How the Queen brought down a government
The royals claim to be politically impartial, casting themselves as above politics, but this isn't true. Back in the 1970s, Queen Elizabeth II helped bring down Gough Whitlam's government in Australia. And that's just the tip of the iceberg.
In this episode of Beyond the Royal Headlines, Republic CEO Graham Smith speaks to academic and biographer Jenny Hocking about her fight to uncover Elizabeth's interference in Australian politics and the prospects of republicanism down under.
There will be a chance to join the discussion and ask Graham and Jenny questions during the course of the programme.
Jenny Hocking
Emeritus Professor Jenny Hocking AM FASSA is an award-winning biographer and inaugural Distinguished Whitlam Fellow at the Whitlam Institute, Western Sydney University, and a Fellow of the Academy of Social Sciences in Australia. Her work has appeared in Meanjin, Australian Book Review, Griffith Review, Arena, Inside Story and Index on Censorship (UK).
Jenny’s books include the acclaimed two-volume biography of Gough Whitlam, winner of the Federation of Australian Writers’ Barbara Ramsden Award and short-listed for numerous awards including the National Biography Award, The Age Book of the Year, Magarey Medal for Biography, NSW Premiers Awards, Queensland Literary Awards and the Prime Minister’s Awards for Literature.
Jenny Hocking’s latest book, The Palace Letters: The Queen, the Governor-General, and the Plot to Dismiss Gough Whitlam, tells the story of her successful High Court action against the National Archives of Australia to release the secret ‘Palace letters’ between the Queen and the Governor-General, Sir John Kerr, regarding Kerr’s 1975 dismissal of labor Prime Minister Gough Whitlam.
The letters’ revelation of the role of the Queen in Kerr’s decision to dismiss the Whitlam government fundamentally recast the history of that time. Published by Scribe with a foreword by Malcolm Turnbull, The Palace Letters has been described as ‘a political thriller’, ‘riveting .. vital Australian history’ and was awarded a Special Commendation in the Henry Mayer Book Award and a Commendation in the Mander Jones Awards. The ABC-TV documentary, The Search for the Palace Letters, based on Professor Hocking’s book screened in 2024 and was short-listed in the NSW Premier’s Awards for History and the Australian Writers Guild Awards.
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