For as long as Western Australia has existed, there have been efforts to break away from the Commonwealth.
Various attempts have been made through its history to release the resource-rich part of Australia from its state shackles. In November last year, 28% of residents polled in the West Australian newspaper supported a “WAxit”.
There are some, though, who aren’t waiting for official recognition. The state is overrepresented with those who are taking matters into their own hands by starting their own independent nation states or joining the sovereign citizen movement in defiance of the laws of the land.
Joel Hill is the host of the The Conditional Release Program, an Australian podcast that covers “cults, crims and con artists”, and he links this prevalence to the state’s history of attempted secessions.
“Why are they the only state that wants to secede? You don’t have a new Victralia movement…” he said via Twitter direct message.
Here are some of WA’s best known sovereign citizens and micronations.
Principality of Hutt River
Australia’s best known micronation was founded in WA’s mid-west over a dispute about the Australian government’s wheat quotas in 1970.
While never being recognised by the government, the nation issued currency, passports, stamps, even offering diplomatic postings to some citizens.
In 1977, the principality even declared war on Australia in a harebrained attempt to establish itself as a nation (despite not having an army).
In August last year, “Prince” Graeme Casley dissolved the micronation after half a century — just a few years after his father, the principality’s founding regent Prince Leonard, had passed away.
Wayne Glew and the SovCits
Former police officer Wayne Glew has become a figurehead of Australia’s sovereign citizen movement, a loose constellation of people who believe most laws do not apply to them.
Citing various parts of the Magna Carta, Glew refuses to pay rates, taxes, legal fees, or follow any law that is an imposition on him.
In 2018, the City of Greater Geraldton seized and sold Glew’s farm in spite of his efforts to stop the council by dumping a mound of dirt on the entrance to his property.
Even with his repeated failures to win in court, Glew has garnered a large online following, with more than 10,000 people following his personal Facebook account. Multiple times a week, he posts long, rambling videos about his misinterpretations of domestic and international law.
His following grew during the 2020 pandemic as anti-vaxxers and anti-maskers latched on to sovereign citizen ideology as a method to try to subvert public health restrictions.
New Westralia
In the middle of last year, a long-haired, tattooed rapper hailing from Minneapolis, Minnesota, live-streamed himself breaking down the door of a courthouse in the small town of York and declared the state government overthrown.
Wade Guerin is one of the leaders of “New Westralia”, a group that, according to its website, seeks to start its own sovereign nation that will be a “world-class destination for spiritual vitality, enlightenment, meditation, wonder and expression on the great adventure of life”.
Despite the movement’s opposition to treachery, Guerin and three other members of the group broke into the York courthouse and declared it part of New Westralia on June 5, 2020. After an hour’s negotiation, police arrested the insurgents for trespass and criminal damage.
It appears their movement is finding new members. Last week, an 18-year-old Busselton resident and sovereign citizen Phoebe Lee Bennett was convicted for speeding after she refused to answer to her name.
After the magistrate informed the young woman that she would be deemed absent if she did not answer, Bennett repeatedly said “we object” over the prosecutor and tried to read out a statement about international conventions.
“Let the record show that you will not accept evidence,” Bennett said.
The Political Party running on the succession banner in the recent state election hardly raised a vote.True WA has suffered fools and jokes offering this tripe over the years but honestly find some real news to report.
Deport the tattooed rapper hailing from Minneapolis. How is it he stays while Dutton deports dozens of others who have not tried to overthrow our governments?
Maybe he has au pairs.
A cop who thinks the law doesn’t apply to him? That’s unusual!
S my late mate, Les, used to say,”Pick up the paper and who do you read about? Criminals, cranks and idiots, not necessarily in that order”.
Watching footage of the American in York courthouse. This is what terrorism looks like. This is how it begins. We are importing QANON American terrorists. These people need to be identified & arrested & deported. What they did in the USA will happen here if we allow them to remain & keep growing in numbers. This is Morrison’s legacy. Faux christian lunacy a la Trump.
You have Qanon on the brain. There is no Qanon in Australia. There’s a few right wing looney types but no less that the left wing looney types like you.
“left wing looney types like you” says Crikey’s biggest QANON supporter. Sad little person pretending he doesnt follow QANON, & denying QANON’s DOCUMENTED presence in the Lodge.
Get help.. you clearly need it. Crikey is now the home of the last remaining QANON covidiots. This is who you sound like. i
What’s with this QANON crap ? I bet you don’t even know the defination & if you do you apply it to everying that doesn’t agree with YOUR own views !
That’s stupid .
James you are well known for your QANON style opinions. I only EVER say this to you & the other QANON person who stalks these forums.
I understand how embarrassed you both must be after Trump’s loss, & the failure of QANON to be what you thought it was. I understand why you now pretend you dont know about QANON.
I actually agree with you on one thing. Assange should not be in jail. But I feel people like you dont help his cause with your conspiracy theories. You frighten people away from his cause.