Succession to the Crown Act 2015

1 Short title

This Act may be cited as the Succession to the Crown Act 2015.

2 Commencement

Each provision of this Act specified in column 1 of the table commences, or is taken to have commenced, in accordance with column 2 of the table. Any other statement in column 2 has effect according to its terms.

Note: This table relates only to the provisions of this Act as originally enacted. It will not be amended to deal with any later amendments of this Act.

Any information in column 3 of the table is not part of this Act. Information may be inserted in this column, or information in it may be edited, in any published version of this Act.

3 Object of this Act

The main object of this Act is to change the law relating to the effect of gender and marriage on royal succession, consistently with changes made to that law in the United Kingdom, so that the Sovereign of Australia is the same person as the Sovereign of the United Kingdom.

4 Relationship with Sovereign not affected

This Act is not intended to affect the relationship between the Sovereign and the Commonwealth, the States and the Territories as existing immediately before its enactment.

5 Definition of Crown

In this Act:

Crown means the Crown in all of its capacities.

6 Succession to the Crown not to depend on gender

In determining the succession to the Crown, the gender of a person born after 28 October 2011 (by United Kingdom time) does not give that person, or that person’s descendants, precedence over any other person (whenever born).

7 Removal of disqualification arising from marriage to a Roman Catholic

A person is not disqualified from succeeding to the Crown or from possessing it as a result of marrying a person of the Roman Catholic faith.

Subsection (1) applies in relation to marriages occurring before the commencement of this section if the person concerned is alive at that commencement (as well as in relation to marriages occurring after that commencement).

8 Disqualification arising from marriage

A person is disqualified from succeeding to the Crown if the person is disqualified by subsection 3(3) of the Succession to the Crown Act 2013 of the United Kingdom, as in force at the commencement of this section, from succeeding to the Crown in right of the United Kingdom.

9 Amendments and repeal relating to marriage and succession to the Crown

Each Act of England or Great Britain that is specified in Schedule 1, so far as that Act is part of the law of the Commonwealth, a State or a Territory, is amended or repealed as set out in the applicable items in Schedule 1, and any other item in Schedule 1 has effect according to its terms.

10 References to Bill of Rights and Act of Settlement

References, however expressed, in any law that forms part of the law of the Commonwealth or a Territory, to the provisions of the Bill of Rights or the Act of Settlement relating to succession to, or possession of, the Crown are to be read as including references to the provisions of this Act.

11 Union legislation affected by this Act

So far as they are part of the law of the Commonwealth, a State or a Territory, the following are subject to this Act:

(a) Article II of the Union with Scotland Act 1706 of England;

(b) Article II of the Union with England Act 1707 of Scotland;

(c) Article Second of the Union with Ireland Act 1800 of Great Britain;

(d) Article Second of the Act of Union (Ireland) 1800 of Ireland.

12 Repeal or amendment of this Act

This Act may be expressly or impliedly repealed or amended only by an Act passed at the request or with the concurrence of the Parliaments of all the States.