Queensland's Constitution

Paul Kelly, Kev Carmody, Frank Hardy, Vincent Lingiari


Former Legislative Council Chamber


Stained glass window: Queen Victoria


Inner courtyard of Queensland Parliament House

I spent yesterday at a symposium to celebrate Queensland's 150th birthday: The Queensland Constitution, its origin and evolution.

Lots of speakers, but the two most impressive to my mind were Justice James Allsop, and Pat King, J. (I need to have the documentation to hand to say precisely who they are..) All the speakers read from their papers (to be published) and did an impressive job of skipping pages to fit to the timeline.

Allsop was extremely interesting in his history of the NSW parliament and the various strands of intense feeling, and the forming different alliances, in the efforts of the colonists to rid themselves of the executive dictatorshop of the penal settlement. So I am sort of looking forward to the book.

The conference was held in the old legislative council chamber (the LC was abolished in 1922, after many years of effort), which we reached by crossing from the parliamentary annexe. Hence the paintings, improperly photographed & shown here. Somewhat surprising were the wooden verandahs round this inner courtyard. Odd for such a majestic building (at least from George & Alice Streets.) (I think we were shown the dirty linen. But probably everyone is so used to it, they don't notice it.)

I had paid to go to the dinner, but there was a gap of two hours between pre-dinner drinks and the dinner, and the end of the conference, and my courage failed me. A pity, I had planned to see the strangers dining room.

Regal Statues

Statue of Queen Victoria, Queens Square, Brisbane.

Some time ago, I saw an equestrian statue of Edward VII repeat itself somewhere along St Kilda Road, in Melbourne. My first viewing of it was just outside the Sydney Botanic Gardens. So when I spotted this example of a regal statue, I was curious to see whether she, too, had multiple manifestations. However, it seems that the patriotic people of Australia mostly commissioned (bought) new and different statues of Victoria. However, although I haven't so far found a replica in Australia, this is a later casting of an original in Portsmouth. See an EPA web page for Queens Square.