. Ordinary amendment#

• (a) A proposed amendment to this Constitution may be initiated by a resolution passed by an absolute majority of each House or by a constitutional convention convened under law.
• (b) An initiated amendment is submitted to a national referendum.
• (c) The amendment passes only if approved by:
  • (i) at least two-thirds of the electors voting nationally; and
  • (ii) a majority of electors voting in at least five of the six states.

§ 2. The unamendable core#

Notwithstanding § 1, and notwithstanding any referendum or parliamentary margin whatsoever, the following provisions shall not be amended, repealed, suspended, or circumvented:

• (a) The Preamble and Article I in its entirety (Founding Principles: operative effect, individual sovereignty and inherent rights, equality before the law, non-establishment of religion and freedom of conscience, public reasons in law, free inquiry, ordered liberty not licence, and the interpretive rule);
• (b) Article III, § 4 (exclusion of the executive from the legislature) and § 8 (non-delegation), and Article IV, § 4 (faithful execution and limits on executive orders) and § 5 (civilian control of the armed forces and limits on domestic deployment);
• (c) Article V, §§ 1 and 4–5 (judicial power; judicial review; void ab initio);
• (d) Article VII, §§ 1, 2, 3 and 6 (constitutional supremacy; non-delegation and regulatory budget; sunset of delegated legislation; no autonomous authority);
• (e) Article VIII in its entirety, together with Schedule 2 (Digital Rights) (Bill of Rights);
• (f) Article IX (One Law for All);
• (g) Article X, §§ 5 and 7 (civic and constitutional education; directionality of safeguards);
• (h) This Article, § 2.

§ 3. Anti-concentration rule#

No amendment otherwise valid under § 1 may have the effect of transferring to any one branch of government the core powers of another, of suspending the Bill of Rights in whole or part, of establishing a religion, or of creating a parallel or group-based legal order. Any such amendment is void under Article V, § 5 on the same footing as an ordinary law.

§ 4. Rationale preserved#

The unamendable core reflects the judgement of the constituent people that certain commitments are not offered to the passions of a future majority: the inherent equal dignity of the person, the supremacy of this Constitution and its Preamble, one law for all, the separation of powers and non-delegation, non-establishment of religion with robust conscience protections, ordered liberty presupposing moral responsibility, and an entrenched Bill of Rights are the floor beneath which no referendum, however large, may sink. These principles, drawn from the moral realist framing of Foundational Values, reject relativism and provide the fixed interpretive standard for the entire constitutional order.

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Article XIII - Commencement and Transitional Provisions#

§ 1. Commencement#

This Constitution commences on a date fixed by proclamation following its ratification by national referendum in accordance with the procedure in Schedule 1. From that date it is the supreme law of Australia.

§ 2. Repeal of the 1900 Act#

On commencement, the Commonwealth of Australia Constitution Act 1900 (Imp.), the Australia Act 1986 (Cth) and (UK) to the extent of any inconsistency, and the Statute of Westminster Adoption Act 1942 (Cth) to the extent of any inconsistency, are repealed.

§ 3. Savings of statutes#

• (a) Laws of the Commonwealth, of the states, and of the territories in force immediately before commencement continue in force so far as they are consistent with this Constitution.
• (b) Laws inconsistent with this Constitution are void under Article V, § 5 from the date of commencement.
• (c) To prevent undue dislocation, the Supreme Court may, on the application of the Commonwealth or a state, stay the operation of § 3(b) as it applies to an identified statute for a period not exceeding 24 months to allow Parliament to enact compliant replacement legislation. A stay shall not protect the continued operation of any provision that breaches Article VIII, IX, or X, § 7.

§ 4. State constitutions#

Within three years of commencement, each state shall amend its constitution as necessary to conform to this Constitution, and in particular to Article VIII. A state constitutional provision that remains inconsistent at the expiry of that period is void under Article V, § 5.

§ 5. Existing offices and proceedings#

• (a) Persons holding office immediately before commencement continue in office, subject to the oath in Article II, § 4, until their terms expire or they are replaced under this Constitution.
• (b) Proceedings pending before courts at commencement continue under the rules of those courts, with any constitutional question arising to be resolved under this Constitution.

§ 6. Transitional judicial arrangements#

The justices of the High Court of Australia in office immediately before commencement shall, upon taking the oath in Article II, § 4, become Justices of the Supreme Court established by Article V. Their initial terms shall be allocated by lot to staggered expiries at intervals of approximately two years, so that steady-state rotation under Article V, § 2(b) commences thereafter. Any such Justice whose allotted expiry would fall after their seventy-fifth birthday shall retire on that birthday.

