Sam Mostyn

speaker

313 appearances 1 recordings 1 series first heard Aug 2026 last heard 1 Aug

Sam Mostyn’s voice in public audio — every appearance, attributed to the second.

Trend

recordings per month · last 12 months

Recordings per month over the last 12 months — 1 in all, peaking in Aug 2026 with 1.

Appearances

newest first · ▶ plays the moment

Full Story · Governor general Sam Mostyn on the ‘growing catastrophe’ in our democracy · 1 Aug 2026 podcast

And within those four, you've just described many of my constitutional and ceremonial requirements and community is a big part of what I do increasingly so.

What I'd say about what I'm doing compared to others is I think every person who has served as Governor-General has faced into a time unique to them.

And often we are chosen for these roles by Prime Ministers who make the recommendation to the Crown about appointing us.

to represent something about where we're at as a nation.

And all of the former living governors general that I met with, and I continue to meet with many of them, to seek their guidance and counsel and advice from their times, is that you meet the moment.

And I went back and read a lot about Sir Zelman Cowan.

I was looking for governors general who had lived through times when there was a need for some kind of healing.

because of where Bondi had taken us most catastrophically last December, but where this descent into incivility and lack of understanding of basic constitutional arrangements meant I thought we were in a time requiring healing of a kind.

And so I've read a lot of Sir Zelman because he came in

relatively shortly after a constitutional crisis where those reserve powers were used by Sir John Kerr to dismiss Prime Minister Gough Whitlam.

And I've studied that as a lawyer as well over many years.

But reading Sir Zelman, he says that...

The Governor-General can't just be a functionary ribbon-cutting, I guess, artefact of something.

It's a living job.

And he says at a time when the country needs healing, the Governor-General needs to be present and needs to be able to play a really important role on behalf of all Australians to reflect the light and shade of the nation back to the nation.

and help the nation interpret itself in order to know where we're going and what we could all do as citizens.

They're beautiful words in his memoir where he talks about that at a particular time.

And I reflect on that and think about where we are.

It's quite different to some of my most recent predecessors.

General Hurley had COVID.

Showing 101–120 of 313 · page 6 of 16