Hows about a shot at the top job, mate?

Australian republicans have announced their latest bid to boost the dormant campaign to cut constitutional links with Britain: a "mate for head of state" day.

The republican movement maintains that it is absurd that the Queen should be Australia's head of state when she lives half a world away.

Instead, they say, the appointment should go to an Australian citizen and a "representative of the people" - in colloquial terms, a "mate".

The movement has declared this Sunday "A Mate for Head of State Day", and urges Australians to wear gold ribbons and come together at barbecues to discuss the sort of person they would like to see appointed president in any future republic. But the initiative was dismissed by monarchists as a "tacky" stunt.

The country rejected the idea of severing constitutional links with the UK in a 1999 referendum, but republicans say it is time to revive the debate.

"It's a populist concept which we hope will grow and grow," said organiser Anne Henderson, co-founder of the anti-monarchist Sydney Institute.

She conceded the "mate" concept was a simplification of a complex issue. "It may be trivialising the idea to an educated person in Sydney or Melbourne, but most people find the constitutional nitty gritty very hard to understand. "We're boiling it down to the basics - our head of state should be one of us."

Most republicans envisage a future president as being a former politician or an eminent public figure. In a survey last January, 46 per cent of those polled were in favour of Australia becoming a republic and 35 per cent were against, with the rest undecided.

Republicans concede that the debate has floundered in recent years, in large part because Prime Minister John Howard is an avowed monarchist. They hope to nudge the issue along in March, when the Queen is expected to open the Commonwealth Games in Melbourne.

"This is a grass roots effort to get people excited about having an Australian head of state," said Australian Republican Movement director Allison Henry.

"We are no longer a British-dominated society. It's time we stood on our own two feet. Having the Queen as head of state is an anachronism. Its getting ridiculous."

Professor David Flint, the head of Australians for a Constitutional Monarchy, said the idea was a "self-consciously ocker and tacky" stunt.

He said that while Australians are not outrageously monarchist, most were happy with the present constitutional arrangement.

"Australians are not lying awake at night worrying about who their head of state is."

Last year, Immigration Minister Amanda Vanstone made the suggestion of reviving the tradition of celebrating September 1st as Wattle Day as a way of advancing the cause of republicanism.

The proposal evoked memories of the famous Monty Python "Bruces" sketch, which lampooned Australia's national flower with the ditty: "This here's the wattle, the emblem of our land. You can stick it in a bottle, you can hold it in your hand."

Flint said: "Wattle Day sank without trace. The mate idea looks like another fiasco in the making."