Peter Goers: Whose face should grace Australia’s $5 note – Steve Irwin, Eddie Mabo, Lowitja O’Donoghue

Many Australians have spent more time in Bali than King Charles has in Australia, yet he will be on all our coins – at vast expense. But our $5 note is a different story, writes Peter Goers.

Dame Edna said that the Queen had a wonderful sense of humour but you can’t tell from the coins.

Bob Dylan coined the phrase The Times They Are A-Changin’ and so are the coins. A quiet republicanism is on the money. Good.

A recent, comprehensive poll indicates that a clear majority of Australians don’t want our foreign head of state, King Charles III on our $5 note. Happily, the Federal Government is not committed to having Charles thereon.

Failed Taswegian senator Eric Abetz who virulently opposed same-sex marriage, is now the chairman of the Australian Monarchist League, and he’s not a happy chappie. He calls moves to replace his beloved new monarch with an eminent Australian on the $5 note, “a cynical move by an elitist cohort who seek to impose an unpopular republic by stealth”.

Bring on the stealth.

Surely royalty is the ultimate “elitist cohort”? What else is it? Eric Abetz would be awash with admiration for that worshipper of British royalty, the former Lord of the Cinque Ports (whatever they are?), the sainted Robert Menzies who, at the time of decimal currency, campaigned to call our currency “royals”. He lost, giving us dollars, and that loss was also republicanism by stealth and popular opinion.

Australian coins are set to be updated to feature the portrait of King Charles.

Good King Charles will be on all our coins – at vast expense. There is no law which requires the monarch to be on the money. It’s an ancient tradition, just like slavery, public hangings, and the tradition that royal persons can cure scrofula. Australia is unusual in numismatics that a non-Australian is featured on our currency. It’s an imperial remnant.

Like his predecessors, glorious or moronic, popular or reviled, Charles will be on our currency only by accident of birth. Let’s replace him with an eminent, nation-building Australian. Let’s be honest, what has Charles ever done for Australia? He’s visited here occasionally in 73 years. Many Australians have spent more time in Bali than Charles has in Australia, and no Australian can be the Indonesian sovereign. He promoted the most elite school in Australia, Geelong Grammar, and he came twice to show off his various brides. Like all royalty he only comes here at the expense of the taxpayers.

Any volunteer in Australia has done more for our country than this king.

Australia has given the world many gifts not the least of which are the wine cask and plastic money. Many great Australians are celebrated on our celebrated polypropylene moolah. They include Nellie Melba, John Monash, Aboriginal inventor and writer David Unaipon, Edith Cowan, John Flynn, “Banjo” Paterson, radical socialist and poet Mary Gilmore and convict turned philanthropist Mary Reibey. Sadly, the highly notable Caroline Chisholm and Lawson and Mawson were bumped from our notes but could return on the fiver.

The British Royal Mint has unveiled the official coin effigy of King Charles III, designed by Martin Jennings. The first coins to bear The King’s portrait are a special £5 Crown and 50 pence commemorating the life and legacy of Her Late Majesty Queen Elizabeth II.

There’s a campaign to have Steve Irwin replace the monarch on the five buck note. Crikey! He’d be better but not ideal. Aboriginal activist Vincent Lingiari and the immortal and nation- building photo of Gough Whitlam pouring sand through Lingiari’s hand would be inspiring on the fiver. Evonne Goolagong Cawley, Eddie Mabo, Douglas Nichols all changed our nation as did Doris Taylor the woman with a disability who founded Meals On Wheels which feeds the nation. All great choices, but my pick is a woman who steadfastly advanced the rights of not only Aboriginal people but all people, the great Lowitja O’Donoghue. She’s a woman truly of the people and her favourite restaurant is Barnacle Bill’s.

Let’s have more pride in our own great achievers and not automatically defer to an Anglican foreigner. This concept must be “on the money”.

Charles’ phiz will soon be on all Australian coins struck by the Royal Australian Mint. Ironically, coins have never been so devalued, rarely used and irrelevant just like the monarch whose graven image they will bear.