§ 7. Transitional administrative arrangements#

Statutory authorities, commissions, and independent agencies in existence at commencement shall be deemed reauthorised for a period of three years, within which Parliament shall either re-authorise each under Article VII, § 4 with a narrow and defined mandate, or permit authorisation to lapse.

§ 8. Good-faith implementation#

All officers of the Commonwealth, of the states, of the territories, and of local government shall act in good faith to give effect to this Constitution and to bring the laws, practices, and institutions of their jurisdictions into conformity with it.

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Schedule 1 - Ratification Procedure#

[To be settled by the convention or Parliament initiating the transition. The policy material specifies ratification by national referendum of a plainly drafted text, with the question put to the people after adequate public deliberation.]

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Schedule 2 - Digital Rights#

This Schedule forms part of Article VIII and binds every person and authority bound by that Article. The rights recognised here are inherent in the person and follow from Article VIII's protections of speech, conscience, privacy, and equal protection, as applied to the conditions of digital life.

§ 1. Reason-giving and human review of automated decisions#

• (a) No decision by a government body, or by a private entity acting under compulsion of law, that materially affects the rights, liberties, entitlements, or legal status of a person may be made by an automated system without the right of the affected person to prompt human review by a person authorised to alter the decision.
• (b) On request, every such decision shall be accompanied by reasons in plain language sufficient to understand the grounds of the decision, including the principal factors and weights determining the outcome.
• (c) An automated system producing such decisions may not use any factor that it would be unlawful for a human decision-maker to use under this Constitution.

§ 2. Integrity of private communications#

• (a) Every person has the right to communicate privately using cryptographic means.
• (b) No law may require the provider of a communications service to weaken, bypass, or create means of access to end-to-end encryption, nor may any law require the scanning of the contents of private communications on a user's device or at rest.
• (c) Lawful access to the contents of communications requires a warrant under Article VIII, § 5 and may only be directed at the parties to specific, identified communications, not at the population or any class of it.

§ 3. Data portability and deletion#

• (a) Every person has the right, in a form that is machine-readable and interoperable, to obtain from any entity holding personal data about them a copy of that data.
• (b) Every person has the right, subject only to specific lawful record-retention obligations, to require the deletion of personal data held about them where the original purpose has been fulfilled or the consent on which the data was held has been withdrawn.

§ 4. No coerced silencing by state-private coordination#

• (a) No officer or instrumentality of the Commonwealth, a state, a territory, or any level of government shall directly or indirectly procure, demand, pressure, or induce a private platform, publisher, or communications provider to suppress, moderate, or deprioritise lawful speech.
• (b) Informal requests, advisory communications, coordinated working groups, and the implicit or explicit threat of regulatory or contractual consequence all fall within this prohibition where they have the effect of suppressing lawful speech.
• (c) The protections of Article VIII, § 2 apply with full force against coordinated state-private action as they do against state action alone.

§ 5. Limits on digital identity#

• (a) No person may be required to adopt a unified digital identity as a condition of access to rights, services, entitlements, or participation in public life.
• (b) Where a digital identity is established for any purpose, no information held under that identity may be shared, linked, or combined with information held under any other identity or purpose without the express, specific, and revocable consent of the person concerned, save under warrant under Article VIII, § 5.
• (c) The Commonwealth, each state, each territory, and every local government shall provide at least one non-digital method of access to every public service and entitlement.

§ 6. Cash and offline participation#

• (a) Lawful currency issued under the authority of the Commonwealth shall remain legal tender for all transactions; no law may compel any person or merchant to accept only digital or electronic forms of payment in the ordinary course.
• (b) No right recognised in this Constitution, no public entitlement, and no access to public service may be conditioned on a person's participation in any digital or electronic system.

§ 7. Interpretation#

• (a) This Schedule shall be interpreted in harmony with the rest of Article VIII and with Article I's interpretive rule.
• (b) Technological neutrality: the rights in this Schedule apply to present and future technologies performing the same functions, however described.
• (c) The enumeration of rights in this Schedule does not limit the rights retained by the people under Article VIII, § 14.

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Closing note#

This revision resolves the design choices that earlier drafts had flagged as open - the mode of presidential election, judicial tenure, any notwithstanding or override clause, Senate composition for states and territories, the local-government override threshold, citizen-standing case management, the regulatory-budget methodology, independent electoral administration and redistribution, and the treatment of digital rights - by writing settled answers into the relevant Articles and adding Schedule 2 (Digital Rights) to the unamendable core.

This draft, aligned with the moral realist framing, ordered liberty, one-law supremacy, and structural safeguards drawn from Foundational Values, Government Structure, Individual Rights, and Rule of Law, is offered as a strengthened starting point for public argument, convention, and referendum. Every clause remains open to amendment, clarification, and improvement by the people whose Constitution it is to become.