Warren Snowdon (Lingiari, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for External Territories) Share this | Hansard source

It gives me great pleasure to participate in this condolence motion for the Rt. Hon. Malcolm Fraser. He was one of the old regime. We do not have them anymore, thank goodness—not the old regime, but the old practice. I come at this discussion around Mr Fraser's life from the perspective of someone who first met him in 1971 or 1972, I cannot be precise, when I was driving cabs here in Canberra. I picked him up one day at the back of Parliament House and dropped him off somewhere. I am not sure who he was with or why he was going there or any of that sort of stuff, but that was my first interaction with him. Then, of course, I was to observe his role in the nefarious dismissal and he became a bete noire for people like me and those of the left and those in the progressive side of politics for all of his then political life.

But it is not about that that I want to talk. I really want to talk about his life after politics and reflect principally on his role with Care Australia. I did have some interaction with him in later years, most recently at the 100th birthday celebration for Simon Crean's mum, Mrs Crean, in their home in Melbourne. He and Mrs Fraser were present and it was very clear that not only were they well received and well respected by those who were there, but they were treated with the sort of respect you would expect for someone who has led quite a significant public life and done a great deal for this country.

Prior to that I was involved with him as he was a commissioner, along with Bob Hawke, the National President of the RSL, Rear Admiral Ken Doolan (Retired), Peacekeeper Major Matina Jewell (Retired), veterans advocate Kylie Russell and cartoonist and journalist Warren Brown on the National Commission on the Commemoration of the Anzac Centenary. They were appointed by then Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, on 25 April 2010, and reported in 2011. Six hundred submissions were received, along with 1,500 suggestions from Australia and overseas, on how we might best commemorate the Anzac Centenary. So they were very much part of the architecture that led us to the development of the processes and commemorative events around the Anzac Centenary. I want to thank all of those people but most particularly acknowledge the roles of former prime ministers Bob Hawke and Malcolm Fraser. One of the meetings we had that I was present at was at the war cabinet room at Victoria Barracks, in Melbourne. There was a very interesting interaction between all of the members of the committee, and I have to say that it was a great opportunity for me to see first-hand the way in which Mr Fraser worked.

I do not want to dwell on whatever sins I might have seen committed during 1975, and subsequently while Mr Fraser was Prime Minister and a member of parliament. I want to talk about his post-parliamentary career, and most importantly his single-minded dedication to issues to do with human rights. We have heard others talk about his role in advancing the arguments against apartheid, and the very strong actions he took to ensure that the Australian government took when he was Prime Minister, which sent a very strong message to South Africa about the unacceptable nature of the apartheid regime. We know that. It was a very strong and personal commitment of Mr Fraser's.

He also had a belief, which I think was lifelong, that Australia should play an active role on the international stage on human rights issues. That may have stemmed from his very progressive liberal views about the rights of individuals being protected, and protected in this context in terms of their human rights. It is evidenced not only by his own actions but also by the criticisms and admonitions he received from others on human rights issues. It was evidenced by the way in which they behaved or misbehaved. But I do not think it is properly understood in this place that he played a significant role in issues to do with human rights and international aid, in the period post-1987, when he became involved with CARE Australia. He was chair of CARE Australia from 1987 until 2002, which is twice as long as the period for which he was Prime Minister. Also, he was president of CARE International between 1990 and 1995. Mr Fraser committed himself wholeheartedly to this role. I had some engagement with him whilst he was in that role, principally because a former workmate of mine, Brian Doolan—a person who worked with me while I was a member of parliament and a member of the executive in the Hawke government—who became an employee of CARE Australia and worked very closely with Mr Fraser over a number of years. He made a very strong impression upon Brian, and subsequently Brian transmitted that impression to me. It was very clear that he earned the respect, because Brian was a person of the Left. He was not someone who came from the conservative side of politics. He and Mr Fraser got on extremely well. Mr Fraser used his considerable experience, presence and skill to advance CARE's work. He was fearless in advocating for the rights and welfare of CARE employees. It was in that context that his presence, his energy and his commitment was evidence to his work for the release, in 1999, of Steve Pratt and Peter Wallace, and, later, Branko Jelen, who were employees of CARE Australia when imprisoned by the Milosevic regime in Yugoslavia. Mr Fraser was not a hands-off person in this context. He made five visits to Belgrade over the period and was very active in progressing the issues to do with the release. He very much had hands-on participation in the negotiations with the Milosevic regime. He was involved in the politics of the United Nations and its relationship to Yugoslavia, and at one point in the discussions acted as a representative in part for the Australian government.

