not acting on inflation which at the time was in a more stable state. Whitlam argued the Labor Party had inherited 'stagflation' from the previous government who had instigated wage rises and created circumstances for an overvalued dollar. Whitlam offered several policies to address the issue, such as famously cutting tariffs by 25% across the board. In August 1973, Whitlam introduced legislation that established the Prices Justification Tribunal, which ultimately scrutinised price changes by large corporations. Although this provided the federal government with some general powers on pricing, the Prices Justification Tribunal was not given the power to act on decisions found from their enquiries. Opponents of the tribunal criticised its ineffectiveness, arguing that the tribunal had no real power in effecting market prices and thus curbing inflation. The ineffective nature of the tribunal was under fire with Snedden ironically calling it the Prices "Exemption" Tribunal. However, supporters of the tribunal argued that it was effective in holding back price rises. The first Prices Justification Tribunal Annual Report identified the difference between prices originally proposed to the tribunal and the prices found to be justified by the tribunal was $253 million. Additionally, the existence of the tribunal made companies more cautious about price rises, although the effect of this is unquantifiable. In a ploy to boost the effectiveness of the tribunal and silence critics, Whitlam on 22 September proposed the Prices Referendum that sought to give power to Australian Parliament to control prices as one element in an anti-inflationary strategy. Question The question appeared on the ballot paper as: Public opinion polls Numerous polls were published before the referendum by reputable polling organisations. Overwhelmingly, these public opinion polls predicted that voting intentions were to affirm the referendum. A poll published in The Age on 6 December predicted: Another poll was taken by the McNair Gallup Poll on 23 October, which was published in The Herald. It must be noted that this poll was taken early in the referendum campaign and thus may not have captured accurate public voting intentions. The poll predicted: Morgan Polls published a poll in The Bulletin in mid-November. This poll predicted: Arguments for and against Major political parties The referendum was debated primarily on party lines, with Whitlam's Labor Party proposing the "Yes" case and Snedden's Liberal Party proposing the "No" case. Whitlam's "Yes" case can be summarised into three arguments: For the government to be