KEY POINTS:
- Anthony Albanese has declined to answer directly when asked if Australians should swear allegiance to King Charles.
- King Charles will be crowned in London this weekend.
- A leading monarchist says Mr Albanese's comments lacked "grace or empathy".
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has refused to answer directly when asked whether Australians should swear allegiance to King Charles, just days after they were urged to "cry out" their support for the new monarch.
, leading a delegation which will include Governor-General David Hurley and a handful of prominent Australians.
The office of the Archbishop of Canterbury, Lambeth Palace, is organising the event. It has urged all Commonwealth citizens to join a Homage of the People, to ... [for] their undoubted King, defender of all".
as "out of touch" with modern Australia, but a leading monarchist has attacked Mr Albanese, a life-long republican, for lacking "grace or empathy" after he declined to encourage Australians to take part.
Pressed on whether Australians should take part, Mr Albanese simply described the coronation as an "important event" and said the Royal Family was "always welcome here".
"I would like to see the King come to Australia. I've invited the King ... One of the things that occurs, of course, when we get sworn in as members of parliament, is that you do swear allegiance to the Crown," he said on Monday.
Mr Albanese has flagged a referendum on an Australian republic in a second Labor term, though played down talk of constitutional change in the immediate aftermath of Queen Elizabeth's death last September.
Monarchists, republicans clash over oath request
Former Liberal senator Eric Abetz, campaign chair for the Australian Monarchist League, claimed Mr Albanese had been graceless ahead the UK's first coronation since 1953.
Mr Abetz argued the prime minister's comments were part of a broader strategy to undermine the monarchist movement.
"It is a matter of regret that our prime minister is unable to find it within himself to encourage our fellow Australians to swear loyalty to the King of Australia, especially on the historical occasion of the coronation," he told SBS News.
"This ham-fisted pro-republican stand, completely lacking in any sense of grace or empathy, reflects poorly on both himself as an individual and as prime minister."
King Charles will be crowned this weekend. Source: AAP, AP / Henry Nicholls
Mr Spencer stressed Mr Albanese and Mr Hurley had already been required to swear allegiance on behalf of Australians when King Charles ascended to the throne.
"So in 2023, someone has sworn an oath on my behalf. I don't even get need to get up and do my homage," he told SBS News.
"The governor-general and prime minister have already promised that I will be faithful, loyal and obedient, whatever that means, to the King ... Is this the way Australia sees itself in 2023 and going forward? We are a country that says: democracy, not monarchy. We're a country of egalitarianism."
Mr Spencer said an Australian head of state should meet three criteria: they should be Australian, should have an "unswerving loyalty" to Australia, and make focusing on Australia a full-time job.
Politicians are required to swear allegiance
Australian politicians are required to declare allegiance to the reigning monarch as they are sworn in to parliament.
Then Greens senator Lidia Thorpe - a DjabWurrung, Gunnai, Gunditjmara woman - was forced to retake the oath in August, after initially referring to "the colonising Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II".
Senator Thorpe, who has since moved to the crossbench, later insisted "sovereignty never ceded" as she shared a photo of the swearing-in, which made international headlines.