It needs to be understood here that this was a man who had spent his time as Prime Minister and had now decided to devote his time to human rights issues and advancing the interests of others through his role in CARE Australia. He needs to be congratulated. We need to acknowledge his role and, in his passing, acknowledge that that role made a significant contribution to the role that CARE Australia plays across the world stage. He obviously became very attuned to the politics of international aid, of international aid organisations, of the role of the Department of Foreign Affairs here in Australia, of Australia's role in the world of human rights and international aid, and of the role the United Nations played.

I rang Brian the other day. He now happens to be the CEO of the Fred Hollows Foundation, and he is currently in Rwanda. I spoke to him by phone and asked, 'What should I be saying about Mr Fraser?' He gave me some insights about his relationship with him, which was a very strong relationship, but he said that one of the things I needed to refer to most strongly—and this was emphasised to me as well by Simon Crean—was the role that Mrs Fraser played and how close she was to Mr Fraser in supporting him in his work both in Australia and internationally.

Brian regaled this story from during the Yugoslav crisis. They were at the London high commission and Mr Fraser was away in the corner on the phone having a yarn, with his hand cupped over the mouthpiece, to Mrs Fraser. He yelled out across the room, 'Tamie wants to know how you are, Brian?' And Brian said, 'I'm okay, but I haven't eaten for 12 hours.' That was relayed to Mrs Fraser. It was not much later that Mrs Fraser emerged with some refreshments for Brian. She was that sort of person, and I think we need to acknowledge in Mr Fraser's passing the magnificent contribution she has made to Australian public life and to her reputation in terms of her role as a partner, wife, mother to Mr Fraser's children and grandmother to the grandchildren. But most importantly there was the support she provided for Mr Fraser.

I just want to refer to Malcolm Fraser: the political memoirs, which I commend to those who have not had the opportunity to read it. I have not read all of it myself, but chapter 21 deals with his time with CARE Australia and I have to say that it is worth a read. At the end of it, given the time and effort that he put into this exercise in working for CARE Australia and trying to work for the interests of others across the world who were far less fortunate than ourselves, it says on page 711:

'There is no doubt', Fraser says, 'that helping to found it was one of the very best things that I have done.' Fraser believes the great strength of CARE is that it is non-political and non-religious, giving help where it is needed, as and when it can. And what about the politics, the disappointments and the betrayals? He shrugs. 'Well, that's people. We are imperfect creatures.'

And we are imperfect creatures. I am sure that Mr Fraser, in acknowledging that we are imperfect creatures recognised his own imperfections.

But one of the things that he was not was stale. I know that there are those opposite who would not be too enamoured with his behaviour of latter years in walking away from the Liberal Party. But do not worry: he was on the path again. I thought I might have a copy of this today, but I have not been able to procure it. But he had been actively canvassing setting up another political party prior to his death. As recently as only a few weeks ago he had communications with some very close friends of mine who were friends of his, about the need to set up another political party in this country which might reflect the best, I suspect, of what he would have thought of as the liberal movement, as well as what came out of Labor. The people he was speaking to were otherwise Labor supporters. Indeed, they were members of the Labor Party.

This was very recent. This was not something which was old; it was not something which he did 15 years ago. This was something he was doing prior to his death. He was in his 80s. There was this active man being involved—as he had been for a long time—in prosecuting issues to do with human rights. His attitude towards people wanting to come to this country—refugees and refugee settlement—is well known. It is something which he needs to be acknowledged for, that he did not have the attitudes that were reflected in the conservative side of politics on those issues. He did not have those attitudes.

I remember when the Vietnamese came here in the seventies. Those who say that there were no boat people need to think again, because Vietnamese boat people arrived in Darwin Harbour and effectively presented themselves to the police—they landed. But he had a great role in making sure that we dealt with that huge crisis sensitively, appropriately and securely. Now we have a thriving population of Vietnamese people in this country and their families and descendants, and we can be happy that Mr Fraser had a very great role in developing the multicultural ethic that is now at the centre of what we do in this country. But, as I said, his views are not the ones which are currently reflected on the conservative side of politics.

I do want to finish by saying—as I said at the beginning of my contribution—that he was a bete noir for me during that period while he was in government, at the time of the dismissal. But subsequently, he certainly redeemed himself in my eyes because of his public role in advocating for human rights, for his role in the international community, in giving agency for change and in addressing the needs of those most in need. I think that however he is judged into the future, that his life's work is an extremely significant body of work. But to me, the most important things that he has done related to the period after he was prime minister.

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