Firstly, we have been told that a minimalist approach to constitutional change would open the way for a president to assume dictatorial powers. It was coined by republicans for good purpose. When we were in the wilderness we needed to explain that a republic could be established in Australia without a fundamental change to our structure of government. What impeded us then was the widespread assumption that to become a republic we would have to adopt an executive president of the American sort. Some republicans in their zeal to show how simply the change to a republic could be effected may have said that you only needed to create a president and then insert the word president for the words Governor General in the Constitution.
None say that now.
The paradox of minimalism is that in order to keep the system of government the same a good deal of the Constitution needs to be changed. The reason for this is that the Constitution vests huge powers in the Governor-General . Full executive power is given to the Governor-General together with the command of the armed forces. The Constitution provides that the Governor-General will choose ministers, but is silent on what principle shall govern the choice. Now if we created a president and left to him or her all the powers of Governor-General, and if a president chose to use them, we would have a very different system of government.