The Commonwealth bill was finally passed by the national Parliament on 19 March and assented into law on 24 March after more than three years in the making. With finesse in coordination, the Governor-General proclaimed the law to commence at “the beginning of 26 March 2015 by United Kingdom time” at which time the UK law came into effect in all 16 realms. Professor Anne Twomey from Sydney University described it as “a small blow struck for women” as female children assume the crown in birth order, not males first as it has been since 1701 (we add: also for Catholics wanting to marry the monarch and for those who require the monarch’s permission to marry whittled down now to six people ie the first six in line to the British throne).
Read Anne’s excellent article below [“Power to the princesses: Australia wraps up succession law changes” by Anne Twomey, The Conversation online 26 March 2015] in which she explains that, “This does not remove all discriminatory aspects of the rules of succession [to the British throne]. Family and religion still play a critical role. A person can only be sovereign if she or he is a Protestant in communion with the Church of England and can only ascend if she or he is descended from Sophia, Electress of Hanover.” The only hurdle remaining is the hearing of a challenge to the Canadian succession change law due to be heard in the Quebec Courts by June 2015. The Wikipedia article under the title: Perth Agreement is most informative on the history of this process since the decision was taken by all realms to make the change in November 2011.
