House debates
Tuesday, 8 February 2011
Condolences
Australian Natural Disaster Victims
5:48 pm
Kevin Rudd (Griffith, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Foreign Affairs) Share this | Hansard source
Yesterday I telephoned a little boy called Bailey Lackas. Bailey is nine years old and this year is excited about going into grade 4 at his local school. He is also excited about the three new foals that he has to care for. Their names are Jear, Charlotte and Cupcake. And Bailey, as long as I have known him, has always been excited about his extensive collection of toys, led by the unparalleled and unmatchable Ben 10. Bailey is a typical little Australian boy, except two years ago he lost his dad in the Black Saturday fires in Victoria. Life has been tough for little Bailey and many like him in the two years since then and it has been tough for his mum, Sandra, too. But there is some good news: in the next month both Sandra and Bailey are going to move into their brand-new home. Since their last house burnt down, they have been living in the converted back part of a farm shed where I visited them last year, this having been built for them by their friends and their neighbours.
So why do I mention little Bailey and his mum, Sandra, in relation to the motion before the House today? Because it reminds us all that it is not just the first few weeks after a disaster that matter—it is the months and often the years that follow. It reminds us all that ultimately we rely upon the community around us when we face life in extremis. But there is also something particularly special about the story of Bailey and his mum. Sandra told me that this winter the two of them will head north to Queensland to help in any way possible with the reconstruction effort there. I asked her why. She said she believed in ‘paying it forward’. She said she and Bailey had received so much from the community and from so many people that she did not know and will never know that she would now like to do the same for the good people of Queensland. In this small story there is so much alive about the spirit of this great country, Australia.
My community in the middle of Brisbane suffered considerably in the Queensland floods. Of course, we were not alone and many communities have suffered much worse, both in the floods and later in the cyclone in Queensland’s north. And in our community we suffered no loss of life. All our hearts go out to those in Toowoomba and those in the Lockyer Valley who lost loved ones in that wall of water that descended upon them. In my community, homes and businesses were inundated across West End, South Brisbane, East Brisbane, Norman Park and Hawthorne. But then, without a single phone call, without a single marshalling call, without ever being asked, the whole community rose immediately to support those in trouble.
One street symbolic of much of what happened in my community was Ryan Street in West End. On the night before the river broke its banks, the waters were already rising fast from the stormwater drains. Then suddenly volunteers, at 11 o’clock at night, began to appear—out of the dark, seemingly from nowhere, wading through already waist-deep water. This went on into the early morning until the job was done. The family living in the house told me that they had never met most of the folk there. One of them told me that they had migrated to Australia some 35 years ago and that he would never have seen such a mammoth community effort in the country from which he came. It brought tears to his eyes then; it brings tears to his eyes still today. And this was the story right across the city, right across the state and beyond in the various natural disasters that we have suffered these last few months. The next day, Ryan Street in West End looked like a war zone. And then an army of volunteers arrived—not just on that day, the day of the clean-up, but for days and days until the job was done.
So I thank this army of unnamed volunteers. I thank those who cleaned and those who delivered the cleaning equipment. I thank those who delivered the food and the clean water; those who bagged the sand; those who distributed the sandbags, such as in the extraordinary community effort I witnessed firsthand at the Morningside Australian Football Club; and, of course, those who then built the levees. To the Army, the SES, the police, the council workers and the electricity workers, I say: thank you for your absolute professionalism and always going above and beyond the call of duty. To the legion of local businesses who gave and gave, too numerous to name, I thank you too. Through my office alone, these local businesses gave—and we then distributed—10,000 pairs of gloves, 60 pairs of gumboots, 140 litres of industrial bleach, five high-pressure cleaners, 1,500 bottles of water, countless rounds of sandwiches—and so the list goes on. To those who offered their homes and their hearts to those who had lost so much, I also say thank you.
With the headlines gone and the emotions of those days now a little dimmer, there are those who still provide practical, day-to-day support for those trying to put their lives back together. These are often the silent heroes in the aftermath of any disaster. The uncomfortable truth is that the emotional impact on relationships can be great during a time of crisis and the time that follows, and this has been a time of great, great crisis for far too many people: family photos lost; frustrations with insurance companies and with family finances; the pressures of temporary accommodation. These are the hidden impacts of these disasters on people’s everyday lives, and they continue to need our support.
I have one final word of thanks and that is to the young people. As I said just after the floods, gen Y:
… came out in droves.
Everywhere I went, young people represented about a third of the cleanup force.
So no, they didn’t stay at home, locked in their rooms, on Facebook, with their anonymous friends across the globe.
Instead, they sprung into action. And I thank these young people in particular.
So for anyone who doubts our country’s future, for anyone who fears the rise of the so called “selfish” generation, think again. For what happened is these young people proved that you are wrong. Our country’s future is in the safest of hands for those who will come after us.
As it has been in our generation, despite the anxieties of those who passed us this baton.
The young people of Australia deserve our praise—
for what they have done voluntarily during these disasters.
Our test, as with the bushfires before this, will be to stay the course until Queensland’s reconstruction is complete and until the reconstruction task right across the country is complete where Mother Nature’s fury has been unleashed. For Queenslanders this is a testing time, but we will not be found wanting—in part because Queenslanders are a determined lot and in part because Queenslanders are confident of the support of the great Australian family.
The Prime Minister spoke eloquently on behalf of the nation today. Many other members whose communities have been affected have spoken movingly of their local experiences. As foreign minister, I would also like to take this opportunity to inform the House that people and governments around the world have been amazed at what has happened here—amazed at the magnitude of this disaster, amazed at the magnitude of the community response and amazed at the spirit of Australia in the face of adversity. In this House I thank formally the governments and peoples of the world for their expressions of solidarity and support during this testing time. We are justifiably proud of this country and confident too for our country’s future—a future which will rest comfortably on the shoulders of Bailey Lackas and those like him in the decades to come. I commend the motion to the House.
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