Anthony Albanese explains why he ‘wouldn’t mind’ scrapping Australian states

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has made an astonishing admission he ‘wouldn’t mind’ scrapping Australia’s individual states if he were writing the constitution today, suggesting larger national and local governments could fill the gap.

Mr Albanese delighted fans during an appearance at the Woodford Folk Festival north of Brisbane this week where he took part in a wide-ranging Q&A session on Thursday.

He admitted Australians ‘might not have three tiers of government’ if he was writing the constitution today, voicing his frustration with how distant Canberra seemed with ‘most real world experiences’.

A member of the audience had told Mr Albanese state governments in NSW and Queensland had refused United Nations personnel entry to inpatient wards. 

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said he wouldn’t mind scrapping Australian states – a similar thought shared by former PM Bob Hawke years before – but conceded it was something unlikely to happen

She asked if the federal government would implement laws to intervene.

In his response, Mr Albanese said he couldn’t intervene to overturn every single decision made by levels of lower government.

He said state governments were accountable for their own actions.

‘If we were writing the constitution again today, you might not have three tiers of government,’ he said.

‘But we do and often Canberra is the most distant from people’s real world experience compared to state and local governments.’

Former Labor prime minister Bob Hawke had proposed abolishing states in a series of lectures in the late 1970s

Mr Albanese’s comments appear to follow in the same suit as Labor great Bob Hawke, who previously outlined a wish to abolish the states in a series of lectures in 1979 – three and a half years before he became Prime Minister.

Mr Hawke had described Australian states as a ‘dangerous anachronism’ that had created difficulty, with different education, health and criminal systems which ‘hurt Australians every day of every week’.

But he admitted abolishing states would be ‘almost impossible’.

Mr Albanese on Thursday said he ‘wouldn’t mind doing it either’ but conceded it was a system people had to work with.

‘I can also see you would need … some form of regional government that was a little bigger as well,’ he said.