Exit Big Liz

The Victorian Attorney General, Rob Hulls, has announced that from 1 January 2010 criminal legal proceedings in state law will be brought in the name of the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) rather than in the name of the Queen, ie the rather rich lady who is head of an established church, lives in another country and got her job (for life) by being her father's daughter.

Reference to the DPP rather than to Ms Windsor is not particularly revolutionary; she's already been removed in legal proceedings in Tasmania and Western Australia. The change - effected through the Criminal Procedure Act 2009 (Vic) - has, however, apparently caused some diehard monarchists to suffer deep distress: I had visions of them spraying the cornflakes over the doily or perhaps choking on a kipper as they read the sad sad news.

The Age (it's Christmas, after all, news is slow and devotees of the idiot box are suffering from Carbonhagen Fatigue) made a bid for attention by announcing that -

Monarchists and republicans have gone to war over the State Government's decision to dump the Queen from Victoria's legal system.

Supporters of the Queen yesterday accused Attorney-General and Acting Premier Rob Hulls of trying to transform Victoria into a republic by stealth.

But Mr Hulls, an avowed republican, hit back, saying monarchists were inventing ludicrous conspiracy theories when all he was trying to do was modernise the state's justice system.

Oh dear, diddums, as one of my feistier students is wont to say.

The A-G reasonably explains that the change reflects his Government's "commitment to modernise and simplify laws" -

Referring to the Queen is outdated. Substituting the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) for the Queen or Regina reflects the legal and political independence from the United Kingdom and its monarch that has been achieved by Australia. ... This is a further step to bring our legal system into the 21st century.

It is also consistent with the passage of the Australia Acts which terminated the power of the United Kingdom Parliament to legislate for Australia, removed the ability of the Queen to disallow or suspend federal or state laws, and abolished appeals from the High Court to the Privy Council.

The change followed removal in 2000 of the requirement for new lawyers to swear an oath of allegiance to the Queen and substitution of 'Senior Counsel' for 'Queens Counsel' (the latter perhaps being more regretted by senior members of the profession than deletion of references to Her Majesty.