You’ve seen the photo – Gough Whitlam delivering his immortal line to reporters on the steps of Old Parliament House. But what led up to the moment? Photo: Museum of Australian Democracy, National Archives of Australia.
“Kerr said to him, ‘We shall all have to live with this.’”
“And then Whitlam just looked at him, and said, ‘You certainly will.’ And they never spoke again.”
You might know “Well may we say, ‘God save the Queen’, because nothing will save the governor-general” as the most famous line ever uttered in Australian political history.
But to Campbell Rhodes, head curator of the new exhibition at Canberra’s Museum of Australian Democracy (MOAD) – The Dismissal: Words That Made History – it’s the quieter exchange between prime minister Gough Whitlam and governor-general Sir John Kerr that says it all.
“By all accounts, it does appear to have been real,” Rhodes says.
Tuesday, 11 November 2025, marked exactly 50 years since Whitlam turned up at Government House expecting to discuss how to break a political deadlock – and instead was told he’d been sacked.
To mark the anniversary, MOAD has opened a major exhibition featuring never-before-seen documents from the Whitlam Institute and University of Melbourne archives, including the original letter of Dismissal itself.
But if you’ve grown up hearing about ‘The Dismissal’ without really knowing what went down, here’s what happened – and why we’re still talking about it half a century later.
The Dismissal is on exhibition at the Museum of Australian Democracy. Photo: Museum of Australian Democracy (MOAD).
So, run me through what happened.
Whitlam’s Labor government came to power in 1972 after 23 years of Liberal-Country rule. Its campaign slogan – ‘It’s Time’ – captured the national mood for change, and Whitlam moved quickly on big reforms, such as free university education and the beginnings of what has since become Medicare.
But by 1975, Labor was in trouble. It didn’t control the Senate and had lost public support due to a number of scandals, chief among which was the ‘loans affair’.
“The loans affair was essentially the government seeking to get temporary loans for large infrastructure projects of about $6 billion [about $25 billion today],” Rhodes says.
“The loans were raised internationally by all sorts of forces, but the front man for the loans was an Iraqi businessman called Tirath Khemlani.”
The loan money never arrived, and opposition leader Malcolm Fraser saw an opening.
In October 1975, he used his party’s numbers in the Senate to block the government’s Budget – effectively cutting off funding – until Whitlam agreed to call an election. It was a high-stakes tactic known as “blocking supply”.
Sir John Kerr. Photo: National Archives of Australia.
Whitlam refused, arguing that his government still held a majority in the House of Representatives and therefore had every right to govern. Fraser dug in. Neither man would budge.
As the government’s money began to run out, governor-general Sir John Kerr quietly sought advice from the chief justice of the High Court, Sir Garfield Barwick. Barwick confirmed that Kerr had the constitutional power to dismiss a prime minister who couldn’t secure supply.
On 11 November 1975, Kerr acted.
When Whitlam arrived at Government House for what he thought would be an advisory meeting about the situation, Kerr handed him a letter terminating his commission and that of his government.
“We’ve been sacked,” Whitlam reportedly told his advisers.
Within hours, Kerr had sworn Fraser in as caretaker prime minister, supply bills were passed, and Parliament was dissolved for a December election.
That afternoon, standing before an angry crowd outside Parliament House, Whitlam delivered the words that made history:
“Well may we say, ‘God save the Queen’, because nothing will save the Governor-General.”
Gough Whitlam never spoke to Sir John Kerr again after this day. Photo: Museum of Australian Democracy, National Archives of Australia.
So, why is this controversial?
Kerr had used what are known as his reserve powers – unwritten constitutional powers allowing a governor-general to appoint a prime minister in the case of an unclear election outcome, to dismiss a prime minister if they don’t have a majority in the House of Representatives, or if they break the law, and to refuse a request from a prime minister to call an election.
Some argued these powers threaten democracy when vested in one person, but others thought it was positive – breaking a deadlock and restoring stable government.
“Depending on who you ask, Kerr was either a man in a difficult position doing his duty to resolve a crisis, or someone who wanted to be at the centre of things and thought himself to be the king,” Rhodes says.
Either way, the December 1975 election ended in a landslide victory for Fraser’s Liberal-National Country Party coalition.
“By that time, the shock of the dismissal had started to wear off,” Rhodes says.
“The Coalition actually won enough seats to govern without the Nationals if it had wanted to.”
Would it happen again?
In theory, yes – but in practice, probably not.
The Constitution hasn’t changed since 1975, meaning the Senate still has the power to block supply, and the governor-general still holds reserve powers. However, Rhodes says the political and media landscape has undergone significant changes.
“The way it was done at the time was in almost total secrecy,” says Rhodes.
“Fraser didn’t tell anyone what he was doing. Even his wife didn’t really know. In the modern day, everyone’s movements are tweeted. The secrecy and clandestine stuff would not be able to happen today.”
Governor-General Sam Mostyn speaking at the Museum of Australian Democracy. Photo: MOAD.
Current Governor-General Sam Mostyn has agreed it’s “highly unlikely” too.
“One of the beauties of our constitutional arrangements and the reserve powers is that they are there … in the interest of stability,” Ms Mostyn said recently.
“I’m not going to say it would never happen, but the fact that we’re discussing it 50 years later … tells us that we will not be in this position where a governor-general will be sitting across from a sitting prime minister and effectively using the dismissal power.”
Still, Rhodes says the event’s legacy endures.
“People joined the Labor Party and got active in politics because they were furious about being thrown out, and others joined the Liberal Party to prevent Labor getting back in. This is an event that galvanised the country.”
Visit the MOAD website for more information on ‘The Dismissal: Words That Made History’ exhibition.
