Jill Hall (Shortland, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I would like to endorse the comments that have been made by the Deputy Leader of the Opposition. She, along with most women on our side of politics, benefited from having a close relationship with Joan Kirner. She was an incredible woman. She was a woman who lived her life according to her beliefs and she achieved a lot in her political life, being elected to parliament in 1982, to cabinet in 1985, and to Premier. She was only the second female premier in Australia and the first in Victoria, and she was Premier until 1992 even though, when she became Premier, she knew it was a poisoned chalice.

What I really want to talk about is the Joan Kirner I knew, the Joan Kirner who provided support to a woman who was looking at entering politics. As the member for Sydney said, there was that phone call at the right moment when you were up to your eyeballs in campaigning and you knew that someone was there supporting you, and an organisation was there supporting you.

It was Joan Kirner who was behind EMILY's List becoming the force that it is in Australia, a force that supported progressive women and pro-choice women, and it supported women in winnable seats. That was something that was not a long tradition in the Labor Party, and it was something that Joan Kirner fought for and it was something that she actually achieved. There are now women in winnable seats, not only in the federal parliament but also in the state parliaments. Joan Kirner really is the person who helped that come about. She was a mentor; she was a role model. She was a special person who, as I said, lived her life according to her beliefs. She was a person who worked to remove the barriers that were quite artificial—barriers that were sometimes very subtle and were not noticed by everybody.

I feel privileged to have known Joan Kirner. She was such a down-to-earth person—a person who could really feel the need that you had at a particular time. I thank her for the support she gave me. She will be missed by many women on our side of politics.

See this speech in context