1973 Australian incomes referendum

The Constitution Alteration (Incomes) 1973 was a referendum proposed by the Australian Labor Party in December 1973 which sought to alter section 51 of the Australian Constitution to give the Commonwealth legislative power over incomes. The Whitlam government's most prominent reason for posing this amendment was the issue of inflation, as they argued that with government power over incomes, inflation would be better managed.

Australian Income Control referendum, 1973
8 December 1973 (1973-12-08)
Do you approve the proposed law for the alteration of the Constitution entitled "An Act to alter the Constitution so as to enable the Australian Parliament to make laws with respect to incomes"?
OutcomeNot carried
Results
Choice
 Votes  %
Yes 2,420,315 34.42%
No 4,612,085 65.58%
Valid votes 7,032,400 98.39%
Invalid or blank votes 114,967 1.61%
Total votes 7,147,367 100.00%
Registered voters/turnout 7,653,469 93.39%
Results by state
Note: The darker the shade of green, the more "yes" votes

The proposal did not pass due to a majority "no" vote from all states. This referendum was extremely unpopular and had the lowest percentage of public support when compared to any previous referendum held in Australia.

This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.